If Modi is innocent, why did he wait for an Ahmedabad court judgement? Blogging may have become a way of political expression only recently, it took almost 12 years and the political opportunity thrown up by a court order for Modi to feel ‘grief’, ‘sadness’, ‘misery’, ‘pain’, ‘anguish’ and ‘agony’. Modi and his party are obviously elated by the court verdict but politicians live by their image and the message they send down to the public at large. Court verdicts don’t overhaul the image they create for themselves. He and his supporters may keep quoting the verdict and keep asking for proof, but in the world of politics, the proof lies in what you speak to your constituency. In his case, the constituency is of those who think the idea of modern India is all about making money and hard selling a “pro-growth” image. It is a fig leaf behind which communal minds hide. This constituency essentially hates communities but since it is politically incorrect to admit that they quote his development quotient which itself is questionable.
After he equated the riot deaths to dying of a puppy, in his blog now he has equated communal killings to death in a natural disaster. While earth quake sees no religion, the administration under him did make that distinction. Though there has always been a problem with Modi’s articulation, sufficiently reflected in the bad English that his assistant has put out in the blog, the problem lies in his clarificatory tone. A “model” chief minister, well known for his divisive political ways as also his “strong” administration, it seems was helpless. “During those challenging times” all he did was to recollect “the wisdom in our scriptures”. And if we are to believe him, he was bit lonely too. “Those sitting in positions of power did not have the right to share their own pain and anguish. They had to suffer it in solitude . I lived through the same ...In fact, whenever I remember those agonizing days, I have only one earnest prayer to God. That never again should such cruelly unfortunate days come in the lives of any other person, society, state or nation.”
And, by labelling this as a “harrowing ordeal” that he went through in those days at a personal level, he has insulted those who actually suffered in the riots. But did I hear regret or at least shame? No. And the reason is very clear. His constituency will not like the leader to say he regrets the death of Muslims in his state. The wannabe prime minister is actually a shrewd power seeker who knows how to use every trick in the book. This time it was a timid blog and not a fiery speech distorting historical facts.
