The ‘Intolerance’ Rancour: Counterblast From the Cowshed

If the #AwardWapsi campaign was all about Bihar, it might have been barking up the wrong tree.

Filmmakers at a press conference returning their National Awards in protest against the government over FTII students strike, in Mumbai on Wednesday. (Photo: PTI)

The #AwardWapsi campaign and the memorandum on intolerance that was presented yesterday to the president are both of a piece. The campaign has rapidly sprouted contributors from home, abroad, and from different walks of life. But with the politically crucial Bihar Legislative Assembly election coming to an end on November 5, will it begin to peter out? Was the campaign really all about Bihar in the first place? Because if it was, it might have been barking up the wrong tree.

In mofussil Bihar, quite taken up by Modi’s promise of vikas and money from the centre, a clamour in Delhi may not be of interest to any nonplussed man, woman or beast.

It is, after all, a noise about the freedom of expression, beef, milk, the undoing of the Nehruvian narrative, isolated Dalit and Muslim killings, the lies told by Nehru about Subhash Chandra Bose, Robert Vadra being investigated, RSS men supplanting faithful Congress nominees, the FTII, Shiv Sena with its black paint, etc.

Black oil paint was thrown at Sudheendra Kulkarni for refusing to cancel Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri’s book launch in Mumbai. (Photo: PTI)

How does all this matter to a Bihari trying to make up his mind between Nitish and Modi?

As a protest, it has certainly been well choreographed. Congress is hoping, no doubt, to degrade Modi’s standing both at home and abroad. But did it bargain for a counter-offensive?

Why has it, in turn, sprung up now? Is the NDA confident of a win in Bihar? Is that why it has chosen this watershed moment to send the Opposition flying back to the margins? Will it truly proceed to place the Nehruvian narrative in the dustbin of history next?

To start with, there was a march of aggrieved Sikhs, still ostensibly hurting from the Congress-organised pogrom in 1984, surging alongside the Congress walk of 140 to Rashtrapati Bhavan on November 3.

And on the coming Friday, there will be a counterblast of artists, actors, intellectuals and more who will be marching up Raisina Hill to condemn the insult to the nation by the Award Wapsis.

Of course, the scattered counter-offensive has been gathering momentum on TV, in the press, and on social media for some days. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has fired several volleys himself of late.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley at the release of the poster for 46th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in New Delhi on Tuesday. (Photo: PTI)

Still, the integrity of the mincing and cheeseparing original protest seems doubtful. It is curious how none of these troubled protestors, many of whom have lost influence with the advent of the Modi government, thought it inappropriate to object to far bigger riots, pogroms and the squashing of individual freedoms over decades past.

But, once the ball was set rolling, they were joined by the ignored and discarded from other sides too. A backbiting LK Advani, his acolyte Sudheendra Kulkarni recently beloved of the Pakistani establishment, Yashwant Sinha, carping, unmindful that his son is a well-regarded minister of state in Modi’s government.

And then there is Arun Shourie, hilariously likening the goings-on as ‘Congress plus Cow’, thereby setting the cat amongst the pigeons. For more comedy, he also averred that the Prime Minister was not the official presiding over a homeopathic apothecary.

Of course, there were those who want to behead the would-be beef eating CM of Karnataka, and send Shahrukh Khan to Pakistan. Besides, former dictator and terrorist trainer, Pervez Musharraf, wants Shiv Sena banned.

In Patna, Shatrughan Sinha, the power-hungry cine actor, said the BJP today is just Modi, Shah, & Jaitley. He visualised them, all three, bunched up collegiately on the same ‘scooter’.

Intolerance of criticism then it cannot be, can it?

Shobhaa De, author (Photo: ANI)

To wit, vintage socialite-cum-author Shobhaa De protesting oxymoronically: People were scared to speak out before but now they are not. Huh?

As it stands, the AwardWapsi/Intolerance movement has all the hallmarks of a well-executed PR offensive. And perhaps it was led on by the fact that BJP has done nothing till now to counter the calumny being heaped upon it.

After all, it was winning every assembly election. This, together with the sarkari Mann Ki Baat, AIR and DD in tow did Modi just fine. There were the well-received foreign jaunts, the “Obama is my friend” Republic Day, the pin-stripe suit. Suddenly, came the rout in Delhi.

This gave the devastated Congress its second wind. If political novice Kejriwal could take on Modi and win, so could the halting, hesitant, Rahul Gandhi.

And so Rahul began, with his ‘Suit Boot Sarkar’ jibe, followed by the Parliament roko thereafter. Modi was stymied.

But if November 8 does throw up an NDA win, it may lead to very different outcomes from the one that Rahul and his handlers anticipated.

(Gautam Mukherjee is a plugged-in commentator and instant analyser.)