by B. R. GOWANI
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I
A South Asian joke:
In arranged marriages in South Asia, families try to find out as much information as possible about the potential candidates to be on the safe side. The patriarchal setup and the gender inequality which is biased towards females, the girl’s side of the family is particularly careful in finding out more because the girl is the one who leaves her parents home, to join her groom’s family after the wedding, a totally new environment, many a times, hostile and unfriendly.
The male elders of one of the marraigeable boys went to another town to ask for a girl’s hand for their boy. The male elders of the girl’s family started interogatting their counterparts.
“How would you describe your son?”
“He is a very good boy.”
“Does he have any bad habits?”
“No, but once in a while he smokes.”
“Any other vice?”
“No, however, when he smokes, he always drinks.”
“Anything else?”
“No, but drinking leads him to gambling.”
“That’s it?”
“one more thing, he then ends up in a red light area.”
“What else?”
“Nothing. We told you he’s a good boy.”
II
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose second five year term is ending pretty soon, is running for the third term.
If Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s henchmen and Godi Media <1> were to speak truth, at least once, on Modi’s true character, the question answer session would go something like this:
“Is Modi a compassionate Prime Minister?”
“Yes, of course. Modiji never differentiates: he loves whom he loves and he despises those whom he despises such as Muslims, liberals, seculars, …”
“What else is Modi guilty of?”
“Nothing else, except he wants to get rid of Muslims first and then others whom he hates.
“Mind you, he has nothing against Muslims. You must have seen Modiji being awarded highest civilian honors by leaders of various Muslim countries and how he greets the leaders of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain, and so on. In India, he avoids Muslims <2> because they are hateable.”
“Any other fault?”
“No. Modijee does everything in a legal manner. That’s why he is contesting the election. To maintain the sanctity of the 2024 election, he has personally chosen and appointed his own election commissioners.”
“What other shortcomings Modi has?”
“Modijee has no shortcomings. For that reason he has promised that his party BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) will win more than 400 seats in parliament’s lower assembly, that is more than 75% of the 543 total seats. This will let us do all the things we want to without any opposition.”
“Any deceptive activity Modi is involved in?”
“Ram Ram! <3> Never. It’s a universal fact that money plays a crucial role in elections. Money has played a huge role in all of Modiji’s elections. Since 2018, secret donors, secret to the public but known to Modiji’s government, have given $1.9 billion to political parties, mostly to our party.
“If people wants to give money to Modiji’s campaign — whether out of love, fear, patriotism, sycophancy, to extrat favor(s), or whatever reason — he can’t refuse such an honor. He is innocent of the donors’ motives. The electoral bonds may give him an edge over other parties, of course.”
“Do Modi suppress his critics”
“No. But usually, you know there is always opposition when you are trying to do certain good things for the country. Stalin, Hitler, Biden, Trump, Netanyahu, they all faced or are encountering hurdles and so you have to fight back and suppress/silent those forces. Sometime they leave on their own such as Ravish Kumar; other times our people silences them. <4> Most of the news media in India support Modiji. The opposition, out of jealousy calls that media “Godi Media.”
“Anything else?”
“No, except when Modi is enraged and wants to impress Hindu fanatics he may indulge in pogrom like the one that took place in 2002. About 2,000 people, majority of them Muslims, were killed.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it. The only thing we would add is that Modiji wants India to be a
Vishwa guru, a “global professor” who will turn world into one Hindu family. So Modi could open up more mandirs around the world like Ram Mandir he inaugurated on the site of demolished Muslim Babri Masjid or Babri Mosque.”
“Anything more to add?”
“No. We told you, Modiji is a very loving, caring, benevolent Prime Minister.”
Notes:
<1> The term “Godi Media” has been coined by brave Indian journalist Ravish Kumar. Godi means lap. Kumar rightly described the Indian news media as Godi media, that is, the media that sits in Modi’s lap and so keeps mum on Modi’s wrong doings: mixing politics with religion, spreading hatred, ignoring his followers’ harassment and or killing of minorities, and so on. It instead employs all its energy on going after the opposition all the time. Kumar was with NDTV , one of the last major news channel exposing Modi government’s injusties, but had to leave once it was bought by a billionaire businessman Adani, a Modi supporter and a co-Gujarati.
<2> Professor Christophe Jaffrelot says the effective propagtion of “diabolical images of Muslims” is now “deeply rooted in the psyche of the [Indian] society. He uses Sammy Smooha’s term “ethnic democracy” to describe India after Modi’s election as PM in 2014, in a sense that Christians and Muslims are second class citizens.
<3> Ram Ram is a greeting/salutation but when said with a bit of shock it means “God forbid.”
<4> During Modi’s two terms, over 400 opposition leaders got harassed over corruption harges — 90% of them from the opposition. Those who agree to join Modi’s party see the chatged dropped quikly or slowly.
B. R. Gowani can be reached at brgowani@hotmail.om