Ponmala

India has got a new parliament house costing 1200 crores, shaped in the triangular shape of the RSS flag, inaugurated on the birth anniversary of Hindutva acharya Savarkar and the funeral day of Nehru, the architect of democratic India, timed to ensure a third term for Modi after the upcoming national elections. The construction for it was started when Delhi was wreaking of the stench of burning corpses of those who had fallen victim to the Corona pandemic. Its construction site was exempted from the Corona lockdown that kept the whole nation within doors. That was symbolic of the preponderance the Modi government gave to soaking the nation in Hindutva ideology over people’s lives and wellbeing.
The Modi government is presenting the New Parliament complex as the symbol of a new beginning for Indian democracy. New beginnings are always to be welcomed, provided they signify progress, which is hardly the case here. The day chosen for the inauguration of the new parliament had a message to convey – the funeral of India’s modern secular democracy, for which Nehru laid the foundation and which the nation nurtured for six decades, and the ushering in of a Brahminic theocratic state. It was also symbolic of Modi government’s avowed intention to bury India’s democratic ideals and to enthrone the regressive Hindutva ideology. On the eve of the inauguration, Modi received the sceptre of power from Saivite sanyasis, symbolising the return of Rama Rajya and the coronation of Modi as the modern day Rama. The symbolism of the inaugural ceremony was so regressive that it wiped out all the social progress our nation has made post independence. The return of Rama Rajya will be complete if Modi hands over the defence of our country to Bajrang Dal – the monkey army.
Attracted to the Hindutva ideology of the RSS as a young boy, it became Modi’s breath of life. At age twenty-two, it dragged him out of his three-year-old marriage and set him on a mission to win the nation to it. And when the gods made him the Chief Minister of Gujarat and later the Prime Minister of the country, making Hindutva the nation’s breath of life became his topmost priority. His second priority was to earn a place in world history by building pompous monuments a la erstwhile monarchs; the new parliament building, the Ram Temple he has facilitated to build and the gigantic Patel statue are intended to serve that purpose.
Modi failed to achieve in time a game-changing feat that would have crowned the inaugural function. He would have very much wanted to convene the two parliament houses on that very day to adapt a new Hindutva based constitution and immediately declare India a Hindu Rashtra. The regret for not achieving that in time would have gnawed at him as he went through the inaugural ceremony. Despite all the diabolical games he played to achieve it, he missed it by a whisker. The humiliating defeat that he suffered in Karnataka just days ago might keep it beyond his reach, unless Lord Ram bestows it on him as a thanksgiving gift after the inauguration of his temple in Ayodhya.
If only Modi understood that the Taj Mahal did not help Shahjahan to go down in history as a great ruler! That luckless king died as a prisoner. In Indian history we only know of two monarchs who were called great – Asoka the Great and Akbar the Great. Their reigns are considered golden periods in Indian history. Under them their subjects enjoyed all around progress and peace. And that is why they are called ‘Great’, and not because they built splendid monuments. The one past ruler with whom future generations will compare Modi is Muhammed Bin Tughlaq, whose capricious decision to shift his capital from Delhi to Daulatabad caused untold hardships to its residents. Modi has capricious decisions galore to his credit. For the role Modi played in the Gujarat pogrom of 2002, he may also be compared to the Biblical king Herod who ordered the killing of all the male infants in his kingdom. The one monument for which Modi may also be remembered is the 100 crore-wall that was built in Gujarat to block the view of slums when Donald Trump visited that state. Hiding India’s poverty and boosting own image with media hype are an obsession for Modi. Long live the Maharaja of India’s teeming poor!
Nostalgia for the past often hold organisations and nations hostage to the past. Creativity must break out of the cocoon of fossilised tradition and take wings. If that had not happened, the world as we know it would not have come into existence. We would have still remained cave men and hunters. That would have been better than modern man’s nostalgia taking him back to the cave and bow and arrow. Unfortunately, the ceremony organised on the occasion of the inauguration of our new parliament building is a step in that direction. It augurs well for the nation that 21 opposition parties boycotted it. They should now stick together and fight the upcoming national elections together and thwart Modi’s effort to saffronise our constitution and declare India a Hindu Rashtra.