Why do Indians reward corrupt politicians with votes?
Politics comprises two ingredients: speech and action. So said the Greeks. The Greeks also had a vibrant theatre. Theatre too is compacted of the same elements: speech and action. "Acting" is common to theatre and politics. We say as much, though unwittingly, when we talk of the "theatre of politics".
To the Greeks, politics - and this is sure to surprise almost everyone - was the "art of living together in a city". The word "candidate" (Roman in origin) shares a root with ‘candid’. A candidate was one who had nothing to hide. He was clean. The Roman political aspirant, while canvassing votes, wore a white toga. Purity was his merit.
Like Romans, we too dislike corruption (?). At least we rail against the corrupt. But it is not clear what it is that we dislike more: corruption or purity? The chances are that we dislike purity more. The proof?
Can an honest man (a "candidate" in the Roman sense) win an election today? We denounce the corrupt and, as if to make amends for it, give them our votes. As per the statistics presented in Parliament during the UPA days, 35 per cent of central and state legislators had serious criminal records.
Well, compared to us, the Romans were simpletons. Simpletons are free to see obvious truths. One such truth is that the welfare of citizens is safe only with those who are "clean". It takes smart people like us to believe that our interests are served best by crooks, scoundrels and history sheeters.
This brings us to the real tamasha of Indian politics. Each party justifies its corrupt and criminal assets by insisting that all other parties are equally corrupt. The more "different" a party claims to be, the more it asserts its right to be corrupt like all other parties.
White is not only Roman. It is Indian too. It is on our national flag, the tricolour. Here, too, white symbolises purity. We were better than Romans with colours. So we went a step beyond. Reinforced white with saffron: the colour of sacrifice and uncompromising commitment to good. We are told not to dishonour the tricolour. We have our ideas about this too.
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| It is a rare feat that we support the corrupt and flaunt the flag at the same time. |
Those ideas do not include, even as a faint hint, the truth that compromising the purity of our public life and of our national character amounts to insulting the flag. It is a rare feat that we support the corrupt and flaunt the flag at the same time.
Purity is not merely the absence of corruption. It is not a sterile thing. Purity is the zeal to do what is right and just. The Preamble to the Constitution lists the ingredients of political purity: justice, liberty, equality, fraternity. Purity in politics is the fierce commitment to the welfare and empowerment of the people.
The curse of corruption is not that somebody is getting richer or that the tax havens are thriving because of Indian tax payers’ money. The worrisome proof of our political corruption is the cynical, even hostile, apathy to the people, especially the needy. Between corruption and hatred towards the people, it’s a small step.
Hence it is that we have a duty to distinguish politics of performance from politics as performance. We have abandoned the former and embraced the latter. And, what is worse, we think we have done a smart thing.
To understand this, let us look at the word, "hypocrisy"; a word of Greek origin. In that language "hypocrite" meant an actor. An actor is not what he seems to be. He is all show. He performs within conventions, which have nothing to do with the real life. The hypocrite’s, or actor’s, job is to entertain by sustaining illusions: an arrangement that the people willingly accept.
The actor is a performer. Everything depends on what we mean by ‘performance’. Depending on the context, ‘performance’ can mean two contrary things (a) to do what is useful, as in performing one’s duty (b) to do what entertains, as the actor does.
An artisan - say, a potter - performs by creating earthen vessels. Something tangible, and useful, results from, and survives, his performance. Now think of a stage actor, who also performs. He entertains while on the stage. But nothing concrete results or survives. The curtain comes down. We go home. And return in time for the next show.
Politics too is performance. But what performance? In the run-up to elections, in the stirring, scintillating words uttered, in the promises made, in the hopes raised, in the assurances given, it apes performance of the first kind. But, as soon as government formation takes place, the paradigm shifts to the second model. No artist stays on with the audience or continues to be mindful of them, once the performance is over.
Clarity is a democratic duty. A confused people cannot be sovereign. Those who allow themselves to be led by the nose are not sovereigns but slaves. A confused, willfully blind people should not be sovereign. Those who behave like fellows will be treated like fellows and those who ape buffaloes, accordingly.
We have to be particularly foolish to endorse politics as performance and expect to reap the benefits of the "politics of performance" which drives a wedge - the wedge of hypocrisy - between speech and action. A people, after all, can get only the government they deserve, which is the essence of "freedom of choice".