Business Standard

Shielding the govt: The use and abuse of intellectual storm troopers

The Modi govt doesn't address critics directly and lets an outsourced army take them on. This keeps the govt at an arm's length from any debate about its policies

Illustration: Ajay Mohanty
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Illustration: Ajay Mohanty

Bharat Bhushan
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has given two great enemies to the Indian people, one external and the other internal. Pakistan is the external enemy. And the internal enemy comprises minorities and the intellectual critics of the government. 

When 49 public figures wrote to the prime minister, drawing his attention to mob-lynching and to ‘weaponising’ religious slogans like “Jai Shri Ram, neither the prime minister nor the government chose to respond. The response instead came from 62 public figures, some direct beneficiaries of the Modi government’s largesse, who are ideologically inclined towards the BJP. 

Confronting those who are critical of the government,
Disclaimer: These are personal views of the writer. They do not necessarily reflect the opinion of www.business-standard.com or the Business Standard newspaper

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