Post-2014 Climate Change in India

MANY OF US, especially those who are either retired or semi-re­tired, tend to be members of WhatsApp groups, created by those with lots of time on their hands. I happen to belong to at least a dozen WhatsApp groups, including at least six whose messages go directly to the archive folder, awaiting deletion every six months. However, there are at least three groups that I follow quite keenly, although my own interventions are very occasional.

One of these groups is populated by a significant chunk of the erstwhile English-speaking Establishment. I say erstwhile because with the post-2014 climate change in India, the nature of the Establishment has undergone a definite modification. This is not an original observation, and weighty books have been written about the phenomenon, particularly by those who have experienced this dispossession minus a sense of inevitability. Although the political clout of the old Establishment—I prefer to describe it as the ancien régime, a term which is a little more universal than the ‘Khan Market gang’—has waned significantly, it would be an exaggeration to suggest it has become irrelevant. There are many important institutions, particularly Delhi-based ones, where the old connections work.

For the past two to three months, and after Congress defeated BJP in the Karnataka Assembly election, the ancien régime had been gripped by a sense of anticipation. Whether this was merely clutching at straws, or an outcome of some serious study, is not known. However, as an observer of the old Establishment, many of whose members I still count as friends from another era, it was possible to detect a growing excitement. For some, the shift began when many English-speaking worthies, including Raghuram Rajan and representatives of George Soros’ foundations, accompanied Rahul Gandhi in his Bharat Jodo Yatra (BJY). Since the Congress victory in Karnataka happened in the immediate aftermath of BJY, a section of the old elite rushed to the conclusion that Congress had rediscovered its mojo and found a leader who could mount a challenge to Narendra Modi. The point is not that Congress or Rahul Baba had done anything spectacular, but that the ancien régime’s desperation to see the end of Modi rule had prompted them to see some light at the end of the tunnel.

It is significant that the perception of the Modi government hurtling towards its final crisis was not tempered by the hype over the G20 summit in Delhi and the headiness over the Chandrayaan mission. An average citizen would have concluded that coming shortly before the Assembly elections in five states, the excitement over India’s world power status would have had an electoral impact. And I am not even including the flag-waving nationalism that was so integral to the ICC World Cup tournament, including the decisive win over Pakistan.

Future historians may interpret the BJP wins in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh as the culmination of a well-planned strategy, but to a large section of the old elite, it did not seem that way when they woke up on December 3 morning. There was a belief—and you can go over the newspaper files and YouTube clips—that December 3 would mark the beginning of the end of the Modi government.

The expression, “beginning of the end” seems to be used a bit too generously. I found the over-agitated Mahua Moitra using it during her speech to the nation from the steps of Parliament recently.

We know that it didn’t quite work out the way it was planned. We also know that the very features that were cited before polling to argue why Congress was on the ascendant were cited after December 3 to explain the party’s failure. I feel particularly sorry for Bhupesh Baghel of Chhattisgarh, the man whose public relations machinery had projected him as the leader who would show the way. Following his unexpected defeat, he is now being pilloried as the man who overlooked the interests of Dalits and Adivasis and led Congress to an entirely avoidable defeat.

The flicker of hope about India returning to the old days and ways seemed to have died abruptly by the afternoon of December 3. There were even obituaries of the I.N.D.I.A. alliance that had been presented as the best thing since sliced bread only three months earlier. Mahua’s speech may have revived spirits and encouraged the belief that the English-speakers and the south could fight a rear-guard battle, but the reality is that the war (and not merely the battle) has been lost.

Now wait for the funeral orations after the Ram temple is inaugurated next month.

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