India’s Colosseum: Politician-gladiators spar over manufactured conflict

The quagmire of a stalled parliament all through the recently concluded winter session, coupled with a motion of no confidence against Vice President Jagdish Dhankar, was more than just an institutional or constitutional crisis. The chaotic situation offered in a concentrated form an insight into the intention and modality of everything that has transpired over the past decade in the guise of governance.

Since the winter session began on November 25, the Opposition held demonstrations every day, demanding an investigation into alleged bribes paid by the Adani Group to secure lucrative contracts. The group’s head, Gautam Adani, is reported to have close links to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party-led alliance on its part also disrupted proceedings, insisting on a discussion about claims that the Congress has conspired with Hungarian-American billionaire philanthropist George Soros to “destablise” India.

Adding to this, the Opposition contended that Dhankar is biased towards the ruling bloc and has failed to act as a neutral referee in his role as chairman of the Rajya Sabha.

Parliament stood converted into a colosseum, with the treasury benches and the Opposition transformed into gladiators to entertain the nation. The ruling bloc was manufacturing conflict to provide amusement so that it could evade discussions on issues of public importance.

The session ended with both sides accusing the other of violence outside Parliament.

Prisoners of war

Despite reducing democracy to a spectacle, the ruling dispensation still believes it is important to win elections. After all, public approval is an essential symbol of democracy. It does not matter what means have been used to obtain these victories.

In the view of the ruling bloc, there is no real need to debate the Opposition. After all, they have already been vanquished and the public verdict on them is known.

The BJP views the defeated Opposition as prisoners of war. They are deliberately ignored, they are insulted, they are sermonised to, and they are dealt with unfairly. This is an essential feature of the script. Treating the Opposition unfairly ensures that they will get agitated, storm into the well of the House and create a ruckus. All this makes for great entertainment.

It also gives the ruling dispensation its cue to create the narrative that the unruly Opposition is obstructing parliamentary proceedings. This allows the treasury benches to read out the rule book and serve up reminders that the House needs decorum if it is to function.

Vice President Dhankar, for instance, has used the commotion as the opportunity to remind the Opposition that the “nation is watching” – a riff on a television anchor’s signature line when he harangues critics of the ruling party by claiming that the “nation wants to know”. Dhankar implies that the Opposition is besmirching the “garima” or dignity of the House.

A majoritarian circus

Adding insult to injury is not only entertaining but also a key part of a majoritarian psyche. Behaving unfairly towards minorities is an essential strategy for majoritarian consolidation.

The treatment being meted out to India’s religious minorities is being institutionalised in the way Opposition members are treated in Parliament. Every dissenting voice is being “minoritised” in the way it is dealt with.

The process of converting the Opposition into gladiators involves devaluing and weaponsing regimes on justice and rights. When a legitimate motion was moved against the illegitimate behavior and conduct of the vice president, the ruling dispensation used the opportunity to float a shallow narrative that this was an insult to the farmers from the Jat community to which Dhankar belongs. This even though the ruling party had no compunctions about using tear gas against farmers protesting the government’s farm laws at Delhi’s borders.

Disagreements are an essential feature of any democracy but in New India, they have been transformed into shouting matches. All conflict is sought to be reduced to a spectacle. The real social disputes of the aggrieved are quickly stifled. Only sectarian conflicts are permitted. Those who choose to align themselves with the victors are rewarded. Choosing to side with the vanquished only brings ignominy, pain, suffering and the attention of the investigative agencies.

Entertainment and violence bring excitement and anxiety. Public reasoning is replaced by mass entertainment. Justice is replaced by the rumbling of the bulldozers as constitutional authorities demolish public institutions.

Even citizens who do not agree with these tactics are condemned to watch the pageant in Parliament in silence because they are time and again reminded that they have given their consent to majoritarian rule. Since they have approved of majoritarian religiosity, they have no option but to fall in line with the actions that follow.

Sanjay Raut, an MP from the Uddhav Thackeray faction of the Shiv Sena, declared that Dhankar is not presiding over Parliament – he is actually running a circus. The majoritarian circus on the streets has entered Parliament.

In all of this, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is rarely present in Parliament. As the Opposition and even MPs of his own party waste the nation’s, he has held himself to be above this petty bickering. Instead, he is busy elevating the global image of the nation. He is working as hard as ever, 18 hours a day. His absence from Parliament is proof of his commitment to the nation and to democracy. He can manage the nation better without the Colosseum that is Parliament.

Ajay Gudavarthy is an associate professor at the Centre for Political Studies at New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University.