Cashless, jobless, spineless, nevertheless…

There is a perception of Indians as an extremely tolerant lot. Indians have, over centuries, tolerated foreign rules, atrocities, social unrests and the proverbial dog-shit which sits in front of the house. We have the reputation of being so tolerant to everything that it could seem like resignation.

It was from this very idea of tolerance that India celebrated and nurtured diversities and socio-cultural multiplicities. And sometime before the formation of the present India, around the time when the characteristics of Indian-ness were being formed, we became a country united by diversities. We began taking pride in them and learnt to respect and cherish the lack of uniformity. Then, 2014 happened! And everything was forced towards a change in the opposite direction. Religious, regional, gender-driven hates started being propagated under various garbs.

The new government, to its dubious merit, made sure that the common citizens were simultaneously subjected to immense struggle in day to day life. Demonetisation, hopeless implementation of the GST, robbing blind the poor and the corporate (not the ones on the fast-dial button of the Sarkar!) with equal zeal. These were steps taken with great temporal precision to divert the public’s attention from divisive acts for petty political gains aimed at the annihilation of everyone considered an “outsider” or a “misfit” within her/his own country.

Plus, there is the never-ending saga of the Aadhaar card. We need it? We don’t? Government bodies – not to mention private telecom companies – ask for it even though the Supreme Court has ordered against its obligatory nature. The same set of people who fiercely opposed the Aadhaar card during Congress rule are now geared to go against the Supreme Court to satisfy hunger for our data. Anyway, the question here is simple: Are we living in a banana republic where even the Supreme Court is made to feel insignificant in front of the Pradhan Sewak’s adamant will?

The ATMs are running dry in various states. There is a cash crunch. This needs to be studied better so that causes and consequences are properly understood. First, we were told on the November 8, 2016, that we must put all our money in banks. Then, the Pradhan Sewak went to Japan and made fun of the Indians crying hoarse for their own money. Then, we were told that the money in the banks was safer. Then, Nirav Modi ran away with the bank money, just as a lavish BJP office was inaugurated in the prime-most area in Delhi. This was followed by scraping of millions of jobs and hollow promises of creating 10 million jobs through skill development. The employment growth rate, as if in defiance to the Pradhan Sewak’s falsehoods, is falling steadily. And today, we are living in a world where the pink-coloured Rs 2,000 notes are in major shortage. I am sure this means that the money in the banks is safe for another Nirav Modi to run away with, or for more BJP offices to be built.

There were incidents of rapes and barbaric oppressions in the recent past. Many of these were not mere crimes of passion but politically motivated and doctored incidents. While the whole world was speaking up for the eight-year-old, the Pradhan Sewak was posting animated videos of ustra-asana. In his tweet, he wrote that if you find it too difficult, then you can start with the ardh-ustrasana. The animated video shows the Pradhan Sewak performing the movement. The sheer lack of sensitivity or, for that matter, ardh-sensitivity (because full-blown sensitivity can be difficult for someone new to it)!

Callousness and spinelessness have reached a new low but, to be honest, I am not lamenting his silence. I would be very happy that he keeps silent instead of spreading fake news and making bogus promises. Our Pradhan Sewak, however, can perform a teary-eyed speech-delivery one of these days, which would never get him an Oscar award but it might make him feel like he has finally achieved redemption. The ever-decreasing mob of his supporters might continue to support him, giving the worst example of the Indian tolerant complacency. Many – if not most – of his 2014 voters today feel betrayed beyond repair and want to ensure that the Modi mishap does not get repeated. With buzz building that the tally of expected BJP seats in 2019 elections is reaching below 145, the Pradhan Sewak might resort to desperate measures in the coming months.

In France, they have installed vending machines which dispense short stories. The move is to encourage the pubic to consume literature. With the best kind of fabricated fiction being dispensed daily from the Pradhan Sewak’s sources, India, I believe, would be quite happy if the vending machines can just dispense the required cash.

Courtesy: The Telegraph