I ask this question of all Indians born before May 26, 2014: were you ashamed of being an Indian till Narendra Modi became the prime minister? That, at any rate, is his claim as he wings himself from one NRI gathering to another.
Breaking the tradition that Indian PMs do not wash dirty domestic linen on foreign soil, Modi has been repeatedly taking domestic disputes to foreign shores. Woe betide the nation if the opposition decides to respond in kind by holding anti-Modi demonstrations at every venue where he chooses to address his NRI supporters.
Street fighting in foreign capitals is not my idea of foreign policy at its most dignified. Dignity, decorum and decency have been thrown to the winds as Modi continues his election campaign a year after decisively winning the election. Won’t someone whisper in his ear that the campaign is over?
Are you ashamed of being an Indian? Are you ashamed of being the inheritors of the land of Gandhi? Are you ashamed of our democracy? Or the startling fact that the bitterest opponent of the Gandhian movement was invited to frame the underpinning of our republic? Are you ashamed of the fact that there was never a military coup in India? Are you ashamed of our never having descended to civil war? Are you ashamed of our free press and independent judiciary? Are you ashamed that the average annual GDP growth rate of 0.72 per cent at the time of independence was raised under Manmohan Singh to 9.4 per cent? Are you ashamed of the largest number of human beings ever in history―138 million―being raised above the poverty line over the UPA’s two plan periods? Are you ashamed of our being a secular country where we value all religions and repudiate none?
Illustration: Bhaskaran
Have you reflected on the unique fact that while there are civilisations that are older than ours, we are the only one to have combined antiquity and continuity with heterogeneity? We are the world’s exemplar of plurality. Are you ashamed of that?
As for more recent times, are you ashamed of Manmohan Singh having been feted at G-20 gatherings as the world’s teacher of economics? Are you ashamed of the breakthrough India-US nuclear deal? Are you ashamed of the encomiums poured on doctor sahib by George W. Bush and Vladimir Putin? Are you ashamed of the UPA government that built both BRICS and IBSA? Are you ashamed of the country’s economic performance that was so spectacular that a new vocabulary had to be created―moving India up from being a “developing country” to an “emerging economy”?
Are you ashamed of our democracy that enabled a party headed by someone not of Indian origin to come up from behind in 2004 and form a rainbow coalition? And then decline prime ministership! Or ashamed of the freedom that allowed the people to express their displeasure when ten years of UPA rule had passed?
Yes, I have reasons to be ashamed of as an Indian today. I am ashamed that we have a prime minister who displays ignorance about India’s greatness. I am ashamed of a prime minister who is tainted by the pogrom of 2002. I am ashamed of an India in which the prime minister dismisses the brutalised minorities as puppy dogs that had accidentally come under the wheels of a passing car. I am ashamed of an India in which the prime minister has nothing to say when Muslim habitations are attacked and burnt, especially at election time. I am ashamed of an India in which churches are attacked and burnt―and the PM takes weeks to react. I am ashamed of an India in which the prime minister struts around in a suit with his name monogrammed on it and which costs more than most Indians earn in a lifetime. But I would be ashamed to say all this on foreign soil.
