<b>Mitali Saran:</b> Shock and awe

That phrase more or less sums up the psychological results of India's Lok Sabha elections 2014. Rivers of ink have flown in recriminations even after the result, as an emotionally battered electorate continues to lick its campaign-time wounds. Everyone has fought so bitterly and hard, for so long, that they're still socking away at each other out of habit. Winners are still spewing venom about decades of suffering under perceived secular-liberal tyranny; losers are still emitting elegant warning hoots about the dangers of electing Narendra Modi, as if he isn't already here. People are still talking in terms of a contest. Yoohoo! They've closed the battlefield. We're all supposed to be back to being one team for the greater good, some in power, some in the constructive opposition. The only constituents who have adjusted to the new power configurations faster than greased lightning and are getting on with it are the media, who have seen an astonishing amount of churn in recent days - both in terms of personnel and in terms of views.

So here we are, losing side shocked, winning side awed, and nobody with the faintest idea how any of it is going to play out, not that that stops anybody from playing it out ad nauseam.

The psychological toll on the losing side of an election being what it is, this column is addressed exclusively to those pseudo-sickular libtards who have obstinately remained pseudo-sickular libtards despite watching Mr Modi cry in Parliament. Here's what I wanted to say: now that your worst nightmare is upon you, get through the five stages of grief as quickly as you can.

We've had denial about the result, shouting "No! No!" at the television, newspaper, and website as our brains refused to process the fact. We've been through anger, much of it aimed at the party/parties that let us down. We've been bargaining with ourselves in the shape of a great many graphs and pie charts that show that the winning 282 seats in Parliament are based on a minority vote share, a fact that we find heartening. We're probably still in depression, and drinking more than normal. Go ahead and do that as long as it helps. But at some stage we have to get to acceptance. I'm suggesting that the quicker we get there, the better we can do what we really need to do, which is go back to being watchful.

Repeat after me: the process of bringing one side or the other to power, or keeping them out of it, is over. Now it's time to quit crying about how unfair it all is, and deal with reality. Pull your head out of the sand, unpack your suitcase, tear up your ticket to Pakistan, and start doing that thing that people on this side of the political divide (barring its far end) rarely do: stand your ground. Liberal India is very good at making the right noises in print and on television. But it often takes nothing more than one thuggish growl from an intolerant nasty, or one polite hint from a suited and booted paymaster, to shut people up.

Worst of all, it takes nothing more than a vague sense that one is being impolite to self-censor one's ability to speak truth to power. Social equations are the most effective neutraliser of independent critical thinking. If you can't bring yourself to say difficult things to the people who let you into their drawing rooms, you may as well hang up your left liberal boots and admit that you're no better than the unthinking right-wing loyalists whom you so abhor. And if the people in the drawing room won't hear the things you have to say, whether they agree with them or not, they're no less dangerous than the right-wing powers-that-be whom you so abhor.

Carelessly ceding liberal inclusive space - through silence, through easy justification, through self-censorship, because our guys were in power at the Centre - is sort of how we got to this place, where outright bigotry makes for not just acceptable but winning mainstream politics.

If you don't like where we are, it's time to put some real things on the line, like your time, your money, and your social capital. Stand up when you're bullied, instead of subsiding into an elegant sulk and muttering about tasteless boorishness. Support your cohort in their battle against the same things. Defend principles, not parties or people. Test your ideas, and credit the good ones on the opposing side; and hold your own representatives accountable just as you must as the other side's.

Being liberal, inclusive and genuinely pluralistic in India just got harder. So work harder at it. Walk the talk, or shut up.