Who are we kidding here?

We are a good, self-respecting democracy, and there should be no two opinions about it. We have a fine Constitution, fundamental rights, a legal code left behind by Macaulay, and a judiciary which is safeguarding the basic structure of the Constitution, a role which the judiciary has acquired for itself. We can talk about rights and politics without whispering. We take umbrage when people outside — meaning foreign think tanks — criticise us for our ‘down-sliding democracy’. I was happy to see the Foreign Minister put up a fine defence over a recent such report.

So far so good. But antipathy to such reports, and the brimming over of ‘patriotism’ should not make us myopic. As far back as October last year, the Swedish V-Dem Institute, based in Gothenburg university, had stated that India’s democratic processes were on a path of steep decline. India was almost put in the same league with Brazil, Poland, US (oh those halcyon Donald Trump days!) and Hungary. Brazil under Bolsonaro and USA under Trump were Indian favourites last year, remember. The report talked of ‘shrinking space’ for media, civil society and the Opposition. “India has continued on a path of steep decline, to the extent it has almost lost its status as a democracy,” the report said. Nothing could be more damning. Freedom House, now a bête noir among our right-wing “intellectuals”, also downgraded us as a ‘partially free democracy’ and one under siege. Have we come to this? And if we have, we can at least listen to them without fulminating.

The Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council’s Working Group, in a report, criticised the incarceration of the pregnant Jamia Millia activist Safoora Zargar and stressed on her ‘deprivation of rights’. She is an MPhil student. It called for political prisoners to be ‘released unconditionally’.

Let the world come and see our elections. They are free and fair. But what of the aftermath? MLAs are won over or purchased. How do we explain this phenomena to the world? In Puducherry, a BJP Lt Governor, who had lost woefully in elections against Kejriwal, was given a free hand to stymie the working of an elected government, till the Chief Minister and the Lt Governor were both thrown out. In Delhi, the Lt Governor and CM tussle, which started in 2014, was settled by a five-member Bench of the Supreme Court in 2018, which ruled in favour of the elected government. Now tables are being forcefully overturned through astonishing legislation, which says in effect that ‘Delhi government means Lt Governor’. After two humiliating rebuffs (BJP won just eight seats in a House of 70), power has been snatched, going against the SC ruling. What does the Delhi government do now? Wrap files in red tape with notings, “LG may kindly approve”. And what if he doesn’t? If the BJP were ruling, would such a Bill have been thought of?

Amartya Sen was nudged out of the Nalanda University and Bhanu Pratap Mehta from Ashoka University. What message are we sending to the world? We don’t need the very best, especially if what they say is contrary to the non-intellectual elite that rules us today. How long can the establishment just showcase Swapan Dasgupta? As ex-Bolsonaro supporters, we have not much right to claim we are doing enough for climatology. No wonder our police arrested Disha Ravi, a climate activist, on February 13 on sedition charges! Ten days later, she was released on bail.

I was in Bengaluru the day an upright judge sentenced Jayalalithaa to four years’ imprisonment and a fine of Rs100 crore in a disproportionate assets case. The corruption reeked to high heavens. The High Court acquitted her later on the plea that the trial judge’s calculations were wrong! Today political parties are swearing by her in the coming elections. This too is a part of our democracy.

Reports said that 70,000 men from the Central armed police forces were being sent to West Bengal for election duty. I rushed to my atlas. Were we declaring war? It couldn’t be on our friend Bangladesh. Then a bright idea struck me — happens once a year or so. The Home Minister must have suddenly caught the human rights bug, and so we were moving into Myanmar on behalf of Aung San Suu Kyi. I pondered over the thought, and another bright idea struck me — that meant two in a row! War in erstwhile Burma was unthinkable. The force, 70,000 if you please, was being despatched to fight Mamata Banerjee! The Election Commissioners did not turn a hair. They could be bald, always a possibility. Looks a bit of an unequal contest, 70,000 in camouflage fatigues, Election Commission, formidable Home Minister, NRIs with money, and the army of TMC turncoats against one lady on a wheel chair. Hallelujah!

But much more sensational is the eight-page letter of the former Mumbai Police Commissioner, Param Bir Singh. He alleges that Maharashtra’s Home Minister, Anil Deshmukh, from Pawar’s NCP, asked assistant inspectors, etc, to muster up a hundred crores a month from dance bars and the like. Hain? Weren’t we better off during the days of Sultana Daku? Wasn’t Chicago better off in the days of Al Capone and Sherwood Forest more peaceful, sylvan almost, in the days of Robin Hood and Friar Tuck? So many days have passed, but Anil Deshmukh hasn’t resigned.

Despite these aberrations, the fact is we are the premier democracy in South Asia and I am not being sarcastic.