(India is neither an authoritarian state nor a genuine democracy. Modi is not a tyrant in the mould of Stalin or Hitler nor possesses the virtues of a Liberal Democrat. The many international reports from various research bodies on India and their democracy rankings are damming. They seem exaggerated, misleading and distorted when slotted alongside Pakistan as partly free or below Libya in the happiness index. But to disregard them totally would be fatal and detrimental to India’s interests and global standing, as they contain elements of truth.)

India seems betwixt and between – neither an authoritarian state nor a democracy, neither a developed economy nor a backward country. It has made great scientific strides but many of its people and political leaders are also under the spell of ancient myths of our past glory and are lost in age-old superstitions. It is neither a totalitarian Hindu State nor an enlightened democracy with secular credentials, neither ruled by a dictator nor governed by a Liberal Democrat. India and the idea of India is neither fully one thing nor properly the other. It has always been an enigma.

The international reports downgrading India on many parameters that determine a vibrant democracy, though may not be entirely accurate, the perception of India, a beacon till now for the rest of the world, is in danger of becoming a diminishing democracy. Perceptions matter. Is Modi a tyrant comparable to dictators of the past, a Stalin of the former USSR, a Hitler of Germany, who put millions to death? Or can he be likened to modern-day despots – Putin of Russia, Erdogan of Turkey, Mohammed Bin Salman the present de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, or Xi Jinping of China – some of whom have not hesitated to ruthlessly eliminate their opponents through blood-curdling methods or simply make them disappear overnight without a trace? Such comparisons may be far fetched. His fiercest and most bitter high profile critics – political leaders and intellectuals are roaming free, attacking him at will and critiquing him copiously. Can you imagine a Rahul Gandhi, or Mamata Bannerjee, a Pratap Bhanu Mehta or Ram Guha walking free in China or Russia after criticising those governments? But does that make Modi a Liberal Democrat? No one may give him that certificate. For every Ram Guha or PB Mehta, there are scores of Sudha Bhardwaj and Taltumbes languishing in jail without a fair and speedy trial. His millions of fans who see him as a demigod would approve of many of his autocratic ways. The country was adrift, his predecessor was weak. A messiah was needed and Modi was sent.

Modi is thoroughly modern but also worships false gods – he pushes for solar energy and vaccines and Rafael fighter jets but also invokes cosmic energy to drive out the Covid virus by exhorting the public to beat gongs and conches at auspicious hours based on ancient numerology. He praises India as the largest vaccine producer in the world but does not pull up his cabinet colleagues when they launch voodoo medicines of baba to fight the coronavirus, a drug that has no clinical evidence of trials and condemned by the Indian Medical Association. He’s in a sense like countless Indians who embrace modernity without abandoning their obscurantist superstitions.

Modi is not a despot that many Indian intellectuals compare him to, but Modi’s devotees may not be able to effectively parry the charges of many of his authoritarian ways. His fiery oratory – be it on Ram Temple, beef ban and protection of the holy cow, his party’s narrow definition of nationalism, intolerance to criticism, the CAA and status of migrants, his espousal of a brazen majoritarian politics – may have encouraged vigilante justice resulting in killings through lynchings of innocent people among minority communities. His silence at times and reluctance to rein in his overzealous officials and the rabid elements of his party could have resulted in the incarceration of numerous dissenting academics, critical journalists and protesting students and could have triggered violence between various sections of society. It is alleged, his penchant for reforms by ramming them through executive orders and ordinances without consultations, even If well-intended may have brought miseries on his people.

Even so, is India an authoritarian state? Are its people happy? Are they free?

Sweden’s V -Dem Institute which publishes its annual Democracy report described India as an electoral autocracy in its 2021 report. If it were true, that many of India’s formal institutions are compromised including the election machinery and democracy totally undermined, and the media suppressed, Delhi wouldn’t have been ruled by Kejriwal, Punjab by Amarinder, Andhra by Jagan Reddy who is a Christian and Telangana by K Chandra Shekhar Rao. Almost 70 per cent of India is ruled by non-BJP states. In the just concluded local civic body elections in Andhra Pradesh, Jagan Reddy’s congress completely wiped out the BJP. Yet there are elements of truth in the report.

Washington’s Freedom House index – has rated India as partly free as a Democracy and placed it in the same bracket as Pakistan. World Happiness Report 2020 by United Nations Sustainable Development Report places India at 139 out of 149 countries featured – and has ranked India below these countries – Libya, 80, Belarus 75, Venezuela 107th Niger, 96, Pakistan, 105, Saudi 21 st.

So when an international research body positions India way below Saudi Arabia for example in the Happiness Index, where a dissenting journalist, a Saudi national can be dismembered by an execution squad and dissolved in acids and where people are beheaded in full public view for violation of Islamic laws and an adulteress can be stoned to death, you are in disbelief that Indians are the least happy in the world and you would wish to trash the research reports. Findings and generalisations born out of statistics can often distort reality. If a man were to hold a red hot iron rod in his left hand and ice in the right hand; he will be scalded on one end and suffer frostbite on the other. But a statistician would say his mean body temperature is nice and warm.

But yet it will be imprudent to ignore these reports.

Many strong leaders easily fall into what Bertrand Russel called The Administrators Fallacy. He pointed out that they are liable to imagine that the state they administer is a tidy and neat organism and homogenous. And they wish to fit men to systems rather than systems to men. Human beings and their communities are infinitely complex and diverse with their desires, traits and proclivities. Diversity, creativity, freedom and liberty are the necessary condition for progress and happiness and the flowering of democracy and civilisation.

India is at a crossroads. Where must India head now? Should Modi be guided by his jingoistic advisors who are advocating a policy of isolation and misplaced muscular nationalism and practice of politics and governance that favours one community over another, and inward-looking self-reliance bordering on hubris? That path may lead India into a “ climate of intellectual .. incest.” as Arthur Koestler said and stunt its growth from “ever-widening thought and action”, and leave a nation ‘fragmented by narrow domestic walls.’

On the contrary, should he pursue building a genuine democracy that will enable a healthy milieu of economic, political, social and cultural worlds that encompasses and nourishes our rich diversity of languages, literature, music and the arts that will lead to a happy and egalitarian society? We can be reminded of a line from Rigveda -“ Let noble thoughts come to us from every side. “

India can be a leading light in the comity of nations by following the latter path and Modi, with his mandate and stature is well placed to lead India into that exalted position.

If he did so, it could be his lasting legacy.

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Views expressed above are the author's own.

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