History of attacks on our democracy

Parliament House. Pic/AFP file

The assault on Capitol Hill and American democracy should have us rewind to November 7, 1966. On that day, an umbrella organisation of cow-protection groups brought lakhs of people to Delhi, to press upon then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to impose a countrywide ban on cow-slaughter. They drew upon the support of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, particularly its chief Guru Golwalkar, the Jana Sangh, the Hindu Mahasabha, socio-religious outfits such as the Arya Samaj and, yes, a few conservative Congress leaders.

The carnival mood at the protest site turned into rage as Swami Rameshwaranand, an MP of the Jana Sangh, which was renamed Bharatiya Janata Party in 1980, took the mike. Rameshwaranand had just been suspended from the Lok Sabha for stalling its proceedings. "They have turned me out of the House," he said. "Go and teach them a lesson." Waves of cow-protectionists, including naked sadhus with ashes smeared on their bodies, stormed the approaches of the Parliament complex, set ablaze buildings in the vicinity, and laid siege to then Congress president K Kamaraj's residence. The police opened fire. Five people died, the stormtroopers were dispersed, and Indira Gandhi sacked Home Minister Gulzarilal Nanda.

From storming Parliament to lynching in the name of the cow, India's democratic journey has been in the reverse direction to that of the United States. Its people lynched blacks for decades before they assaulted the Capitol last week. Yet the two journeys are united by the theme that those who believe they possess superior rights arising from their claims of having been the original inhabitants of a country are inclined to distrust democracy.

The outgoing President Donald Trump did not turn a large segment of America racist. He only made racism respectable, portraying it as a legitimate response of white supremacists who blame their loss of privileges, dressed as "a way of life", on the numerically superior combination of blacks, immigrants and white liberals who subscribe to the democratic principle of equality. Grievances were the bricks with which white supremacists built an alternative reality, in which conspiracy theories became seductive explanations for their perceived loss of entitlements. The alternative reality acquired a critical mass in the Trump years because individuals who nursed grievances and prejudices were brought together by social media. Trump's unapologetic racism set free the beast of hate lurking in them.

The Hindus who stormed Parliament did indeed revere the cow. Yet their challenge to democracy, too, was based on the nativistic notion that the superior rights of Hindus must not only supersede those of other groups, but also cast aside the scientific and economic logic of culling of cattle to improve agricultural productivity. Hindu rightwing outfits had engaged in propaganda that the Congress government was reluctant to ban the slaughter of cows, without any exemption for health and age, to humour Muslims, sidestepping the reality that Dalits and Adivasis too consumed beef.

The privileging of the rights of Hindus was also an outcome of the alternative reality constructed with the grievances assiduously nurtured against Muslim rulers, who were portrayed to have no interests other than to demolish temples and convert Hindus. Until their rule, India had exemplified religious tolerance, a myth perpetuated by underplaying the violence visited on Buddhists and victorious Hindu rulers abducting the deities patronised by those vanquished. The alternative reality, nevertheless, was conducive for Hindutva to breed in a segment of Hindus the desire to undo the past wrongs.

This desire was weaponised at the time the government introduced reservations for the Other Backward Classes. With the hegemony of the upper castes challenged, a concerted effort was made by the Hindu Right to prevent the numerically superior combination of lower castes, Muslims and caste liberals from emerging. Nearly 28 years before the American Right stormed the Capitol, over a lakh of Hindu Right activists, with BJP stalwarts watching, demolished the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya.

Indeed, democracy is assaulted not only when Capitol Hill and Parliament are stormed, or when armed militants raid such citadels, as they did in Delhi in 2001, but also when its principles are trampled upon. Democracy is assailed not only when the "democratic process" is "subverted through unlawful protests," as Prime Minister Narendra Modi so thoughtfully tweeted last week. Democracy is also subverted when men rise to power over dead bodies, as had happened with the pogrom against Sikhs in 1984 and Muslims in Gujarat in 2002.

America's alternate reality was consistently challenged by the media and public institutions, which did not dither to call out Trump's lies. In India, the media have largely become an echo chamber of the government, which has subordinated public institutions to its whims. This is why conspiracies and delusions abound today.

Protestors have to be Maoists, jihadists, Khalistanis or anarchists, worthy of festering in jail. Political parties critical of the government's policies are dubbed anti-national. Inter-faith marriage is seen as a design to demographically outnumber Hindus. India knew of the science of plastic surgery, stem cell therapy and aerodynamics centuries ago. That greatness is waiting to be recreated by the forces that stormed Parliament in 1966, just as Trump wanted to Make America Great Again.

The writer is a senior journalist

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