Tavleen Singh writes: No lessons from cockroaches

Sadly, I must begin this piece on a gloomy note. It appears that no lessons were learned from Jantar Mantar by either the government or the opposition. If they had been learned, the opposition would have chosen to speak inside Parliament about students being shot at instead of playing into the government’s hands by making the usual racket and reckless demands. Rahul Gandhi led the charge by insisting that the Home Minister would have ordered pellet guns to be used and that he should resign for doing this. The government, for its part, lied that no guns were used when there is clear evidence that they were. The government should have discovered from the Cockroach Janta Party’s remarkable protest in Jantar Mantar that they are dealing with a new generation of Indians who will not accept lies and will not be afraid. It should have learned that going back on its promises will be immediately spotted and opposed. Since it did not, it reverted to the typical tactics that we have seen against dissidents, which is to bully them into obedience. Criminal cases have been filed against young people who mocked the Prime Minister in Jantar Mantar and the founder of the CJP has been personally threatened with dire consequences. This newspaper in a report last week had this comment from Abhijit Dipke. “I received threats saying that it would be better if I join the BJP…otherwise we will beat you up and shoot you.” He said that intimidation devices had been used not just against him but against his family as well. Anyone vaguely familiar with the BJP’s methods will find this comment from Dipke credible. Anyone who follows politics even slightly knows that opposition political parties have been broken because of these methods. And that supposedly corrupt politicians became miraculously cleansed as soon as they entered the ranks of the BJP. The only person who appears to have learned a lesson of sorts is the Prime Minister himself who has taken to popping up on Instagram every other day to make some announcement or other. What he has not learned is that he needs to change his message if he wants to reach the generation he is trying so hard to reach. His videos are neither well-made nor interesting. In them he stares woodenly at the camera and then proceeds to deliver a monologue on his latest achievements. Surely, he should have discovered by now that this generation of young Indians can be reached much better with dialogue than monologue. Unlike older Indians, like your aged columnist, younger Indians are mercifully unwilling to accept the mess that our political leaders and officials have made of India. They do not accept that year after year when the rains come, there will be states like Assam and Himachal in which people will lose every one of their possessions because the government has been unable to prepare better for the rains. They do not accept that the rains will bring chaos in our cities because of badly built roads and drains. They are impatient with politicians who tell them that by next year our sacred rivers will be clean and the air in our cities will be fit to breathe. They know well that the real reason why the education system is broken is because of massive corruption in which politicians collude with mafioso types to make sure that nothing changes. If real change ever happens, then political leaders will lose the so-called educational institutions that enable them to get government land and grants. If real change happens, then the coaching centres who thrive on the misery of students will close and be replaced by real colleges. If real change happens, government schools will have properly trained teachers instead of highly paid frauds. If real change happens, Indian children will be taught to think instead of being taught to learn by rote. These are not problems that have been created only in the age of Modi. They are legacy problems that have developed over decades of neglect and criminal negligence. What is sad is that Modi has done so little to rectify the problems he inherited. What is sad is that he has paid so much more attention to non-issues like making it a criminal act to interrupt the singing of Vande Matram. We did not need a new law for this, but it is one of only two that so far got passed in the monsoon session of Parliament. If opposition leaders had understood the cockroach protest better, they would have allowed Parliament to function this time instead of using the usual tactics to make it non-functional. They are right to demand that the Home Minister explain why protesting students were shot at with pellet guns, but it would have been so much better if this had been discussed and debated. When are the opposition parties going to discover that they should leave street fighting to a new generation of Indians who know how to do this much better? All in all, none of our political leaders covered themselves in glory in the week gone by in which we saw the aftermath of the cockroach protest. And since no lessons were learned, we are likely to see much more of what Bob Dylan unforgettably described as ‘music in the cafes at night, revolution in the air.’ This could be good.