Thanks to manufactured debates on TV, there is no time for irony and
nuance nor are we able to distinguish between a charlatan and an
academician
Harish Khare in The Hindu
Now that the Supreme Court has provided some sort of relief against harassment to Professor Ashis Nandy,
it has become incumbent upon all liberal voices to ponder over the
processes and arguments that combined to ensure that an eminent scholar
had to slink out of Jaipur in the middle of the night because of his
so-called controversial observations at a platform that was supposed to
be a celebration of ideas and imagination. Sensitive souls are quite
understandably dismayed; others have deplored the creeping culture of
intolerance. Some see the great sociologist as a victim of
overzealousness of identity politics. All this breast-beating is fine,
but we do need to ask ourselves as to what illiberal impulses and habits
are curdling up the intellectual’s space. We need to try to recognise
how and why Professor Nandy’s nuanced observations on a complex social
problem became “controversial.” Who deemed those remarks to be
“controversial?” And, these questions cannot be answered without
pointing out to the larger context of the current protocol of public
discourse — as also to note, regretfully, that the likes of Mr. Nandy
have themselves unwittingly countenanced these illiberal manners.
After all, this is not the first time — nor will it be the last — that a
sentence in a complex argument has been picked up to be thrashed out
into a controversy . This is now the only way we seem able to talk and
argue among ourselves. And we take pride in this descent into
unreasonableness. We are now fully addicted to the new culture of
controversy-manufacturing. We have gloriously succumbed to the
intoxicating notion that a controversy a day keeps the republic safe and
sound from the corrupt and corrosive “system.”
This happens every night. Ten or 15 words are taken out of a 3,000-word
essay or speech and made the basis of accusation and denunciation, as
part of our right to debate. We insistently perform these rituals of
denunciation and accusation as affirmation of our democratic
entitlement. Every night someone must be made to burn in the Fourth
Circle of Hell. In our nightly dance of aggression and snapping, touted
as the finest expression of civil society and its autonomy from the ugly
state and its uglier political minions, we turn our back on irony,
nuance and complexity and, instead, opt for angry bashing, respecting
neither office nor reputation. We are no longer able to distinguish
between a charlatan and an academician. A Mr. Nandy must be subjected to the same treatment as a Suresh Kalmadi.
Nandy, a collateral victim
Mr. Nandy’s discomfort is only a minor manifestation of this cultivated
bullishness. And let it be said that there is nothing personal against
him. He is simply a collateral victim of the new narrative genre in
which a “controversy” is to be contrived as a ‘grab-the-eyeballs’ game, a
game which is played out cynically and conceitedly for its own sake,
with no particular regard for any democratic fairness or intellectual
integrity. By now the narrative technique is very well-defined: a
“story” will not go off the air till an “apology” has been extracted on
camera and an “impact” is then flaunted. In this controversy-stoking
culture of bogus democratic ‘debate’, Mr. Nandy just happened to be
around on a slow day. Indeed it would be instructive to find out how
certain individuals were instigated to invoke the law against Mr. Nandy.
Perhaps the Jamia Teachers’ Solidarity Association needs to be
applauded for having the courage to call the Nandy controversy an
instance of “media violence.”
At any given time, it is the task of the intellectual to steer a society
and a nation away from moral uncertainties and cultural anxieties; it
is his mandate to discipline the mob, moderate its passions, disabuse it
of its prejudices, instil reasonableness, argue for sobriety and inject
enlightenment. It is not the intellectual’s job to give in to the mob’s
clamouring.
‘Middle class fundamentalism’
But, unfortunately, that is what our self-designated intellectuals have
reduced themselves to doing: getting overawed by television studio
warriors, allowing them to set the tone and tenor of dialogue. There is
now a new kind of fundamentalism — that of what is touted as the
“media-enabled middle class.” For this class of society, the heroes and
villains are well defined. Hence, the idea of debate is not to promote
understanding nor to seek middle ground nor to reason together, but to
bludgeon the reluctant into conformity. Mary McCarthy had once observed
that “to be continually on the attack is to run the risk of monotony …
and a greater risk is that of mechanical intolerance.”
When intellectuals and academicians like Ashis Nandy allow themselves to
be recruited to these “debates,” even if they are seen to be
articulating a dissenting point of view, their very presence and
participation lends credibility to the kangaroo courts of intimidation.
Manipulated voices
The so-called debate is controlled and manipulated and manufactured by
voices and groups without any democratic credentials or public
accountability. It would require an extraordinary leap of faith to
forget that powerful corporate interests have captured the sites of
freedom of speech and expressions; it would be a great public betrayal
to trust them as the sole custodians of abiding democratic values and
sentiments or promoters of public interest.
Intellectuals have connived with a culture of intolerance, accusation
and controversy-stoking that creates hysteria as an extreme form of
conformity. Every night with metronomic regularity our
discourse-overlords slap people with parking tickets.
And a controversy itself becomes a rationale for political response. Let
us recall how L.K. Advani was hounded out of the BJP leadership portals
because a “controversy” was created over his Jinnah speech. And, that
“controversy” was manufactured even before the text of the former deputy
prime minister’s Karachi remarks were available in India. Nor should we
forget how Jaswant Singh’s book on Jinnah was banned by the Gujarat
Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, even before it was published because our
newly designated national saviour had anticipated that a “controversy”
would get created.
The Nandy ordeal should also caution against the current itch to demand
“stringent” laws as a magical solution to all our complex social and
political ills like corruption. It would be sobering to keep in mind
that Mr. Nandy has been sought to be prosecuted under a stringent law
based on the formula of instant complaint, instant cognisance and
instant arrest. Mr. Nandy is lucky enough to have respected scholars
give him certificates of good conduct, testify that he is not a
“casteist” and that he is not against “reservation.” Lesser
intellectuals may not be that fortunate. We must learn to be a little
wary of our own good intentions and guard against righteous preachers.
If we insist on manufacturing controversy every day, all in the name of
giving vent to “anger”, it is only a matter of time before some sections
of society will be upset, angry and resort to violence. If we find
nothing wrong in manufacturing hysteria against Pakistan, or making wild
allegations against this or that public functionary, how can we object
to some group accusing Mr. Nandy of bias? When we do not invoke our
power of disapproval over Sushma Swaraj’s chillingly brutal demand for
“10 heads” of Pakistani soldiers, who will listen to us when we seek to
disapprove Mayawati’s demand for action against Mr. Nandy?
Just as the Delhi gang rape forced us to question and contest the
traditional complacency and conventions, the Ashis Nandy business will
be worth the trouble if it helps us wise up to the danger of culture of
bullishness and accusation. Unless we set out to reclaim the idea of
civilised dialogue, the intellectuals will continue to find themselves
on the run.
(Harish Khare is a veteran commentator and political analyst, and former media adviser to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh)