The Indian Express, October 7, 2014
By re-discovering Gandhi as only an icon of cleanliness,
government has taken the first step towards dismantling his legacy.
As the new regime settles into office,
efforts seem to have begun to shape a new thinking process and redefine our
national heritage and the idea of our collective being. While the elements
associated with the ruling party, but operating outside the government, have
enthusiastically and somewhat aggressively started underscoring the change, the
government too seems to have taken seriously the mandate that it has to change
the face of India’s intellectual personality. At least initially, these efforts
seem to have adopted a non-controversial and seemingly consensual tone that can
easily keep convincing the pro-development lobby that Narendra Modi assiduously
cultivated during the campaign. The prime minister’s televised speech on
Teachers’ Day fitted with this approach. The “Clean India” drive too appears to
have evoked equally enthusiastic and consensual reactions. And yet, the Gandhi
Jayanti programme was a clear indication of the change that is coming.
The crucial question is about
symbolism. In the rhetoric that emanated from the prime minister, there was no
hint of any of the radical moves Gandhi made. His penchant for toilet-cleaning
had far too radical social implications.
To understand this change, we need to
unravel the puzzle as to how Gandhi, with whom the Hindu nationalists always
remained in an adversarial conversation even after his death, suddenly becomes
an official icon of the regime based on that same Hindu nationalist ideology.
This could happen only by redefining Gandhi. The government has now initiated
that process. Only by taking Gandhism away from Gandhi, can “Gandhi” be
converted into an icon whose words can be used as official catechism (or, as
the “brand ambassador” of a new clean India!). The aggressive cleanliness drive
launched by the government on Gandhi Jayanti and the marketing of the new
Gandhi need to be seen in this perspective.
Source: CR Sasikumar
Planning ahead for the
150th birth anniversary of Gandhi, this drive promises to denude Gandhi of the
substantive ideas he was associated with. If this effort goes on for five
years, the next generation would remember Gandhi for cleanliness (only).
Already, there are many, even today, who are convinced that Gandhi (only) meant
cleanliness. That is why, from corporates to spiritual gurus, so many have
supported the drive. Suddenly, our corporate giants have learnt from the prime
minister that India needs toilets and they are coming forward dutifully to fund
the drive. As Modi mentioned in his address to adoring audiences of NRIs at the
Madison Square Garden, we need to build an India that “they” (Indians staying/
working in the US) dream of. In direct contrast to Gandhi, who always reminded
us that public life and politics need to be anchored to the dreams and
expectations of the “last man”, we are striving to make an India that would be
liveable for the upper classes, lest they run away to cleaner environs!
But was “Clean India”
Gandhi’s dream? Gandhi surely encouraged and insisted on toilet-cleaning by
(particularly upper-caste) residents of the Ashram. That had symbolism much
beyond cleaning the South Block by venerable officialdom. What was Gandhi’s
dream? As Gandhi was wont to make somewhat complex arguments — often through
his actions — this one, too, had multiple layers. At the most direct level, the
“cleanliness” drive of Gandhi aimed at making sweepers out of the upper castes.
This Gandhian expectation related to the supposed division of (clean and unclean)
labour between the caste Hindus and the “depressed classes”. So, he was not
merely aiming at a “clean India”, but an India where the act of cleaning would
not be stigmatised.
The other symbolism
associated with Gandhi’s shramdaan (voluntary labour) was related to the
dignity of labour and the deeper claim that all labour is equally socially
necessary. If the first claim sought to undercut the caste hierarchy, the
second cut at the roots of the capitalist logic of demeaning productive work
and keeping it underpaid. Therefore, a symbolic and media-centred activity of
celebrities and power-holders on one day surely does not represent the Gandhian
dream. Gandhi was not arguing for shramdaan, but the ethic of doing labour and
according dignity to all work. The economy that puts a premium on non-manual
work is not at all likely to bring about that dignity. And a society that tends
to ensure the concentration of certain communities in low-paid and low-dignity
jobs cannot ensure that dignity by an hour’s work, one day, by the privileged
and the white collared. Moreover, it was not cleanliness but a social order
based on equal status that Gandhi was arguing for. A drive to ensure that rural
India became free of atrocities against Dalits could have been a far better candidate
on the occasion.
But the larger question is
not really about the swachhata abhiyan. If the drive succeeds even partially,
the lives of women and of the poor would certainly be somewhat better. The
crucial question is about symbolism. On October 2, 2014, the nation suddenly,
willingly, suspended reason and history to demote the Father of the Nation. In
the entire rhetoric that emanated from the prime minister, his other ministers,
the media and the obliging intellectuals (artistes included!), there was no
hint of any of the radical moves that Gandhi made. His penchant for
toilet-cleaning had far too radical social implications. The Gandhi that one
comes across in the “Clean India” drive is thoroughly de-radicalised.
And even then, Gandhi was
not only about toilet-cleaning. On October 2, our collective consciousness
seems to have willingly chosen to ignore the other equally radical ideas and
practices of Gandhi. Religious harmony, equality of all religious communities
and acceptance of diversity as the basis of our nationhood were integral to
Gandhi’s way of approaching collective identity. A hundred years ago, Gandhi
began to move Indian society in the direction of a nationhood that was
non-competitive, non-combative and non-exclusionary. Nowhere in the world was
there a precedent for such nationhood. Europe was then deeply immersed in
linguistic or ethnicised nationhood and could think of democracy only within
the context of an exclusionary nationalism. It was at that point that Gandhi
(and one cannot help but mention Nehru) conceptualised and shaped a very
different nationhood. It is that nationhood that forms the central pillar of
India’s present.
However much the ruling
party may want, on the central issue of handling India’s diverse social
heritage and the complications of competitive communalism that are bound to
arise in a democracy, Gandhi had a radical approach that Nehru too shared.
Cleansing Gandhi of that radicalism seems to be the net intended effect of the
abhiyaan to equate Gandhi with cleanliness. By addressing school kids, Modi
sought to replace Chacha Nehru; and now, limiting Gandhi to cleanliness seems
to be the next move in breaking the Gandhi-Nehru legacy.
Clearly, going much beyond
the good governance pledge and the development promise, the new regime seems
set to open a battlefront on ideas. By rediscovering a far too docile and
clean Gandhi, the first step of appropriating Gandhi has been taken. We need to
watch now how the new regime proceeds to dismantle the Gandhi-Nehru legacy.
The writer teaches
political science at Savitribai Phule Pune University
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