Wrong
side of the Right?
-
Suresh Kodoor
While the world is witnessing and waking up to the worrying
signs of dangerous resurgence of right-wing politics across the globe, two most powerful representatives of the
extreme right are aggressively polarising the population in their respective nations.
These are the leaders at the helm of power (‘soon to be’ in case of one) of the
two of the biggest democracies of the world. While the Indian Prime Minister
Mr. Narendra Modi is leading the tirade by the Indian Right, the highly
volatile presidential campaign of the US president-elect Mr. Donald Trump has
left behind a deeply divided nation, driven more by identity politics than
ideology, in the USA as never before.
Triumph of Mr. Trump has surprised many, may be including Trump
himself. For those who still hold the values of democracy, citizen rights,
liberty and freedom close to their hearts, the fact that Trump’s rightist
rhetoric and absurdities found large number of takers was indeed shocking. Trump
campaign has caused deep polarisation, forcing the people to take sides with
either extreme right or the opposite. The middle space shrunk considerably and anyone
not aligned with the right of the right are being automatically qualified to be
in the ‘nation’s enemy’ camp. Even the moderates within the Republican Party
found themselves in the sidelines, being pushed aside by the hardliners,
closely resonating with the way Prime Minister Mr.Modi was raised to prominence
within his party and eventually to the power.
The very mention of the name Narendra Modi evokes sharp
reactions in India, either that of blind adulation or that of bitter
disapproval. As with Trump, Modi has also been instrumental in considerably
destroying the middle space in the Indian political discourses. For many, Modi epitomizes
everything that is divisive and rightist. He has created a deep wedge among the
population and people have invariably been fiercely taking sides in the domestic
political debates. Modi of course belongs to the group that is on the extreme
right within a political spectrum which subscribes to a divisive ideology, both
in content and intent. Modi also carries
the burden of the blame for the communal violence orchestrated during his
tenure as the Chief Minister of the Gujarat state. While Modi’s persona of a
self-obsessed, autocratic, self-righteous ‘strong’ leader goes down well with
the rightists, the same virtues evoke concerns with the liberals and the
sections that care for the democratic and secular social fabric of the nation. Modi’s
contempt for constitutional institutions (as exemplified by his recent refusal
to address the parliament and his statements like ‘I am answerable only to
people’) raises suspicion and fear that if another dark authoritarian ‘emergency-like’
era is looming large on the horizon. The liberals see traits of an insecure narcissist
in him, overly obsessed with self (from being obsessed with his looks to the
extent of launching a Mobile application under his own name and asking people
to send greetings to the country’s men in uniform through the same), and a
complete authoritarian who may anytime kick democracy with back of his foot. He
holds obedience dear to him, not objectivity. And, most worryingly, a large
number of his followers are absolutely in comfort with it and are bereft of
sanity.
Lot of parallels can be read between Trump’s ascend to the
US presidency and Mr. Modi's raise to the power in India. Both exploited the
prevailing identity unrest among the right in their respective countries. Trump
represents everything extreme right. His campaign left the liberals stand in
shock as they watched a large section of people flocking behind his extremist
rhetoric while the liberal values, established and accepted through long
historical struggles, started eroding under their feet. Leaders of the ‘alternative
right’ (alt-right) movement for instance, including Richard Spencer, hailed Trump
as the hero of the rights. Spencer identified Trump’s victory as ‘the first
step, the first sage towards identify politics for white people’. The
alt-right, emerged in 2008, refers to the radical conservative movement defined
by white nationalism which symbolises the resistance to multiculturalism and
globalism.
The white nationalists have always been
raising immigration as their primary concern. They claim that ‘high fertility
rate of third-world immigrants and low fertility rates of white women will
threaten the very existence of white as a race’. Not surprisingly, the Hindu
nationalists in India too argue in a similar line, the identity being religion
in this case instead of race or nationality. Modi cashed in on this communal
divide, sowed and nurtured by the right fundamentalists, the same way how Trump
exploited the existing racism and xenophobia among the rights in the US. Of
course both Modi and Trump were also helped by the incumbency coupled with weak
opponents.
Trump’s win has provided renewed vigour to the right-extremist
groups across Europe and US the same way how Modi’s elevation to power encouraged
and emboldened many of the Sangha Parivar fanatical groups in India. These
rightist groups upped their attack, including physical elimination, against the
minorities and other liberal groups and individuals whoever has dared to
question them or have raised dissenting voices. US would be facing a similar dilemma
under Trump. Trump will have to now live up to the image he has created for
himself as that of an anti-establishment rebel. Ironically though, a nation that
was spearheading the campaign for a tariff-free world all these years through
bodies like WTO, is now embarrassingly resorting to protectionism with Trump
and that too under the premise of rightist nationalism.
Modi too is carrying the burden of his own ‘larger than
life’ image, carefully cultivated and choreographed, and has found himself in a
non-enviable position of having to justify or to give his silent consent to his
political support groups engaged in atrocities, aggression and intolerance. Modi’s
election campaign was designed to craftily build an image of him as a ‘war’ or
‘movie’ hero, who would on his own ‘destroy’ the ‘enemy’ and would bring glory
to the nation. His campaign leaders thundered in the rallies that ‘once Modi
becomes the Prime Minister, leave incidents of beheading of Indian soldiers,
the Pakistani intruders will not even dare to enter into Indian side’.
Unfortunately, that was not going to be the case and in fact India saw
increased insurgencies recently from the other side of the border. This image
of ‘born to teach Pakistan a lesson’ was under threat and his rightist base was
growing impatient. Modi and his close aids of course were under tremendous pressure
to do something dramatic to re-establish his ‘invincibility’ and to tighten his
grip on the absolute power by positioning him as the sole ‘bold’ leader who
alone can rescue the nation. The highly publicised ‘surgical strike’ and the
melodramatic announcement of the demonetization should be understood against
this backdrop. The latest misstep of
highly criticized demonetization move had stemmed from such an image-boosting compulsion
though Mr.Modi ended up swallowing more than he could chew this time as the
flawed strategy miserably failed. The arrogance and the self-righteous attitude
displayed by Modi in the midnight announcement also contributed to intensifying
the wide-spread criticism and protests against his demonetization decision. A
desperate attempt to stir up nationalistic fervour to mobilise support in Modi’s
favour only strengthened the resolve of the opposition.
Nationalism has come to the fore now as never before under
the rightist regime. Everyone feels compelled to prove his or her patriotism to
the self-anointed custodians of nationalism. Even constitutional institutions seem
to have overcome by the intensity of the rightist propaganda and the resulting
mood as exemplified by the recent order by the apex court which observed ‘it is
time that everybody respects the national anthem’. What has changed now and
what is special about ‘this time’ is the most important question.
At the time of crisis, nations need unifying leaders, not
the polarising personalities. Leaders who take people along, letting them leave
behind their diversities, inspiring them to unite for the common good.
Collective decision making, rather than the ‘my way or no way’ autocracy should
lead the nation in the right paths as the cost of any wrong step would be too
high for many generations to pay. It hence becomes imperative that we, the
people, guard against the leaders who want to drag the world to the wrong side
of the right.
Suresh Kodoor
sureshkodoor@gmail.com
