Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history.
—Abraham Lincoln, Annual Message to Congress, December 1 , 1862
To the living we owe respect, but to the dead we owe only the truth
– Voltaire
‘The best defense is a good offence’
PM Modi – the Pracharak who became Prime Minister – must have felt that it would be worthwhile to use this adage much popular in warfare, games, business and even politics, to get the lacklustre election campaign going, which is still struggling to create a narrative in its favour.
What he miserably missed despite his deep knowledge of what his followers like to call ‘entire political science’ is another simple advice repeated ad nauseum by thinking people :
An ill thought and ill prepared offence can lead you to a morass of of your own making.
The idea to search for a ‘Muslim League imprint’ on the main opposition party Congress’s manifesto has proved to be such an occasion.
No doubt neither he nor his plethora of advisers and strategists would have imagined that the use of the time tested trump card with a title capital M would boomerang on them and questions will be raised – for umpteenth times – about ‘Parivar’s’ ideological ancestry, what did they do during the historic anti colonial movement or especially its peak the ‘Quit India movement’..
The battle of ideologies, as the unfolding elections are being portrayed / understood, on the Congress manifesto was joined by none other than the 81 year young President of the Congress Party Mallikarjun Kharge.
This story was originally published in countercurrents.org. Read the full story here.