A simple plan

Illustration/Uday Mohite

You will say I was asking for it when I clicked on an article titled How To Arrange Your Books Like a Sophisticated Adult (I believe I could still become one). You may imagine sorting suggestions based on mood, connections or even, genre. Nope. The article revealed the secrets of making your book background look good on Zoom - colour coding, removing jackets ‘for natural texture' and making coffee tables by stacking, um, coffee table books.

Sophistication is often presented as removed from earnestness or even sincerity, door ka rishtedar of sophistry, yaniki the use of clever but false arguments. So, this bookshelf hack about appearance over substance was faithful to this interpretation.

The central government would agree. While obituaries filled pages in local newspapers, and the air filled with the anguish of no oxygen, no beds, overflowing crematoria, 300 central government officers attended a workshop on creating a positive image of the government, or how to colour code denial and cruelty. Besides punishing anyone who sent out an SOS, Yogiji set up 700 COVID-19 helpdesks for cows. Now that's masterful image control - tum kya mujhe meme karoge, main khud meme banata hoon.

At a human level it is bewildering that the government thinks even now that projecting an image will work. But this is consistent with Hindutva patterns of projecting grandiose fantasias of the future - India Shining, India Dominating, Selfie With Daughter, Samosa on Central Vista. This notional future is supposed to avenge an abstract past humiliation. Since the pride is rooted in an impending, rather than actual success it remains unsteady, and has to be constantly resuscitated by drumming up a sense of being wronged to manifest itself and so finds its quickest expression in tones of braggadocio, brutishness and bullying.

It's tempting to attribute this solely to Hindutva, but it is also the toxic end of an overall culture of appearances substituting for actuality, and performative social media loops of outrage and templated upliftment.

In the early 2000s, the Shiv Sena ran a campaign called Mee Mumbaikar, an aggressive assertion based on opposing Muslims, Pakistanis, Bangaldeshis and outsiders. Two decades later, it is a remarkably different tone in which people are saying they are proud to be Mumbaikars/Bombayites when the BMC Twitter handle is responsive or they have helpful experiences with COVID war rooms and Jumbo centres (though there are a share of harrowing experiences too). The idea of helpfulness trumps the constant noise of power when the BMC chief says he has a free hand to make decisions.

These are not the positive stories the Speak Positive folks, like Ms Ranaut currently on Instagram-vanvas, want to hear of course. But still, here's one more. Many might have read about how district collector Rajendra Bharud made Nandurbar oxygen self-sufficient, simply by preparing in advance. As he explains it, you realise that actually wanting to help makes you look forward, rather than blame the last 70 years.

Right wing leaders and supporters often blame the past or citizens themselves for the misfortunes and hardship. Yet, when you give people something genuinely designed to help them, they respond with sophistication and poise - the Delhi Metro is a case in point.

Sometimes a simple plan - being good at your work, making an everyday difference - can replace the surging resentments in your breast with genuine pride. Sarkar should try it.

Paromita Vohra is an award-winning Mumbai-based filmmaker, writer and curator working with fiction and non-fiction. Reach her at paromita.vohra@mid-day.com