The Regime In Iran Is Tottering

THE ONLY TIME I visited Iran was some 27 years ago when I accompanied then External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh to Tehran. It was a very short visit— three nights to be precise—and, unfortunately, I didn’t get an opportunity to go beyond the capital.

There have been other occasions to make short visits to exotic places, but the visit to Tehran remains firmly etched in my memory. It is important to narrate the reasons why Iran was important to me.

I was a student in London from the late-1970s to the early-1980s and spent a lot of time engaging with the motley group of foreign students who were either serious scholars or, in many cases, political activists who just wanted an excuse to prolong their stay in the UK. A disproportionate number in the latter category were either from South Africa—then under Apartheid rule—or Iran, ruled by the Pahlavi dynasty. The Iranian students weren’t terribly sociable, apart from a small clutch of extremely pretty women who came from privileged backgrounds. The rest of the Iranians invariably huddled together and kept aloof. They certainly weren’t very much in evidence in the evenings when a lot of us took advantage of the convivial atmosphere of the college bar. This was very unlike the South Africans who were extremely clubbable.

Initially, I imagined the aloofness of the Iranian students was a result of their relative unfamiliarity with the English language. It soon became clear that this wasn’t entirely so. The real reason was their dread of Savak, the secret police of the Shah that made it its business to monitor the students and identify the subversives. It was always tempting to dismiss the fear as paranoia. It certainly wasn’t. I can vouch for the fact that these students—nearly all of whom hated the Shah’s regime with a frightening ferocity—were truly wary of Savak informers lurking in the colleges. The last thing they wanted was that their families back home would be targeted and persecuted.

The fear gradually dissipated after Iran was engulfed by protests against the regime. There were huge marches in solidarity with the Iranian people, mainly organised by the Left. I participated in many of them, devoured the literature produced by the exiled groups and interacted with the young Iranians who looked forward to a free Iran. These Iranians were nominally Muslims but in the main most of them were confused radicals whose principal focus was anti-Shah. A very large number of these students went home to Iran after the revolution that brought in the Islamic Republic under Ayatollah Khomeini. In time, I got to know that many of these idealists had fallen foul of the Revolutionary Guards and were now in jail. I think most of the pretty girls from the well-off families didn’t even bother returning home. They became part of the Iranian diaspora that simply bided their time.

My only visit to Tehran convinced me that it was wrong to equate Iran with an oppressive theocracy. The enforced social regimentation was unquestionably suffocating but it was coupled with a freedom that people had chalked out for themselves—despite the mullahs. The other feature of Iran was the fact that urban women were quite easily the most dynamic section of society. It was clear that they propelled the economy, and, given half a chance, they would run the country much better than the plodders preferred by the Ayatollahs.

I am reassured that my observations weren’t off the mark. We may not have anticipated the Pahlavi revival, but there is no doubt that Iran is witnessing a revolt against the black-robed theocrats. It is the young who are leading the protests. But what is particularly striking is that it is the women who are at the forefront of the emphatic rejection of all the symbols of gender-based oppression.

The Israelis had read the tea leaves much before the rest and had reached out to all those who wanted change in Iran. The deep penetration of Mossad agents inside Iran has invited grudging appreciation from everyone, particularly after the surgical strike that eliminated the Supreme Leader on the first day of the latest round of the conflict. What must be kept in mind is that Mossad’s success doesn’t imply an over-supply of treacherous Iranians. It means that the disgust against the regime is so profound that people are anxious to show their rejection of the spurious Palestinianism that the mullahs flaunted to the world. The regime in Iran is tottering. It may be kept nominally alive by the Trump administration to avert a repetition of Iraq and Syria, but it is only a matter of time before the Islamic Republic comes crashing down.