Modi Raj vis-a-vis Emergency: A Very Brief Comment

[Sukla Sen]

Indira was obsessed with being in power. 

Thus the Emergency had been imposed to scuttle the swelling waves of challenge.

(Incidentally, all visible resistance would almost overnight nearly evaporate once the Emergency was imposed.)

And the moment she perceived the ebbing of those challenges, rather inaccurately as only the subsequent developments would demonstrate, she went back to "democracy" - very much on her own, without any tangible external compulsion.

Like her obsession with power, that was also one element of her natural instincts - the yearning to be recognised as a "democratic" leader.

Even more importantly, she had no long term agenda to fundamentally refashion "India" by leveraging the state power at her command.

With Modi, things are very significantly different. 

Of course he is also obsessed about being in power. 

He - in the process, as it appears, has, inter alia, shifted the (traditional) power balance between himself/BJP and the RSS, in his own favour. 

But, the story goes well beyond that.

He is doggedly pursuing an agenda of transforming the "secular" "democratic" Indian state into a "Hindu Rashtra", which will be, regardless of other attributes, stripped of all vestiges of any substantive democracy and pluralism. 

On a permanent basis.

In this scheme, once the goal is arrived at, there is simply no return to any meaningful "democracy", even with no visible challenge. 

And, it is just not limited to Modi.

He is the legatee of an entrenched political tradition.

Hence, the juggernaut has got to be halted halfway, and reversed.

Well before it reaches the culmination.

Otherwise, it's doom.

Sukla

[G G Parikh]

How do we do is the question that needs to be addressed? There is critique but little action. He is handing overthe economy to corporates , what are we to do? He is making Hindus anti-muslim, what do we do? He is allowing humiliation  of Dalits, what do we do?

G

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[Sukla Sen]

Thank you so much for your thoughtful intervention.

To my mind, mass resistance cannot be made to order.

It has its own, somewhat, mysterious dynamics - not fully fathomable.

To illustrate, rapes and murders - heinous as they are, quite often fail to cause even a ripple let alone a splash.

Yet, an extremely brutal rape in Delhi of a young paramedical student travelling in a private bus in late evening along with his boyfriend stirred our conscience as never before.

Large protests were held in Delhi.

As a consequence, not-too-responsive - at least initially, Union Government instituted a commission and, as the outcome, relevant laws got overhauled.

Quite a success.

Of course, that was then.

Even then, it was such an exception.

The bottom line is that the regime has got to be resisted wherever, whenever and in company with whomsoever possible.

As and when the occasion arises.

And these occasions will belong to different terrains, different planes and different time slots.

No need to be overmuch bothered as regards a "Popular Front".

The specific nature of a particular resistance would determine the shape of the "front", if at all any, that'd spearhead it.

Maybe, down the line, at some point of time, a wider "front" would emmerge.

The focus, however, must be on the act of resisting, *not* on any (preconceived) "front".

The "front" will follow, and evolve, in due course - as the resistance gains momentum.

It's difficult to predict, in advance, which ones - if at all any, are going to click.

Mass resistance, as had been pointed out above, has its own mysterious dynamics.

Right now, the agitating farmers are still pretty much there, while, as of now, the "workers" have miserably failed to respond to the monstrous "four labour codes".

The job of the civil society activists would be to encourage, facilitate and intensify all (possible and actual) resistances.

At the end of the day, the regime will have to be dislodged electorally.

But, in order to make it happen, street mobilisations are absolutely necessary.

The outcome of the recent local body elections in Punjab is a graphic illustration - the Congress has swept and the BJP is pushed to the fourth position.

Apart from building up the public mood, unless the regime's wings get effectively clipped, the next poll could very well turn out to be simply a farce - just a walkover, with the use of the coercive wings of the state together with the EC itself - a much magnified version of what happened and is still happening in West Bengal.

Much would depend on the future trajectory of the pandemic.

A third wave would be highly disruptive.

For Modi, the first wave had come as a boon.

The second one - with the images of the dead burning in parking lits and bloated bodies floating in the Ganga, must have had hit him rather hard.

The disaffection and rage, however, needs be translated into mass actions - linked to a variety of issues, of which there's just no dearth.

"India" is under dismantlement - at an ever accelerating pace, before our very eyes.

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