How Chennai drowned sticker politics and saved the city

Over the past three to four days here in Chennai, the flood waters have receded in most places, the rains appear a lot less threatening and people have started taking stock. Almost everyone has a sense of loss, only the degree varies.

But in the midst of all of this, anger against the current government and the political class in general is growing.

These floods have been unlike any most of Chennai experienced. Many from the middleclass and the upper middleclass have, for first time, experienced a natural calamity reach their doorstep and enter their homes.

The resulting empathy has fuelled a citizenry movement that has reached out to places far ahead of the government machinery. Young engineers, IIT graduates, IT professionals, startup employees and their ilk have pooled in their resources and management skills. This organic entity that functions on modern day management principles of efficiency of resource utilisation and quick response - two aspects that all governments can take lessons from.

Meanwhile, the government in Tamil Nadu - the terrible bureaucratic centralised behemoth - has just bickered.

If you want a one paragraph summary: Chennai’s citizenry has neutered the government’s response that is used to operate on a “propaganda is work” approach.

The middleclass has never been the focus of successive governments when it comes to natural calamity and relief measures. The poor - mostly the votebank colonies that are close to the waterways - have been their target (That too has collapsed, but that is for another story).

Each time the AIADMK has led the government since 1991, the ministers and the officials leading the many government departments have always begun statements with the words “Under the direct instructions from”. They have not had any independent voice of their own. Those who speak out of line and by their own volition, get shunted out.

The DMK-led governments too have had similar failings, though to a much lesser degree. At least, the DMK council of ministers HAS the licence to talk in their own voice to the media. But the populist measures of DMK, including the famous “free TV scheme”, was among the first engineered to take stickers featuring the chief minister M Karunanidhi to many homes. AIADMK has attempted it but in a very "in-your-face" fashion.

The media under AIADMK government-led Tamil Nadu, and this includes all newspapers and channels, is under constant scrutiny. Every media report is carefully monitored and there is a great emphasis on who is seen speaking the official word.

Many journalists have traditionally given cover to the officials who speak by creating such vague entities like “civic officials”, “urban experts,” and, my personal favourite “water managers”. This has made discussions very vague and at time questions arise on who the “expert” is - a government spokesperson who is being apologetic for the government or an outside academic who sees what is happening.

During the recent "Jayalalithaa sticker" fiasco, the AIADMK distanced itself by claiming it to be the handiwork of “over-enthusiastic” volunteers. But there is no denying that this party, as with every major party in the state, has grossly misused government schemes in power and public property in general for nauesating levels of propaganda.

#Amul Topical : Tamil Nadu CM’s sticker on relief material. #AmmaStickers #ChennaiFloods pic.twitter.com/2cubREpPRI

— Amul.coop (@Amul_Coop) December 8, 2015

Even during non-rainy months, the political class has constantly put out pavement-obstructing cut-outs along the routes that the leaders takes.

During this Chennai floods, at least on social media networks, the images of the common man - be it the milkwoman who delivered milk in waist deep water or the almost funny mobile video of two Tamil priests describing the floods in Mambalam Canal - have captured imagination in ways no propaganda could.

There are emerging stories by the day, not through corridor whispers but via bold posts in social media, where many are pointing TO instances of how relief efforts are getting delayed while waiting for “banners” and “stickers”.

The sticker propoganda is going to be very TOUGH to shrug from now on for the political class of Tamil Nadu.