Democracy Muted

Towards the end of ninth year of his rule in India, in March 2023, Modi has chosen to mute the proceedings of the Indian Parliament, literally.  When the leader of the largest opposition party Indian National Congress (INC), Rahul Gandhi, entered the Lower House, the Lok Sabha to respond to malicious and derogatory accusations of being anti-national levelled against him, by four ministers of ruling Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP), the Lok Sabha was not only adjourned within seconds of his entering the house, but in the final denouement, the live broadcast of Lok Sabha proceedings on television was fully muted, i.e. one could see the image of the Speaker of the Lok Sabha, but could not hear any audio.  This went on for roughly fifty seconds, and then the audio was restored only for the audiences to hear that the Lok Sabha was again adjourned.  For the first six seconds, when the audio was allowed, one could clearly hear the opposition members of parliament shouting, “Let Rahul Gandhi speak.”  Modi does not want the people of India hear how he has been cornered by Rahul Gandhi revealing his relations to billionaire Gautam Adani, and how he and the three-hundred and three members of parliament of BJP have no answers for Rahul Gandhi’s questions.  The highest forum of democracy in India, the Parliament, has been muted, to protect Modi.  Such politicization of proceedings of the Parliament is the first in independent India.

Rahul Gandhi has single-handedly rattled Modi and his entire eco-system of trolls, mainstream media and puppet ministers.  Rahul Gandhi, in his recent visit to Cambridge, which is his alma mater, laid bare the state of democracy in India, revealing, how the voices of opposition leaders have been gagged, how his microphone has been turned off in the proceedings of Lok Sabha numerous times when he spoke, how the entire opposition has been hounded by state law enforcement agencies, and most vicious and vindictive witch-hunt has been carried out by Modi government against opposition leaders.  Buying of members of state legislatures to form state governments, breaking up of local political parties like Shiv Sena in the state of Maharashtra, and threats of false cases have become the defining characteristics of Modi regime.  Modi government essentially means Modi’s decisions, all ministries of Modi government are run by Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) manned by his loyal bureaucrats, mostly from his home state Gujarat.  Modi’s array of ministers, and other functionaries are plain dummies, whose job is not to work in their ministries, but act only as trolls to defend Modi.  This complete collapse of a functioning government, and centralization of all powers in the PMO has made Modi an autocrat, whose public behavior is akin to a king, and not a leader of a democratic country.  Ironically, it is cowardice of Modi that makes him hide behind his ministers, law-enforcement agencies, and fascist mainstream media.  He has not held an open press conference in his nine years of being in the office.  Even a liberal, bourgeois democracy is now threatened.

In my previous blogs, I have pointed out how Modi is an outright fascist, and there have been all signs of emergence of fascism in India under his government.  Now it is starker than ever.  Not only it is becoming clearer that the government is simply working for Modi’s billionaire friend Gautam Adani, who is mired in the most heinous accusations of financial fraud and looting of India’s taxpayers’ money through favorable bank loans, and bending of government rules to grow his empire; but there is most brutal and relentless attack on Muslim minority population in India that has been unprecedented.  Mob lynchings of Muslims, repeated humiliation of Muslims in public places, erasure of their place of worships, forcible occupation of masjids and performing of Hindu rituals in them, massive propaganda through falsehoods in WhatsApp messages, hate-filled and bigotry laden public congregations by self-avowed Hindu Godmen, open calls of genocide of Muslims, rape of Muslim women, have all come to become mainstay in large parts of Indian society.  Muslims are being systematically pushed out of the economic system, not being allowed to do even low-level businesses, let alone to allow them to live peacefully and with dignity.  Christian community too has suffered the brunt, with churches vandalized by Hindu supremacists, and false charges of conversions registered in local police stations.  The state machinery is actively complicit in the project of Hindu Rashtra (a country based on Hindu religious identity).  The decline and degradation of moral and collective conscience of the majority Hindu community is now becoming on par with erstwhile fascist states, that hinged on visceral hatred of minorities.

In the words of Italian communist, Georgi Dimitrov, “It would be a gross mistake to lay down any sort of universal scheme of the development of fascism, valid for all countries and all peoples. Such a scheme would not help but would hamper us in carrying on a real struggle.”

“In the colonial and semi-colonial countries also, as was mentioned in the discussion, certain fascist groups are developing, but of course there can be no question of the kind of fascism that we are accustomed to see in Germany Italy and other capitalist countries. Here we must study and take into account the quite special economic, political and historical conditions, in accordance with which fascism is assuming and will continue to assume peculiar forms of its own.”

It is unfortunate that Indian intelligentsia and alternative media has not taken this aspect seriously.  They harbor false hopes that this will pass, and is not fascism.  They somehow attribute the current state of affairs to purely a character trait of Modi, not realizing that the rise of Modi itself is a symptom of evolving society towards fascism.  There is somehow a complete eliding of the fact that Modi’s parent organization, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) is a fascist paramilitary organization, that has openly adored Mussolini and Hitler.  Modi carries the tradition forward, working assiduously in the traditional framework of Indian democracy, to weaken it, to capture its institutions, and make it completely subservient to his fascist agenda of Hindu Rashtra.  The entire trajectory of Modi, BJP and RSS have followed the trajectory of fascist rise, which can be said, are peculiar to Indian conditions.  Ignoring fascist character of Modi regime has already proven disastrous for Indian society, economy, national security and communal harmony; if it is not recognized now, the next general election may be the last general election with participation of opposition parties.  Modi is moving towards a totalitarian regime of fascist electoral autocracy, where only BJP will contest elections.  Something akin to Japanese system, where there is one party rule, and whose roots are in fascist Japan before World War II.