India’s 2016 Budget Session began on the 23rd of February. Intellectuals, political and social scientists and the discerning intelligentsia found themselves vociferously debating the events that proceeded the budget session. As the beginning of the session inched closer, the air was filled with the usual expectancy and anticipation that we see year after year, with every budget and every year being dubbed as the year that India finally becomes a global superpower. While all discourse preceding the budget session usually concerns retrospective taxation and the like, what dominated the session on this occasion was how a handful of students divided a nation through its heart.
While the narrative is quite shocking in itself, it is the fallout that is most frightening. The division of our country’s population into two camps – nationalists and anti-nationalists – by the media and the regime is the latest chapter in the divisive nature of our nation. India, the poster boy of diversity, finds its internal sovereignty being threatened at the drop of a hat. For a country that constantly prides itself on equality and fraternity as prescribed by its ‘sacred’ constitution, the government (while regime is a more appropriate word) in power shows no signs of hesitating to fragment a democracy built on the principle of equality. With the men (and women, especially our esteemed, well-educated HRD Minister) in power aiding and abetting the constant onslaught on constructive criticism, and actively metastasizing manufactured propaganda, it is an ominous series of events that have characterized the supposedly ‘pluralistic’ and ‘developed’ India of the 21st Century.
We are not asking for freedom from India but asking for freedom in India. – Kanhaiya Kumar
(picture from APB News)
While bloggers, politicians and virtually anyone with access to the Internet had an opinion about the events that unfurled at the JNU, this article strives to question the need for this brand of aggressive nationalism and how detrimental it is to the prospects of a truly democratic state. Definitions, connotations and meanings of the most popular words used during this time – sedition, anti-nationalist, media, honesty – were as malleable as can be, and differed from individual to individual. This resulted in sections of the media spewing allegations, spitting hatred and screaming without reason.
Yes, not unheard of. The media tends to be voracious, explosive and often over-dramatic in their reporting. But the worrying aspect of the reporting was the irresponsibility that plagued it. Channels aired videos of the event that were doctored and morphed, based their debates and arguments upon these videos and used these videos to ruthlessly incriminate opposes of the regime. While moral absolution is considered a myth, the transmission of fake ‘evidence’ to further ones cause questions the moral fabric of the so-called objective nature of journalism. Quite bluntly put, it is downright appalling for a prominent news channel to misuse the power bestowed upon them by Article 19 of the Constitution to immorally influence millions of viewers. What makes the situation more disgusting is that after the videos were confirmed as doctored, the anchor of the channel made a five minute monologue insisting that he was a real journalist. Not an apology, not an acknowledgement, not a disclaimer. A pompous declaration that the journalist would wear his actions like a ‘badge of honor’, and would not hesitate to do the same again. An egoistic tyrant with an incredible effect on the hapless viewers who lap up his words and transform themselves into pseudo-intellectual individuals. While this grim picture in itself depicts an owned, bought media, the more frightening segment is who actually owns and buys the media.
The answer lies in plain sight – certain entities present in the media are owned by political or politically motivated organizations. This problem, however, is not endemic. The current American Presidential election trail reporting by certain revered news channels is considered to be biased towards certain candidates, for no other reason than that large chunks of campaign financing can be traced to and fro the entities. For an uncritical and intellectually dependant population such as India’s, the first hand reception of any information is detrimental in the formation of opinions. Thus, with political parties exposing the dirtiest side of democracy by segregating our population at the flip of a switch, it brings us to the latter half of this twisted political agenda – the enforcing of information.
The current regime reeks of insecurities. Like a possessive girlfriend, the sovereign demands and expects absolute attention and obedience from its citizens. This is suffocating not just for the free-thinking, liberal, politically charged parts of the population, but for the average citizen striving to live and behave in a manner of their choosing. To prohibit and outlaw subaltern, dissent, criticism or anything against the tide is counterproductive on all fronts. The authority, the victim as well as the common man are all losing parties. For the authority, it is quite simply bad publicity. Their actions alienate sections of the electorate from ever considering that party as credible candidates in the next election. The victim, for their exercise of their rights has resulted in criminal repercussions. And most importantly, the common man who usually is the beneficiary of this constructive criticism will have no access to attempts made to further his cause and improve the general standard of life for him. What the current power does, in turn, is to subject the masses to an onslaught of a brand of aggressive nationalism. This unique concoction incriminates anyone who does not conform to the ideology of the regime, much like the case was in Fascist Italy. Furthermore, it innocuously fuses its political entity with that of religion, which too is shoved down the throats of a heterogeneous, unwilling population. The government has an insatiable, incessant need to impose its beliefs on the peoples it is expected to serve.
The pro-national rhetoric that has grown quite popular, has a typical ring to it – that tax-payer’s money is being used to fund ‘terrorist activity’ in Universities, that people who question the death penalty deserve the death penalty and that people who do not fight along the front lines in Kashmir are not real patriots. None of these statements directly or sensibly justify any actions that the tyrants carried out.
The art of blackmail is one that our country has mastered, with the erection of larger than life flag poles to remind our young, proud Indians that we live in a country where the color saffron is always on top (and is always free. The color white is second in this hierarchy, showing us that peace always comes after the saffron does, and the green is so beaten and trodden upon by the white and the saffron, that it is no longer of any value to us. The first Prime Minister of our country, Pandit Jawahrlal Nehru (The JN, in JNU) once said – “Ignorance is always afraid of change.”
It is unfortunate to see a government so ignorant of what a civilized, modern society indicates and so afraid of change.
Atypical Rationale 