NEW DELHI – Renowned author Arundhati Roy warned that Hindu Nationalism could lead to disintegration of India à la Yugoslavia and Russia. Nevertheless, she reposed faith in the people’s ability to eventually resist the “fascism” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bharatiya Janata Party.
During an interview, Incisive Questions, with Karan Thapar on The Wire, the Man Booker Prize winning author and political and human rights activist described the current situation in India as “extremely depressing”. She, however, saw a silver lining in the way the people are striving to retrieve themselves from the abyss.
Calling India a social contract between a number of religions, a number of castes, a number of ethnicities, she said, “This vision of a Hindu nation— on language, one religion, one country — is like trying to distil an ocean and fit it into a bottle of Bisleri. It is a process of extreme violence.”
The Indian author best known for her bestselling novel The God of Small Things said that democracy has been hollowed out and emptied of meaning and its institutions have turned dangerous as she asked what happens in such a situation. “We are in danger of becoming a showwindow of democracy,” she said on being questioned by Karan Thapar about India’s claim to be the world’s largest democracy.
Roy said the office of the prime minister is being abused by the prime minister as she gave examples of demonetisation, announcement of lockdown and repeal of farm laws.
Conceding that crony capitalism is not a new phenomenon, she said it is Modi who pressed the accelerator for the big business to accumulate more and more wealth while most of the country was suffering from poverty and joblessness during the Covid-19 lockdown. “Even capitalist countries,” she observed, “won’t practice the kind of monopoly of capital in the hands of few people we see in India.”
She said the corporate class underwrites Hindu nationalism.
Lamenting targeted violence against Muslims and Dalits by Hindutva mobs before creating a digital spectacle of the heinous act, Roy said, “Over the last five years, India has distinguished itself as a lynching nation.”
She wondered how violence is being carried out against Dalits while the political parties are actually trying to woo their votes. On the other hand, when it comes to Muslims and Christians, the rape, the massacres, the lynchings, the killing, if you are involved in it you will be garlanded and inducted in BJP. “The brutality and polarisation, all of it is so wrapped up in the social structure of this country,” she said.
She also slammed the liberal class for being in denial, and not acknowledging the reality and instead collaborating and colluding and going into euphoria when Modi assumed power in 2014. But, she said, a lot of them have taken brave positions.
On Hijab row in Karnatake, Roy said how was it fine for a chief minister (Yogi Adityanath) of a state to wear saffron robes while Muslim girls are banned from colleges for covering their heads. In this context, she questioned the role of courts in enabling “Hindu majoritarianism”.
On the issue of Kashmir, when Thapar, referring to her recent Jonathan Schell Memorial Lecture, asked what she meant by “freedom”, the human rights activist minced no words demanding that the Kashmiris should be asked what they want even as she critically brought up the conduct of the government in the Valley.
This story first appeared on clarionindia.net