by A. G. Noorani
“POLITICS is a preoccupation of free men, and its existence is a test of freedom.” It is too much to expect people who went on television to grab whatever publicity they could, in the wake of the terrorist strikes in Mumbai, to read Professor Bernard Crick’s mini-classic In Defence of Politics, or, for that matter, any serious work that bears on the subject. The anchors who invited them were of the same class. The people, exasperated at the lapses of the state, understandably responded to the shrill, sweeping denunciation of politicians and politics. They could not be expected to recall that the loudest among the member panelists was an ardent supporter of Indira Gandhi and the dictatorship she imposed on India.