‘Modi’s win will see India’s soul lost to a dark politics,’ says ‘The Guardian’ editorial
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s victory in the national elections will see India’s soul “lost to a dark politics”, and this is bad news for the country and the world, British newspaper The Guardian said in an editorial on Thursday. The editorial said Modi had threatened “independent India’s most precious facet: a functioning multi-party democracy”.
The newspaper’s criticism of Modi noted that he is a “divisive figure” but “undoubtedly a charismatic campaigner”, who “deployed with terrible effect false claims and partisan facts”. The Congress and the Nehru–Gandhi family, meanwhile, will have to “seriously rethink” how to defeat him, the editorial said.
The editorial said the Hindu nationalism movement that Modi is part of is changing India for the worse, with its focus on upper-caste Hindus, pro-corporate economic growth, cultural conservatism, “intensified” misogyny, and a “firm grip on the instruments of state power”.
The article made remarks about Indian Muslims being “political orphans”, their declining seat share in Parliament, and how Hindutva views them as second-class citizens. It said Modi had recklessly taken India and Pakistan close to war earlier this year.
But Modi’s victory, despite a “spluttering economy”, should perhaps not be surprising, the editorial said, citing a 2017 survey that showed that India had the greatest support for autocratic rule.
About the Bharatiya Janata Party, the newspaper said the party “pays lip service to reducing the yawning inequalities that disfigure India”, and the role of caste and religious conflict in India’s party system suits the outfit. The Opposition, meanwhile, needs to run a “distinctive campaign on an egalitarian platform”, and replace identity-based fights with “political competition over how to benefit all Indians”, the editorial said. “That will require an Opposition in India far savvier and more in touch with the country’s poor than exists today,” it said.
Pankaj Mishra in The New York Times
In an article for The New York Times, journalist and author Pankaj Mishranoted how Modi’s “raw wisdom” had made India suffer for five years, proving him to be “dangerously incompetent”. He wrote about threats to minorities and lower-caste Hindus, as well as dissenting journalists and women. Mishra said that during Modi’s rule, India had witnessed a “savage assault on not just democratic institutions and rational discourse but also ordinary human decency”.
In the article titled “How Narendra Modi Seduced India With Envy and Hate”, Mishra wrote that voters had chosen overwhelmingly to “prolong this nightmare”. “The sources of Mr. Modi’s impregnable charisma seem more mysterious when you consider that he failed completely to realize his central promises of the 2014 election: jobs and national security,” Mishra said.
The writer also said that corporate-owned media had “fervently built up Modi as India’s saviour”.“Since 2014, Mr. Modi’s near-novelistic ability to create irresistible fictions has been steadily enhanced by India’s troll-dominated social media as well as cravenly sycophantic newspapers and television channels,” said the author of the book Age of Anger. He added that the Opposition was right to suggest that the Election Commission had been “shamelessly partisan”.
Mishra said Modi had exploited the “long dormant rage” against India’s “self-perpetuating post-colonial rulers”, noting how previous governments had left “no possibility of dialogue with a metropolitan ruling class of...Godlike aloofness, which had cruelly stranded us in history while itself moving serenely toward convergence with the prosperous West”.
Meanwhile, satirical website The Onion also had a take on Modi’s huge victory. The Onion put up a photo of Modi accompanied with the headline, “India Continues Surge Towards Status as First-world Nation by Reelecting Racist Right-wing Authoritarian”.
courtesy: scroll.in
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Sujit Nair raises concerns over speculation of DMK-AIADMK understanding to block TVK
Chennai: Journalist and political commentator Sujit Nair has expressed concern over speculation that the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam could explore a post-poll understanding to prevent Vijay-led Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam from forming the government in Tamil Nadu.
In a social media post, Sujit Nair said the election verdict in Tamil Nadu reflected a clear public demand for political change and argued that the mandate should be respected irrespective of political preferences.
Referring to reports and political discussions surrounding a possible understanding between the DMK and AIADMK, he said he hoped such developments remained only speculative conversations and did not turn into reality.
Nair stated that if such an alliance were to take shape, it would raise serious questions about ideological politics in the country. He said TVK had emerged through a democratic electoral process and that the legitimacy to govern in a parliamentary democracy comes from the people’s verdict.
According to him, attempts to prevent an electoral winner from forming the government through unexpected political arrangements may be constitutionally valid, but many people could view them as politically opportunistic.
He further said that such a move could particularly affect the political image of the DMK, which has historically projected itself around ideology, social justice and opposition politics. Nair said that in ideological terms, the DMK appeared closer to TVK than to the AIADMK, and joining hands with its long-time political rival only to remain in power could weaken its broader political narrative.
He added that the same questions would apply to the AIADMK as well, as the party had spent decades positioning itself against the DMK and such an arrangement could create discomfort among its cadre and supporters.
Drawing a comparison with Maharashtra politics in 2019, Nair said he had expressed similar views when the Shiv Sena formed an alliance with the Indian National Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party after the Assembly elections.
He said post-poll alliances between long-standing political rivals often create a public perception that ideology and electoral mandates become secondary when political power equations come into play.
Nair also said such developments increase public cynicism towards politics and reinforce the belief among voters that ideology is often sidelined after elections.
He maintained that the Tamil Nadu verdict was emphatic and said respecting both the spirit and substance of the mandate was important for the credibility of democratic politics.
