Ram Mandir, LAC, COVID-19: Is Perception Shutting Out Reality?

Video Producer: Shohini Bose, Debayan Dutta
Video Editor: Purnendu Pritam
Cameraperson: Abhishek Ranjan

Yeh Jo India Hai Na… yahan perception battle ko jeetna mumkin hi nahi, aasaan bhi ho gaya hai… Even as some real battles are either being lost or just not being fought. In fact, a lot is being done to keep us looking away from some realities and to keep us glued to several carefully put together perceptions instead.

Here's the most recent example – this drawing of Modi leading Lord Ram back to Ayodhya. It says a lot. A towering Modiji, helping a chota balak Ram to return to a splendid Ram Mandir to mark his janmasthan, his birthplace.

PM Modi Performed Bhoomi Pujan At Ayodhya: Perception Altered, Reality Ignored

This, along with the PM leading the prayers at Ayodhya, in a nationwide telecast that saw record audiences, tries to cement the perception of Modi as Hindu hriday-samrat, the man who will bring, nahi, who has brought Ram Rajya back to India.

Care was taken that apart from RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat, Modi would not share this glory with any of his BJP colleagues, not even with the original architect of the Ram Mandir project – LK Advani.

Sample these tweets:

Almost every tweet is thanking not the BJP, not the Sangh, but directly, only PM Modi.

From ‘National Shame’, this was the India Today magazine cover 30 years ago, today perception has been altered. And the Ram Mandir is now a symbol of Hindu pride, seamlessly merged with the idea of national pride.

The law of the land still considers the bringing down of the Babri Masjid a crime, for which LK Advani, Uma Bharati and others are still facing trial. But that reality seems to no longer matter.

We Are More Polarised Than Before

If we part this purdah of perception, and look at reality, we can see that today we are more polarised than before.

Northeast Delhi saw violence in which most victims were Muslims, yet most of those arrested were also Muslims. Those organising peaceful protests, have been charged under laws meant for terrorists.

Kapil Mishra and Anurag Thakur’s direct calls for violence were ignored, while mere conspiracy theories were considered enough to file FIRs and make arrests.

On Eid, just days ago, a Muslim man was kicked, beaten with a hammer in broad daylight, while the police watched. Meanwhile in February, the policemen who assaulted Faizan, forced him to sing the national anthem – forget about charges, even the names of those policemen are not known, despite them being seen on camera.

Caste violence too, remains a daily reality, so the idea of nationwide Hindu hriday, beating as one, for the supreme leader – that too, is just perception… not reality...

Perception Management on the LAC Too

On the LAC too, with China, there’s perception management. First, soon after the killing of 20 of our soldiers, the PM said no incursions had taken place into Indian territory. But then, satellite images confirmed multiple Chinese incursions at Galwan valley, Pangong lake and Depsang. The Ministry of Defence put up a note on its website confirming China’s transgressions, but then mysteriously that note vanished.

Negotiations over several weeks got us nowhere.

But in a perception coup, the government banned Chinese apps like TikTok and others. Godi media called it a digital surgical strike.

And so, even though the Chinese have been occupying Indian soil at Pangong lake and Depsang in Ladakh for four months, this is what an India Today survey shows:

But here’s the worry – with many of us unaware of the facts, or ignoring them, the government may soon believe that winning the perception battle is enough, instead of actually delivering on key issues.

India’s GDP Has Crashed, Government Insists We’re Fine

Consider the economy – India’s GDP has crashed. but far from admitting to mistakes, the government insists we’re fine. RBI Governor Urjit Patel, despite being handpicked by the government, resigned in December 2018 after not agreeing to transfer RBI’s cash reserves to the Centre, a move he considered fiscally irresponsible.

Former RBI Deputy Governor Viral Acharya, recently explained why he quit before his tenure ended –

Clear evidence of the government’s obsession with short-sighted perception management. Even as the economy actually crashes further.

COVID Pandemic Also Saw Perception Management

With COVID-19 too, we often saw perception management – bartan bajao, candle jalao, more than actual management of the crisis. The lockdown was announced without anticipating the migrant worker crisis. Despite images of lakhs of them on the roads, little was done to help them, and too late.

That our lockdown failed to flatten the curve, is not discussed. That we now have more deaths daily than any country is not discussed. Why states like UP and Bihar have dismal testing levels even 5 months into the crisis, is not discussed. Why India today has the highest number of cases every day – which is reality, not perception – but it is not discussed.

This is how veteran news editor TN Ninan sums it up –

“This government does not admit to failure or like its failures being pointed out. When faced with unplanned outcomes (read: bad news), it falls silent (as over rising COVID numbers), or plays with the numbers (as with the GDP), or wraps itself in the national flag and accuses critics of being anti-national.”

Institutions That Must Be Enforcing Reality Checks On Government Are Looking Away

The other big worry is, institutions that should be enforcing a reality check on the government, are looking away. For instance, the Supreme Court on Kashmir:

While for the BJP government, it was a core ideological aim, what’s the Supreme Court’s excuse for not stepping with checks and balances?

And yet, frankly, who am I to question the courts, when so many of my colleagues in the media have rolled over and become godi media.

Yeh Jo India Hai Na… to succeed we don’t just need a strong leader, we need a strong country. And to achieve that, we must believe only reality, and not manufactured perceptions.