Smriti Irani, the new Union Minister for Women and Child Development, has been in the news quite a bit in the past few weeks. Her latest feat is to announce in the Rajya Sabha that “Poshan Abhiyan scheme is progressing at an incredible rate and in the next two years no child will be diagnosed with malnutrition”. This is a bit like the $5 trillion-economy-by-2024 feat, based on the belief that a thumping electoral win will release the “animal spirits of the economy”. That claim is not complete balderdash, and we can already see some “animal spirits” being unleashed after the said electoral win, although it’s kind of difficult to ascertain which animal(s) the spirit(s) belong to. It’s also difficult to predict what effect these spirits might have on the economy – not all economies are the same, you know. “Unity in Inequality”.
So, back to “Poshan Abhiyan”. The initial stated objectives of the scheme were to “reduce stunting, undernutrition, anemia (among young children, women and adolescent girls) and reduce low birth weight by 2%, 2%, 3% and 2% per annum respectively” and “reduction in Stunting from 38.4% (NFHS-4) to 25% by 2022”. It has failed to take off so far. The 2018 Global Nutrition Report tells us that India is home to 46.6 million stunted children – those belonging to households with income in the lowest quintile nearly 51% – and 195.9 million undernourished people, where under-5 mortality is still 39.4 per thousand live births with huge regional disparities (meaning India is unlikely to achieve Sustainable Development Goal number 3), where more than 50% of male and female children aged 5-19 years are underweight, and which carries 23.8% of the global malnutrition burden. IndiaSpend’s analysis shows that to achieve zero hunger by 2030, India will have to lift 48,370 people out of hunger every day. India’s reduction in undernourished population from 2015 to 2017 was 3.9 million, which is about 10,685 people per day; less than one-fourth needed to meet the target by 2030. Even at its highest reduction of the undernourished population, 15.2 million in 2006-2008, India could lift only 41,644 people per day out of hunger. But well, you know, “animal spirits” will probably help us magically sweep out malnutrition by 2022.
What Is The RSS “Social Media Journalism Prize”?
Back to Smriti Irani, though. Did you know that the RSS now hands out something called the “Social Media Journalism Prize”? Mind you, nothing can beat that “first-ever Kotler award” – wrap that baby up in cotton wool and cherish it, if you are not an anti-national. Now, (honestly) back to Smriti Irani (for some reason I always keep reaching for the asides). So recently she graced the occasion as an honoured guest for this RSS prize thingy. No, not that RSS, but this one. The one which preaches “Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan”, but whose chief addresses rallies to cadres from its headquarters in Nagpur, in Marathi (some notables submit their election affidavits in Gujarati). Don’t take my word for it, watch Vivek, a 16-part (on YouTube), 4-hours-long documentary filmed by Anand Patwardhan, which tells us in gripping detail about the creeping normality of Hindu nationalism in India, and which was sought to be banned on the pretext that it “might affect law and order” – by a political regime which rewards calls for butchery of Muslims with Chief Ministerships. Anyway, back to (once again, sorry about the asides) Mrs. Irani. So, at this bigly award ceremony, she was handing over um…certificates.
That barb from Mrs. Mahua Moitra in her now-viral Lok Sabha speech where she says, “In a country where ministers cannot produce degrees to show that they graduated from college, you expect disposed poor people to show papers as proof that they belong to this country?”? Ignore it. Ignorance is likely to serve you better in this epoch of immense human stupidity than anything else. “Fake it till you make it,” as they say. Mrs. Irani might not remember the one from her convocation but she is good at giving certificates nonetheless. Also, since when did the Union Minister for Human Resource Development in India need to have undisputed graduation degrees? Ask the current one. You don’t need no education (but you do need thought control) when Hindutva seeks to be in control of it.
Oh darn. I really am incorrigible, innit? Now I am really, actually committing myself to telling you the real story. Pretty much like “news” outlets do these days. So Smriti Irani gifted an RSS certificate, something she might well know a thing or two about, to a troll-harass-dox group on Twitter, the name of which sounds like an obnoxious redux of the failed Swachh Bharat (TM) project. This group is fronted by remarkably thin-skinned, Islamophobic, privileged, upper caste Hindu men who seemingly have no better business than to try and get people fired/suspended/rusticated for airing their non-fascist and contrarian views on social media.
Extremely petty and vicious “nationalists”, the group is one of hundreds of ‘Sanghi’ Twitter troll factories which target people who “insult” the armed forces, among other stupid things. Apart from the fact that all this betrays the extreme insecurity and intense paranoia of nationalism with fascist inclinations, note that it is convenient to anchor your “nationalist” sentiments to an exaggerated sense of unquestioning regard for the military and paramilitary forces of your country, because these agencies can potentially operationalise some of the state’s most brutal instincts. Experience tells us that the moral compass of the armed forces is firmly in control of the Central government, which directs even bomber planes over the clouds to try and “evade” the enemy radar.
State atrocities tend to go unpunished, if not entirely unnoticed. The ones with power are the ones in control of the propaganda bugle. Getting their blessings through flattery means you can pick and choose your soft civilian targets. Anyway, these newly minted “nationalists” (spawned within a few days of that Pulwama attack, not this one – which hardly got much air time since there was no longer an election to be won) are followed by Ministers, pictures with whom they have proudly displayed on their pages. RSS obviously rewards them for “weeding out anti-nationals”, quite conscious of its own role in the nationalist movement in colonial India. If you want all those anti-nationals to cower in their corners, social media terrorism, and getting it rewarded by Union Ministers, is the way to do it.
There, I did it!
Now that the main job is done, allow me (and bear with) my indulgence in ‘asides’. Let’s go back to that Mahua Moitra speech. There she brings up nationalism thusly:
“The first sign (of emergent fascism) – there is a powerful and continuing nationalism that is being speared into our national fabric. It is superficial, it is xenophobic, it is narrow. It has a lust to divide. It is not a desire to unite.”
She further goes on to say:
“The fourth sign is that there is an obsession with national security – identification of enemies…… There is fear pervading everywhere. The achievements of the army are being usurped in the name of one man…. New enemies are being created every day and the irony is that over the last five years terrorist attacks have gone up manifold. There has been a 106 per cent increase in the death of jawans in Kashmir.”
Invoking the military on the slightest pretext to perform your “nationalist” act is the surest way to concede that your argument is indefensible, and to rather unsubtly threaten violence if any more holes are blown in it, and any sign of protest is dealt with gratuitous violence. It is implied that one supreme leader owns the potential brutality of this military power. Any one criticising unjustifiable acts by the military/paramilitary draws faux outrage since “they protect you”, marked out as a “traitor”, and thereby anti-nationalised. This kind of gaudily performative and shallow nationalism, spray-mixed with ugly chauvinism and underlying violent messaging, might sometimes come with promises of “sacrifices” for the nation, but it is assumed that these sacrifices will be made by others, not by oneself. Any notion that the majority of those working in the armed forces might be doing it because they need to feed their families, and not to be cannon fodder for the faux patriotism of the privileged, is instantly met with the ready imbecilic, but often effective, comeback – “You insultin’ the Army, bruv?” This kind of nationalism takes the Shakespearean adage “all the world’s a stage” too seriously, and hence assumes that a mere put-on suffices. It takes the democratic route to power with the intention of undermining it. It’s a bid for hegemonic power so sick it’s near-psychopathic.
Clashes Amongst Fans At Pakistan And Afghanistan Cricket Match
The fetid breath of this monstrous nationalism literally goes beyond boundaries. To the men’s cricket World Cup, currently ongoing, too. Let’s take a couple of instances from this edition of the quadrennial showpiece to show how ugly nationalism poisons sport. First, in the match played between Pakistan and Afghanistan a few days ago, clashes broke out between fans in the stands, and outside the ground, even though there was camaraderie among the players on the ground. This has history and geopolitics behind it.
All the cricketers representing Afghanistan today grew up as refugees in Pakistan, and picked up the sport there. The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) provided them with all the facilities they needed to become professional cricketers, even allowing them to play in Pakistan’s domestic tournaments. In a cricketing sense, Pakistan is where the present-day Afghan cricketers flowered. Even the coach Afghanistan had at their first ever World Cup, in 2015, was the great Pakistani batsman (though people probably remember him more for his running between the wickets) Inzamam-ul-Haq. Then, halfway into this decade, with cricket becoming more popular in Afghanistan, India and BCCI used their economic and political heft to lure Afghan cricket into its alcove, to weaken Pakistani influence over Afghan cricket in particular, and Afghan politics in general.
Afghanistan’s team now trains in India and hs Dehradun as its temporary “home” ground. This stratagem worked remarkably well, as the Afghan Cricket Board (ACB) seems to have imbibed the acrimonious spirit of India-Pakistan relations, siding with India and effectively placing a preemptive gag order on any Afghan cricketer who might want to express his gratitude towards Pakistan. The ACB has huffily ordered all Afghan cricketers to get themselves and their families back to Afghanistan if they want to represent the country. Afghan cricketers have no choice in the matter. Pakistani fans have been angered by this “betrayal”. The political tensions that have been simmering beneath the surface have brewed over. Fans on either side have been at loggerheads for quite some time now, and probably saw its ugliest episode play out at Headingley. This is a fight between nationalisms, between ignorances, a manifestation of the general human failure to understand complexities. Can it be denied that India has played a significant role in all this?
“India Stop Genocide And Free Kashmir”
In the second instance, a plane carrying a banner reading “India Stop Genocide and Free Kashmir” was seen flying over the ground where the match between India and Sri Lanka was being played. I am not going to discuss whether or not this was appropriate, here. But I do understand that word gets around. People around the world are becoming more aware about the human rights abuses that are being carried out under AFSPA, not just in Kashmir, but wherever it has been imposed. All this is being done in our name, presumably to “keep us safe”. India’s own citizens are being tortured, mutilated, mowed down, disappeared, raped – all in our name. When citizens like us protest this kind of degradation of our nation’s conscience and body politic, and assert that those being oppressed too have a right to live in liberty, what nationalism that Ms. Moitra alluded to does – insecure as it is in its own shallowness – is attempt to delegitimise this genuine outrage, the pain we all feel for our fellow beings, and engage the mob to bully protesters into silence. But the human spirit yearns to be free. Just ask Afghan cricketers in general, or Rashid Khan, the wristspinning wunderkind, in particular.
Rashid Khan says he thinks of his country, his compatriots, wherever he goes. He sees himself as a representative of his country, an ambassador for not just Afghan cricket, but also the Afghan spirit – making the most of what you have. Yet, he can hardly spend much time in his own country. He is a superstar, a patriot who wears his nation in his entire being, in exile. There is no point in him making any “sacrifices” for his country. Way more than enough sacrifices have been made already. Rashid Khan tells us that he honed his skills playing family cricket with his brothers. He says all his brothers are nearly as good as him, it’s just they are much older than him, and by the time cricket could be contemplated as a career by an Afghan refugee in Pakistan, they had already grown too old to bother. “You have time on your side, you should do it,” they told Rashid. In effect, if Rashid himself is to be believed, his family is full of Rashid Khans. In the nearly two decades of war that has ravaged Afghanistan, thousands of lives have been lost. Many of them might have become Rashid Khans, who knows? War is a waste of lives, of loves, of ideas, of talents, of meaning. Narrow nationalism is the seedbed in which war germinates.
What Does Nationalism Mean To Afghan Cricketers?
What does it mean to their families who have spent the best parts of their lives escaping conflict, as refugees? What does the Durand Line do to the Pashtun concept of a nation? Is it anti-national for the cricketers to not acknowledge the role Pakistan played in shaping them? Or is it anti-national for them to want to do so? Who gains and who loses from this game? Whatever this game is, it’s just not cricket.
Whether Mrs. Irani seeks to continue handing out certificates or not, it is up to her to decide if she wants to continue playing this ugly game and if the violence she is encouraging against fellow citizens by endorsing petty and vindictive social media trolls is a nationalist act by her definition.
Oh, and before I go, I would like to introduce you to nationalist extraordinaire, whose lackeys are busy building expensive condos in my city. What’s more nationalist for an American than to wave American flags that are made in China? Always trust expert nationalists to also be apologists for criminal violence their nation has inflicted and is inflicting on ‘others’. Expert Trump to celebrate that violence on the country’s day of independence. When such nationalists talk about freedom, they tend to mean freedom to violate the freedoms of others.
Like Bond 007, who must be white, they want a license to kill. How else will you bring peace and civilisation to the world? How else will you inundate their spaces with your products and your culture? Anyone who opposes all these freedoms must be anti-nationals, terrorists etc. To leave you further fuming at all the anti-nationals, here is more anti-national polemical gold from the other half of the globe – almost an antidote to the nationalist’s rambling and definitely more articulate and coherent – a speech from 167 years ago, transposed with and linked to parallels in more modern times. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the legendary Frederick Douglass:
“What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices, more shocking and bloody, than are the people of these United States, at this very hour.”
So there. Done with my anti-national ‘asides’.