A revisionist autodidact has gone bonkers. He is going around the world reinterpreting Indian history, culture, philosophy, constitution and the country’s lived and imagined reality. He can be dismissed as an irrelevant blabber-mouth, and it is true that neither he, nor his stunted intellect hold any credibility anywhere, especially in the India of 2022. But by virtue of being a public representative, being the leader of a political party that has been around for almost a century and a half and possessing a ‘stolen’ surname that still counts for something, even blatantly fake news spread by this bitter specimen of human creation, has the potential to damage our country’s goodwill and reputation.
He argues that Nation is a western concept, and that India is not a nation. That being the case, why does he insist on applying it to India, which is not a western country? He refuses to tell us how he would translate the word ‘nation’ into Indian languages. He dismisses Rashtra as the accurate Sanskrit translation, and informs us that it rather means a Kingdom. Then he goes on to define his India as ‘a voice, the expression of a people, a journey’, which basically translates into ‘nation’. Why is he trying to catch his tail by his mouth by going round and round? Neither the tail is worth it, nor is this pathetic show watchable? Or perhaps, Churchill’s ghost has got into him.
Once you have put forward a false postulate into public domain, based on insufficient and improper reading, or as a part of some crooked strategy, and get called out, everything you say or do to further defend it shall make you look like an ignoramus fool, a massive egoist, and a sore loser. This is because you refuse to take your words back, despite being presented with evidences that prove your claim to be patently false. Escalation of commitment towards a dangerously divisive idea, one that questions nationhood in India, inevitably reminds one of Jinnah and the monster he ended up creating. One must rightfully fear the potential of this idea of ‘many nations’ taking India down the slippery slope of Balkanization.
After falsely peddling the idea of India being the result of a ‘negotiated settlement’, the Lord of the Lies has now equated the Indian nationhood with the European experience. He claims that India became politically and economically united 70 years ago, like the European countries came together to form the ‘European Union’ after the War. If he conceives the idea of ‘Union of States’ as similar to the ‘European Union’, then one should feel pity for his base intellect.
European Union is a group of sovereign nations, but is itself not a sovereign entity. Is India just a group of sovereign states? Have the European countries surrendered or compromised upon their sovereignty? Most importantly, the Treaty of Rome, signed by 25 member states in 2004, which intended to create a consolidated constitution for EU, was ratified only by 18 members. The French and the Dutch voters refused to ratify it, and the ratification process was thwarted. A watered-down Treaty of Lisbon, signed in 2007 and ratified in 2009, has altogether abandoned the idea of a single codified constitution, and taken care of sovereignty concerns. Besides, the European Parliament has the power to make only recommendations, which are non-binding upon national parliaments. The foreign policy is based on unanimity of all members, and as such is beset by delays and blockages. The members also have their national foreign policies parallel to the common one, and it is anyone’s guess how things head in case of conflict of interest between the two. Besides the roles of various decision-making bodies- European Commission, European Council and European External Action Service (EEAS) are not clearly defined and they often compete for influence. At one point of time, EU was considered as a nation-in-the-making. It can safely be said that as of today, EU is just a treaty-based organization, has no sovereignty of its own and has been wounded by the Brexit. I wonder how anyone even superficially informed about international relations can compare India and the European model. Which state does he see exiting the Union? Does the Genius even realize that the Union is indestructible?
Another troubling feature of this autodidact’s semi-coherent rants is the derisive manner in which he refers to the territory or geography of India, or how he mockingly uses the expression ‘sone-ki-chiriya’. Remember that it was his party that had accepted the Partition of India on the basis of two-nation theory. Now he keeps singing that India is only its people, as if he doesn’t value the territorial sanctity of this ‘Union of States’. Whither has flown away the notion of sacred Motherland or Matribhumi? Is this his way of playing to the gallery and appeasing a certain community that has problems with such deification? Or is he simply suggesting that India is not an indestructible Union, and can be Balkanized as and when some people demand? One can suspect that he is laying ground for future partitions of India, by putting everything in their hands, and almost scandalizing the love and attachment one might feel for Bharatvarsha.
His solution to every problem, difficulty or adversity is to adopt the Gandhian way. Perhaps he wants India to consider self-sufficient village economies, shun machines for manual labour, surrender before minority vehemence, and adopt trusteeship as the industrial model. None of these rants make much sense. But then, who cares? Notice how media maintains complete silence on such crucial issues. They could and ideally, should, be giving him hard time by some tough grilling, but they are not interested in getting into intellectual debates which do not sell.
#joker #europe #unionofstates #EU #blabber #fakenews #balkanization #bharatvarsha #indestructibleunion #matribhumi #motherland #nation #rashtra
Abhinav Pancholi 