Comedy brings out deeper yet unacknowledged truths. Comedian-turned-politician Bhagwant Mann may have unwittingly done just that. An official farce recently organised by him at the taxpayers’ expense brought out a deep crisis of our nationalism today.
The occasion was ‘Main Punjab Bolda Haan’. The Punjab CM invited all his rivals, leaders of Congress, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for an ‘open debate’ on the contentious issue of the Sutlej-Yamuna Link (SYL) Canal. The Supreme Court recently issued an ultimatum to the Punjab government to fulfil its legal obligation to construct its part of the SYL canal for Haryana to take its share of the Sutlej water.
Both the SAD and Congress governments refused to implement the court orders in the past, so the ball has now come to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government. Pushed to a corner by the court, Mann challenged all major party leaders to a public debate to expose them and tell the people of Punjab that his predecessors are responsible for the current mishandling of the situation. But opposition leaders did not take the bait and boycotted this hearing. The CM went ahead with the grand event with empty chairs for the absentees and exposed his opponents.
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Down to doublespeak
What troubled me most was not just the expense in a theatrical event that was neither ‘public’ nor a debate in any real sense. I was more troubled that one more political party has succumbed to the tradition of doublespeak on this issue. The AAP has electoral stakes in Haryana and could have tried to mediate between the claims of farmers in both states. But it chose to follow the bad precedent set by its rivals, the Congress and BJP. Both these parties have earlier let their Punjab and Haryana units take opposite positions and play the irresponsible game of competitive radicalism on this issue to placate their respective electorate. Politics in Punjab and Haryana has abdicated its basic responsibility to mediate between competing claims. The same can be said about the role of ‘national’ parties in the Kaveri water dispute between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.
The other troubling aspect of this situation is the complete inaction by the ‘nationalist’ government at the Centre. Everyone knows that the Supreme Court orders – categorically and repeatedly in favour of Haryana’s claim – will never be implemented. This is an issue that puts two states of the Indian Union at loggerheads and has the potential to create disaffection between the people of the two neighbouring states. This dispute has to be resolved through political negotiations between representatives of both the governments.
The constitutional and moral responsibility of doing so lies with the central government. It should be the first duty of a national leader who enjoys stable government and popular support to try and resolve this issue. But our PM has made no attempt whatsoever to address it, let alone make a determined effort to resolve this. Just as he has maintained silence on the Karnataka-Tamil Nadu dispute or the Meitei-Kuki clashes. The only thing you can say in the PM’s defence is that his predecessors also did not make any serious attempt to resolve this issue.
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Parroting populist lines
What troubled me most was the response of the civil society. Punjab has had a rich tradition of progressive civil society organisations and intellectuals that have resisted State power and defied any narrow creed. They have shown the courage to question religious orthodoxy and even narrow nationalism. Civil society in Haryana is weaker in that respect. But when it comes to the water dispute, intellectuals from both the states have parroted the populist line taken by their governments and parties.
More to the point, both Haryana and Punjab have strong farmers’ movements. Their historic unity was the foundation of the successful farmers’ movement barely two years ago. The river water dispute concerns them. Governments and parties in both the states fight legal and political battles in their name. While farmers cannot stop them from playing their games, their organisations and pro-farmer intellectuals can surely work out a framework for the reconciliation of these competing interests. I have repeatedly suggested that such a reconciliation is possible. But so far, no major organisation or platform has taken this risk and even attempted a discussion.
An era of unity vs diversity?
The failure of governments, parties and civil society on the SYL issue is symptomatic of a deeper crisis. Crafting and maintaining a State like India, with its deep diversities, requires a continuous two-pronged effort. On the one hand, its multiple diversities need to be respected and recognised for these to be attached to the national unit. On the other, a constant effort has to be made to find, force, and reinforce strands of unity.
Our freedom struggle understood this dual imperative quite well. Ours was a uniquely positive nationalism. It was united by an anti-colonialism that was not anti-White or even anti-British. It did not need to pit Indians against its neighbours. After all, independent India was one of the first and ardent supporters of China’s entry into the United Nations. Our nationalism connected us to anti-colonial movements and struggles all over the world, from Asia to Africa and Latin America.
Our nationalist leaders rejected the European notions of unity in uniformity. At the same time, they were deeply concerned with forging national unity. Though suspicious of the ideology of nationalism, Rabindranath Tagore provided the Indian State with not just an anthem but also a philosophy of unity. Jawaharlal Nehru’s Discovery of India was not just an intellectual project; it was a political project of searching for strands of unity. Gandhi’s crusade against untouchability and his promotion of Hindi stemmed from deep concern with uniting India.
Today, we have abandoned this legacy. The concern of our national leaders with unity in diversity has been bifurcated. Some have prioritised ‘unity’ at the cost of diversity. And others have focused only on diversity, forgetting the imperative of unity. This is a perverse division of intellectual and political labour. We have travelled a long distance from ‘unity in diversity’ to ‘unity and diversity’ and finally ‘unity or diversity’.
We have a political stream that privileges unity by promoting uniformity at the cost of all forms of diversity. This imitation of European-style nation-states has become the dominant notion of nationalism. Our nationalism is increasingly becoming outward-facing, aggressive, and jingoist. Fighting verbal wars in TV studios against our neighbours or insulting our guest cricketers from Pakistan is the hallmark of this nationalism. There is little reflection within, of the need for and ways to achieve national unity. We have all the time (though little understanding) in the world for the vicarious pleasures of the Israeli pulverisation of Gaza, but no time to even understand the situation in Manipur. Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan is the underlying theme of this travesty of our nationalism.
Sadly, our response to this political mutilation of our nationalism is a simple mirror image of what we oppose. If the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and BJP seek unity in uniformity, we not only oppose uniformity, but we also abandon the concern for unity. In our anxiety to defend diversities against steamrolling, we take on the American language of multiculturalism. If the RSS-BJP take on the label of ‘cultural nationalism’, we begin to feel awkward about nationalism itself. If they are paranoid about nationalism, we are complacent.
Overcoming this duality and reclaiming our unique model of nation-building through unity in diversity is one of the most pressing tasks of our time.
Yogendra Yadav is among the founders of Jai Kisan Andolan and Swaraj India, and a political analyst. Views are personal.
(Edited by Humra Laeeq)