Justifying the desecration of the Ashok Chinha.
This article first appeared on LinkedIn.
As expected, literate, degree-holding corporate people and entrepreneurs have started to put this spin (that the more aggressive, ferocious, muscular lions on the new statue atop the new Parliament House on the new Central Vista are by choice the way they are, denoting a change in the Indian nation from being graceful, benign, and composed to whatever it is that now it has become) on the defacing and desecration of our national symbol, under which (ironically) is our national motto that truth always triumphs. Apparently, this motto is missing from the new installation. Which is kind of apt too.
But that is beside the point. The point is that there are people who are not just fine with this distortion, but are also defending it in the name of ‘New India’, which is supposedly more aggressive and ready to fight. To me, that quality is less lion-like and more pomeranian-like. Aggressive, ready-to-fight, angry animals are typically small ones who need to ensure that they seem scary to other animals. Large animals like lions and elephants rarely display such behaviour. Ditto humans. There are those Indians that, at one time, were secure in their heritage, in their shared history, in their track record of peace and tolerance (or at least were round of the peaceful and tolerant parts and not the violent ones in their history), in their intellect and skills, and in their ability to deliver on the goods as an ancient but yet modern civilisation. No more. These are Indians who are forever insecure, take offence at all slights, perceived or real (mostly perceived), and have skin thinner than a paper dosa. They want to posture all the time, get into fights, and love to brag about how strong and ferocious they are (or their ancestors were). These people, as we all know, are compensating for something.
These are, by the way, the exact same people who’d abuse and assault a handicapped person or a conscientious objector who refuses to rise in a movie hall for the national anthem.
These are the exact same people who’d advocate jail time for anyone who wears anything with the Indian tricolour on it, or distorted it in any way.
These are the folks who want to have a blasphemy law in this secular modern democratic republic.
These are those that I call ‘Cognitive Dissidents’ because they have managed to compartmentalise their education, efficiency, and professional competence (which I am sure is enough for them to reach the heights they have in their chosen fields) and their logical thinking and reasoning (the abysmal lack of which shows clearly in the vomit they ejaculate on social media) in different, watertight parts of their brains.
These are the people who cannot be awoken, their consciousness cannot be raised, their rock-hard, fossilised minds cannot be changed.
These are also, unfortunately, the people who are responsible for the mess we find ourselves in today, with our economy in shambles, employment reducing to rates never seen in independent India, currency diving into worthlessness, wealth gap the largest it has ever been since perhaps the medieval times, corruption (both moral, ideological, and pecuniary) at unprecedented highs, society as (or more) divided than it was at the time of partition, and friends at the throats of friends, neighbours conspiring against neighbours, and siblings set against their own.
We promised ourselves a just, free, equal, and fraternal republic. Look what we have ended up with.
At this point, I am beginning to believe that perhaps the only way to end this would be to let this run its course and completely destroy this nation, with its rich and diverse culture, history, languages, cuisines, costumes, traditions, and stories. Like how Nazi Germany or Fascist Italy did.
The only problem with that is that in running that course, it managed to destroy the entire nation and its peoples. And wipe out at least 3 generations in one fell stroke.
It is sad, but true, that knowing where I stand with my caste, my parents’ religion, my education, my social & financial capital, my family, and my age, sexual orientation, and gender, I would be the least singed by the fire that would engulf this beautiful land and its inhabitants, from which will arise a wiser, more tolerant society, the brunt being borne by the lowest of the low in the social and economic hierarchy, the very people that this nation, through its constitution, had vowed and promised to protect and lead towards prosperity.
tl;dr: We are not a textbook Fascist state without an official declaration of the fact, and the enablers of this are exactly the kind of people that populate LinkedIn. I am ashamed I am seen as one of them.
Notes
- As an extreme free-speech advocate, you’d wonder why a simple change in a statue can cause such angst in me. The sculptors are free to distort or change, modify or differ from the original design. They too have freedom of expression, right? Yes. And wrong. For example, they are free to do whatever fancies them if they were making it for private use. For example, even if they had shown the lions doing something generally considered scandalous, say fornicating or defecating, I’d have been the first to defend their right to interpret the symbol as they wished, and people’s right to pay for and go see and appreciate it. I’d have been against any hooligan trying to stop exhibiting their art or any gallery refusing it. I’d have protested if the government refused them police protection or if the courts issued warrants of arrest. I am against blasphemy laws. And this is tantamount to that. So, what gives? The problem is that this symbol is not their private work of art but is installed using my money on a national monument to represent the nation, which means me. I am exercising my right as a citizen in a democracy to protest this by writing against it and attempting to influence others to oppose it to, so it may be corrected to the kind of representation I wish for my nation. And for myself. I am well within my rights, in and indeed in the performance of my duty, as an Indian citizen.
- As someone who keeps claiming that he is an accidental Indian (due to his birth) and has almost no affinity to the country as such, why am I bothered with this ‘desecration’? Two reasons: Firstly, this is where I live. So, it is in my interest that I try and create a society that adheres to my vision of the perfect society as much as possible. I have rights and duties. And I see me and my descendants living here, and hence wish to create an atmosphere that was promised to me (by my ancestors) in the Preamble to the Constitution. And secondly, I do not have to love the geographical boundaries of India to love the idea of India, the one which is, to repeat, articulated in the Preamble to the Constitution. I wish that India on myself and my compatriots & peers. I wish that India for my descendants. I wish that India for a better world. And if I work towards it, it should surprise no one.
Hope that cleared any vestigial doubts anyone might have had on reading this article.
