Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi filed his nomination papers from Vadodara Lok Sabha seat
“Love
can flourish only as long as it is free and spontaneous; it tends to be
killed by the thought of duty. To say that it is your duty to love
so-and-so is the surest way to cause you to hate him or her.”
― Bertrand Russell, Marriage and Morals
The ongoing national polls in India have been one of the most acrimonious and telegenic
battles over ideological righteousness,
with political leaders, in the name of taking up the cudgels on behalf
of the dispossessed, simultaneously ushering in a phenomenal erosion of
decency and norms.
The ongoing battle
reached a new low when the Indian National Congress, one of the oldest
political formations that traces its roots to India’s independence
struggle, approached the Indian Election Commission through its senior
leader,
Kapil Sibal (who, incidentally, is the Union Law Minister), over the issue of the marital status of Narendra Modi.
Mr. Sibal requested the Commission to take suitable action against the
BJP leader for having concealed information and for not having furnished
details about his marital status in the election affidavits filed by
him in the past.
This development comes in
the wake of the Supreme Court judgment and the new guidelines of the
Election Commission of September 2013, which makes it mandatory for
political candidates to provide complete details in their affidavits. Consequently, for the first time Mr. Modi has
officially declared himself as a married man, which was already an open secret in Gujarati society.
The
revelation of his wife’s name in an affidavit filed before the Election
Commission, along with his nomination papers for Vadodara Lok Sabha
seat, has opened a tinderbox of patriarchal bias, reinforcing the fact
that women in India continue to be perceived and projected as symbols
and carriers of community pride.
The public
disclosure of the marital status provided ideal political ammunition
for Mr. Modi’s detractors, who have sought to confront him over the
alleged betrayal and desertion of his wife, thereby questioning his
credentials for the post of Prime Minister, and over his electoral
promises concerning the empowerment of
Indian women.
What
was missed by most of the detractors was the very futility of
fossilizing the existence of two individuals who had amicably reconciled
with the inevitability of tradition and patriarchy. The only ray of
hope in this entire controversy seems to be their resolve to move ahead, notwithstanding their individual and community’s
social location in a traditional society governed by a state which is confronted with modernity.
This
is certainly an exception to the Great Indian Middle Class audience
that continues to get baptized in the age-old Victorian morals and
retains its adherence to eurocentric values through educational
institutions bequeathed by its former British rulers that continue to
operate as the ideological apparatus of the Indian state in present
settings. The larger picture missed--Mr. Modi’s marital status--by
telegenic political rivals in this otherwise short-lived brouhaha was an
abdication of core issues in confronting one’s political opponents.
The
clarification provided by Mr. Modi's elder brother confirms the
inevitability of certain social groups breaking free from the traditions
embedded in their primordial identities, when they lack the requisite
social capital and
economic empowerment.
Since these issues date back to around five decades ago, the compulsion
to adhere to such social norms was acute and social ostracism could
have been the only logical conclusion for individuals and families not
subscribing to community norms and interdependence. Moreover, the facts
need to be analyzed in the context of Mr. Modi’s poor social stature and
traditionally orthodox family background in his earlier days, before he
undertook his political journey. Interestingly, the fact that it was a
marriage of minors and not of two consenting adults is selectively
brushed aside in the media’s
political discourse.
However,
one could argue that the Supreme Court’s guidelines need to move
further towards consonance with ‘modern times’ and to extract
information from Indian political parties and their great leaders
concerning their relations even outside the institution of marriage, and
about children born both within and outside of wedlock, rather than
seeking to emasculate them with general queries about their marital
status.
The recent court ruling over the paternity suit against veteran former Congress leader
ND Tiwari is a case in point. It has merely highlighted the duplicity practiced by the Indian political class since the
Nehruvian years, unlike their French counterparts who have displayed enough grace to acknowledge their conduct in public. In
the Indian scenario, it is easy to camouflage these types of
transgressions for symbolic purposes behind the façade of the
institution of marriage, which is protected by the predominant male
patriarchy of the nation. The BJP’s admonition of the Congress party’s
scion over his personal comments on Modi’s marital status merely
highlights what has continued to be perceived as an unwritten code. The
open secret about the lives and the squabble within the
Nehru-Gandhi family over the inheritance of legacy, dynasty and identity is suggestive of this code.
Such
acts not only seek to reflect a lopsided understanding of the nation,
but also clearly seek to reinforce traditional norms favouring the
subjugation of
Indian women.
The political discourse of some political parties seeks to embed the
conventional order that ensures the subordination of women and their
objectification at the service of the
male-driven social and political order.
Finally,
what would have been the terms of reference for the political
discourse, if the person in question had origins from society’s upper
caste demographic?
The present hullabaloo
is clearly an unpleasant diversion from the core issues of Indian
electoral politics. This development is certainly an open invitation to
unravel more secrets of an increasingly bizarre kind and much more
uncomfortable truths across the Indian political spectrum, causing more
upheavals in the nation.
