Approximately 18.2 billion light-years from Earth, there exists a hyperluminous, broad-absorption-line, radio-loud quasar located near the border of the constellations Canes Venatici and Coma Berenices. Called Ton 618, it possesses one of the most massive black holes ever found, with a mass of 66 billion solar masses. That is 66,000,000,000 times the size of our Sun.
As a quasar, Ton 618 is believed to be the active galactic nucleus at the centre of a galaxy, the engine of which is a supermassive black hole feeding on intensely hot gas and matter in an accretion disc. The light originating from the quasar is estimated to be 10.8 billion years old.
Due to the brilliance of the central quasar, the surrounding galaxy is outshined by it and hence is not visible from Earth. With an absolute magnitude of −30.7, it shines with a luminosity of 4×10^40 watts, or as brilliantly as 140 trillion times that of the Sun, making it one of the brightest objects in the known Universe.
If I were to light a candle in my house, it will release roughly 80 watts of energy. If I held it in front of the Ton 618 quasar, the energy from that candle will be out-dwarfed by it by a factor of 500,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. Indeed, it won’t be a long shot to claim that the candle may not be visible in comparison with the quasar.
Now, imagine if you will: the amount I care about what I am having for breakfast is the quasar at Ton 618. Then, the amount I care about the troubles of the unemployed youth who voted the BJP into the centre and at their state and are now rioting because they are being deprived of their livelihood is like a candle to me.
I guarantee you that if a religious riot would start today, they’d be the first out on the street looking for Muslims wanting to ‘teach them a lesson in Yogi Raj.’ If a movie-maker were to produce a film about say, Akbar or Tipu Sultan, they’d be offering money to anyone who’d cut off the said producer’s head. If a Dalit groom were to ride across their little village on the way to his own wedding, they’d unhorse him, blacken his face, and beat the shit out of everyone. If their sisters or daughters (or, dog-forbid, their mothers) were to want to go out wearing denim pants, they’d threaten them with violence. If China were to occupy Arunachal today, they’d shout till blue in their faces about 1962 and Nehru. If a woman actor or journalist were to say something like we should not pollute the planet or something equally harmless, they’d be the first to threaten rape and murder.
The only reason they are protesting and burning public property (would the UP and Bihar governments go after the perpetrators and recover the loss from them as they did during the anti-CAA protests?) is because they are hungry. For now. Show them a circus and they’ll forget about the bread. Show them a dog fight (in which they are the dogs) and they’ll not remember that they are hungry. Show them meat in a truck driven by a Muslim and they’ll be ready to kill. Show them a ‘reserved category’ family driving a car and they’ll lose their appetite. In an instant. Mark my words.
The BJP might suffer this election in UP and Bihar. I hope they do. They might even lose all their power to SP or BSP or whoever else. They might lose India in 2024. They might not come back to power for a long time. But this will not be because people saw through them. It will only be because of anti-incumbency. The ideology of hate that fuelled their rise will not go away. Not now. Not for a long time. If you believe that the loss of a state like UP (if it happens) will be attributed by the BJP high command to their hate-mongering and callousness with which they treated the citizens, you are in for a surprise. The BJP knows what drives people to vote en masse and in a frenzy: a shared hatred. The funny part is that so do the other parties. And no one is above using this knowledge to further their interests.
Remember: A change in government does not mean a change of heart at the bottom of the pyramid (or indeed at the top). It only means someone else has figured out the formula too.
