In the Name of God, Go!
While thinking about the state of affairs in India, and its politics specially, one is reminded of Cromwell's speech to the Rump Parliament centuries ago, which bears reproduction in full. This is what he said, in April 1653:
The last words were to be repeated by the Indian-born MP Leopold Amery in the House of Commons in 1940, while addressing the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain. He was confronting Chamberlain over his policy of appeasement in the face of the gravest military challenge from Nazi Germany.
If many of the readers thought of the vast majority of Indian parliamentarians and of this government when reading the above lines, that is entirely understandable, indeed is the purpose of this essay. The purpose is, equally, to emphasize that India also faces a very serious security challenge, and has faced one for two decades or more. And yet, no leader has been able to look beyond appeasement, coupled with a willful neglect of our defences. The point, therefore, is deeper than the nature of the charges against the past British leaders, and the uncanny fit with Indian governance today. They say a wise person learns from the mistakes of others: a fool learns from his own mistakes. So what does one say about a person who does not learn even from his own mistakes?
We have seen efforts by civil society to address the challenge of corruption. Well and good. There are many questions about the way they are going about it, and about the nature of some of the representatives of civil society in the drafting panel. However, what is more worrisome is the aspect of national security, which is probably an even more serious challenge facing the country in the near term.
And here's the trouble: as we go forward, we find the likes of Arundhati Roy and Medha Patkar taking a higher profile among the civil society representatives. They are not only quite opaque about their own finances [while demanding transparency from others], but there is no cause hurtful to our national security or to our economic strategy that these people, between them, will not oppose and fight to a standstill.
Our security is under clear and present threat, let this be stated without prevarication. Appeasement in the face of these growing threats will not save the country. Appeasement has never worked in the past, and will not work in the face of the enemies confronting us. Of course, this is not a call to war, as many in the effete establishment would like to suggest. They ignore the fact that our weakness and military unpreparedness are an invitation to our enemies to launch a war against us. The call to strengthen our defences, if acted upon, will prevent war. Through the 1990's and the first decade of this century, we have drawn down our Armed Forces and equipment to the lowest level since the debacle of 1962. This needs to be reversed. Delay is criminal.
And this government still persists in ignoring our defence needs, and apparently keeps hoping that appeasement will bring us peace in our time. Well, it never did, and it will not now. The time is upon us for someone to say to this government - in the name of God, go!
There is a man who can do this. He is LK Advani. Alone among the leaders of this country, he can stand up in the Lok Sabha and say to the Treasury benches - in the name of God, go! The BJP, for all its faults, is still the only political force that can face the security challenges that clearly lie ahead. It will need to explain to the people its abandonment of its core values under Vajpayee, and it will need to get rid of the factionalism at the top. But the people of India are hungry for reasonably effective leadership, and the bar is not too high.
The time is right, and Destiny is offering Advani that rarest of all political gifts - a second chance. For the sake of the nation, he must take it.
It is high time for me to put an end to your sitting in this place, which you have dishonoured by your contempt of all virtue, and defiled by your practice of every vice; ye are a factious crew, and enemies to all good government; ye are a pack of mercenary wretches, and would, like Esau, sell your country for a mess of pottage, and like Judas betray your God for a few pieces of money. Is there a single virtue now remaining amongst you? Is there one vice you do not possess? Ye have no more religion than my horse; gold is your God; which of you have not barter'd your conscience for bribes? Is there a man amongst you that has the least care for the good of the Commonwealth? Ye sordid prostitutes have you not defil'd this sacred place, and turn'd the Lord's temple into a den of thieves, by your immoral principles and wicked practices? Ye are grown intolerably odious to the whole nation; you were deputed here by the people to get grievances redress'd, are yourselves gone! So! Take away that shining bauble there [the mace], and lock up the doors.You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!
The last words were to be repeated by the Indian-born MP Leopold Amery in the House of Commons in 1940, while addressing the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain. He was confronting Chamberlain over his policy of appeasement in the face of the gravest military challenge from Nazi Germany.
If many of the readers thought of the vast majority of Indian parliamentarians and of this government when reading the above lines, that is entirely understandable, indeed is the purpose of this essay. The purpose is, equally, to emphasize that India also faces a very serious security challenge, and has faced one for two decades or more. And yet, no leader has been able to look beyond appeasement, coupled with a willful neglect of our defences. The point, therefore, is deeper than the nature of the charges against the past British leaders, and the uncanny fit with Indian governance today. They say a wise person learns from the mistakes of others: a fool learns from his own mistakes. So what does one say about a person who does not learn even from his own mistakes?
We have seen efforts by civil society to address the challenge of corruption. Well and good. There are many questions about the way they are going about it, and about the nature of some of the representatives of civil society in the drafting panel. However, what is more worrisome is the aspect of national security, which is probably an even more serious challenge facing the country in the near term.
And here's the trouble: as we go forward, we find the likes of Arundhati Roy and Medha Patkar taking a higher profile among the civil society representatives. They are not only quite opaque about their own finances [while demanding transparency from others], but there is no cause hurtful to our national security or to our economic strategy that these people, between them, will not oppose and fight to a standstill.
Our security is under clear and present threat, let this be stated without prevarication. Appeasement in the face of these growing threats will not save the country. Appeasement has never worked in the past, and will not work in the face of the enemies confronting us. Of course, this is not a call to war, as many in the effete establishment would like to suggest. They ignore the fact that our weakness and military unpreparedness are an invitation to our enemies to launch a war against us. The call to strengthen our defences, if acted upon, will prevent war. Through the 1990's and the first decade of this century, we have drawn down our Armed Forces and equipment to the lowest level since the debacle of 1962. This needs to be reversed. Delay is criminal.
And this government still persists in ignoring our defence needs, and apparently keeps hoping that appeasement will bring us peace in our time. Well, it never did, and it will not now. The time is upon us for someone to say to this government - in the name of God, go!
There is a man who can do this. He is LK Advani. Alone among the leaders of this country, he can stand up in the Lok Sabha and say to the Treasury benches - in the name of God, go! The BJP, for all its faults, is still the only political force that can face the security challenges that clearly lie ahead. It will need to explain to the people its abandonment of its core values under Vajpayee, and it will need to get rid of the factionalism at the top. But the people of India are hungry for reasonably effective leadership, and the bar is not too high.
The time is right, and Destiny is offering Advani that rarest of all political gifts - a second chance. For the sake of the nation, he must take it.
posted by psv brahmanand | 10:13 AM
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