In defence of Shah

So we have found a new villain to hiss at, and it is Naseeruddin Shah, of all people. Shah’s crime is, of course, awful: He is worried about the direction in which this country is going. Expressing patriotic concern is, in today’s India, the surest sign that you are in fact an anti-national. What did Shah say precisely? He said that there are parts of India where a cow’s life is worth more than a human’s. Could this possibly be true? Well, let’s see. Shah was speaking in the context of the murder of a policeman in Uttar Pradesh, a murder by a mob that the chief minister of the state has deliberately downplayed. Was he really exaggerating? It has been years since a man was lynched, not an hour from Delhi, for supposedly eating beef. The reaction to that murder from right-wingers focused on whether or not he was in fact eating beef. The meat in his fridge was sent for analysis. Is Shah overstating things, therefore? Or is he stating a simple fact? 

The truth, of course, is that Shah will suffer particularly because of his name. Regardless of his personal beliefs, whether he is a practising Muslim or not, he will be seen as naturally unpatriotic. His brother, a retired Lieutenant General, might have written an entire book on Muslims serving the Indian state — but, in the end, in New India, it is Shah’s name that will matter. Once he signed a petition against the death penalty, in the context of the hanging of Yakub Memon. Many others hate the death penalty. But, today, when a Muslim speaks out against lynching, the fact that he also spoke out against the death penalty is a sign that he is unpatriotic. 

Irony is working overtime: A senior advisor to one of the “North Korean” channels that so enliven our days blamed Shah for refusing to engage other viewpoints. Every day vernacular and increasingly English-language television news whips up hatred, sounding more and more like the radio stations of 1990s Rwanda — but it is those who worry about the consequences who are at fault. Everyone — Nehruvians, secularists, minorities, non-Hindi speakers — who have any concern about the consequences of such discourse had better shut up. It is not their country. If they are unhappy, they can leave it. After all, as the hardcore Modi belt in New Jersey can tell you, nothing demonstrates more love for India than living elsewhere. 

Shah spoke of the culture of impunity. This was silly of him — he must know that there is no impunity in India for those who express dissent. Yes, you can lynch and murder without consequence if you are on the right political side, but that is not the sort of impunity we should worry about, surely. The 22 policemen accused of involvement in the murder of Sohrabuddin and Kauser Bi were let off thus week. We all know what the purpose of that encounter killing was. But, under today’s rulers, investigating such a crime is pointless. Justice will only come after decades, if at all. Look how long it took to get Sajjan Kumar. 

Too many in India are consumed by envy. They are consumed with envy for well-ordered, monotheistic societies — which is why they seek to remake Hinduism into the image of the religions that Hindutva fundamentalists profess in fact to despise. They are consumed with envy for authoritarian countries like the People’s Republic of China, and seek to remake pluralist and liberal India into the sort of country that can march into the future in lock-step. The simple truth, that anyone with eyes — and not just Naseeruddin Shah — can see is that this will need bloodshed. Those standing in the way will have to be intimidated, silenced, removed. This is the Right’s great project. 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has failed to fully commit to this project. Perhaps he is too old, too unconsciously shaped by Nehru’s India. He tries to fit into the uncomfortable liberal straitjacket expected of an Indian prime minister, and frankly we should all be relieved that he is trying to do so. Perhaps if he returns to power it will not be so — if the liberals do not support him, why should he try to win them over? Certainly, his successor on the Right will be less restrained. As Prime Minister, Adityanath is not an unimaginable prospect. Given his public statements, given his mis-governance of Uttar Pradesh, should we not share Shah’s concerns? How is it unpatriotic to do so?

On the WhatsApp groups where Indian middle-class opinion is formed, the defence of the BJP and Hindutva has begun to sound strained. But one argument is always trotted out in exhaustion: “OK, so the BJP has not done well. But, if not them, then who?” It is time to answer clearly: it does not matter. Anyone who preserves this country’s heritage and institutions — and prevents the slide into anarchy that Shah correctly worries — should be okay by us. 

Email: m.s.sharma@gmail.com; Twitter: @mihirssharma