A charter for liberal indians

A charter for liberal indians

Dear Indian liberals, the photograph of a blood-soaked father of three urgently negotiating for his life minutes before he was beaten to death in a Jharkhand town, has horrified you. It reveals the impunity (दण्ड मुक्ति) a mob enjoys when violence goes unpunished. Is the rule of law becoming only weak liberal wishful thinking in times of cow hooligans (उपद्रवी) and enraged mobs enforcing street retribution (punishment inflicted on someone as vengeance for a wrong or criminal act.)?
The entire liberal project, you're being told, is apparently dead. This is supposed to be the era of macho (मर्दाना) patriotism in which those arguing for a dialogue with Kashmiri stakeholders or talks with Pakistan or those who question religious nationalism, are shouted down as `anti-nationals' and `jihadists'. Driven into silence by an anti-minority nationalistic fervor (जोश/तीव्रता), the idealistic middle class, once the great bedrock of India's freedom movement, is missing in action. The potential loss of idealism among the middle class can become a tragedy of monumental proportions. But it's not too late to recover it if liberals speak up strongly.
Indian liberals, you're told that you belong to a small `westernized elitist (उच्चवर्गवादी) club' and have `colonised mindsets'. This is not true. Numerous liberal protestors who down the decades have fought for progressive values have hardly been disconnected and exclusive. Those who stood by Tamil author Perumal Murugan after he was slapped with criminal complaints, rationalists like Kalburgi, Pansare and Dabholkar, those who fought for women's empowerment like Ela Bhatt, for farmer's rights like Sharad Joshi, to deepen democracy at the grassroots like Sandeep Pandey and Aruna Roy, none of them were or are `westernised elitists'. The rooted salt-of-the-earth liberal is found in every Indian small town and city.
Indian liberals, your quest is individual freedom. Your ancestors are Gandhi, Tagore, Ambedkar, Nehru (who was a social liberal if not an economic one) even a C Rajagopalachari, all of whom believed in the individual over dominant state power. You would like to see citizens' freedom enhanced responsibly and lawfully. You have always chafed (चिढ़ होना/खीजना) at controls, both economic and social. You don't like theocracies or morality cops.
The nationalist Right-wing (like the ideological Left) believes in a gargantuan (विशाल) state machinery, in unbounded state power and in the state's superior rights over the individual, as reflected in the attorney general's recent comment that “You may want to be forgotten but the State doesn't want to forget you.” The AG of a Hindu nationalist government sounded a bit like a Soviet commissar! Indian liberals instead have always stood against rampaging (उन्मादी) state power and for individual rights. Those who protested against the Emergency, against the Anti-Defamation Bill, against bans on books and movies and those who campaigned for citizens' rights, they have all held firm against brute (निर्दयी/कठोर) state authority.
Liberals are called `anti-national'. But the greatest patriot of all, Mahatma Gandhi was India's original liberal. Gandhi was always deeply apprehensive of state power and did not believe in enforcing his personal ideology through government agencies. A devout Hindu, he never wanted a law banning cow slaughter. For Gandhi individual rights of others were greater than his own beliefs. In fact, he had unlimited faith in the power and goodness of individuals, which is why he saw the freedom struggle as a lift off into personal as well as political regeneration.
To Gandhi, the means were always much more important than the ends. He called off (रद्द करना/स्थगित करना) the 1921-22 non-cooperation campaign because it descended into violence and failed to be the just means to a cause. For the liberal, means are always just as important as ends: because once the ends are achieved, the means shape the nature of the victory. Indian liberals, don't let anyone tell you that you don't represent a mighty tradition. You represent the tradition of liberalism in the Upanishads, in the Bhakti movement and the one embodied by Gandhi and the Constitution. It's a heavy duty legacy that is neither confined to a small minority, nor elitist, nor westernised nor simply restricted to any political party. But with such a strong tradition why then are liberals losing out to the votaries (समर्थक/अनुयायी) of majoritarianism?
That's because the liberal language has become mired (फँसा रहना) in, as newly elected French President Emmanuel Macron pointed out, negativity and fear. It's become too focused on denigrating (निंदा करना) and demonizing (make wicked and threatening.) opponents. Instead, the Indian liberal language should draw upon Gandhi and propose something positive, open and persuasive, a language that stimulates goodness and a sense of justice in every citizen and encourages every citizen to be her best not her worst self. It should encourage private enterprise, not crush or overprotect it and seek ways out of poverty for globalisation's victims. Above all, it should recognise the freedom of every citizen to pursue his or her goals without harming others.
Liberal Indians, why should you be fearful? Above your heads floats the spirit of the founders of constitutional India, a spirit that has always opposed those who insist on dress codes, behaviour codes, romance codes, bans on free speech and restrictions on religious, intellectual, dietary and sexual freedom. Confronted with a control-freak state, once again it's up to you to speak up against those who seek control of what you eat, study, watch, wear, speak or worship, in the name of their version of `nationalism'.
This is not the time to shy away or secede (से अलग होना) or retreat (move back) from the debate. This is the time to speak boldly and constantly on every current issue, and emphasize your version of patriotism, grounded in law and respect for all faiths. It's time to proudly say yes I am a patriotic Indian and I am a liberal.