The Hindu has awakened, now what?

Follow TNM's WhatsApp channel for news updates and story links.The most profound irony of majoritarian politics is that it ends up destroying the very ‘majority’ it vowed to protect. This fundamental contradiction connects right-wing demagogues across time: from Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini to our neighbour Mahinda Rajapaksa. These men promised their supporters racial supremacy, economic success and restoration of national pride. But they ended up burning in their own bonfires.Narendra Modi is fast becoming the latest addition to this list as all Indians – cutting across caste, class, gender, sexuality, religion, regional divides and ethnicity – begin to wake up to the consequences of his disastrous years in power as the Chief Minister of Gujarat and the Prime Minister of India. There is an overwhelming sense that everything has collapsed in India, not just the education system. Not just secularism, social justice, press freedom, human rights, constitutional morality, the sanctity of elections, federalism, free speech and all those other foggy lefty idealisms. The economy, the rupee, border security, public health, environment and infrastructure, law and order, and international relations. India is globally ranked fourth in terms of oil refining capacity. The PM’s home state also boasts the world’s largest single-site refinery (owned by the Ambanis). Yet, not even the quality of fuel has survived the overall collapse in standards. Even the donation box of the grandest temple dedicated to the dearest of Hindutva gods wasn’t spared. Among the supporters of the Gen Z uprising are those devotees who believe that Lord Ram Lalla Virajman has cursed this government. The situation gives a twist to the famous refrain from the Nazi era, “When they came for the communists, unionists and Jews, I did not speak because I wasn’t a Jew, communist or unionist.” When Hindutva came for the Hindus, they set the whole house on fire. The man who claimed to be non-biologically born has now become a national joke thanks to the same people who were once part of his ‘divine fellowship’.What does this mean for those millennials who lost their youth fighting to see a day like this? What does this mean for battles that have lasted generations? Importantly, what shape will things take from here? What’s at stake is the legacy of a long struggleOne can see why many veterans of progressive people’s movements are guarded about this historic moment. They aren’t sure how long this will last and how much it will change India. They have lived long enough to know that every revolt is not a revolution. Yet, they are not entirely sure which one this is.  It is reasonable for them to ask if the millions who have taken to the streets across the country will rise again when Muslims, Christians, Dalits and Adivasis are persecuted. Will those who are today holding Bhagat Singh posters and mocking crony capitalists like Adani and Ambani join the class war? Will those who have discovered the Jai Bhim slogan now support reservations and additional safeguards for lowered castes in jobs, education and electoral politics? Will the gender-bender generation challenge the patriarchy of the Brahminical kind? It is clear that these millions will not just go back to sleep in case Dharmendra Pradhan is sacked. Even if they end up uprooting the BJP from power, will it end the fundamental contradiction in Indian politics that gave rise to Hindutva in the first place? These are not illegitimate concerns, particularly because they are coming from the people who have made extreme sacrifices to stand up for causes that are unpopular even among the oppositionThe progressive people’s movements of India, particularly from Left and anti-caste traditions, have ample reason to be especially anxious about the future. The modern anti-caste and Left movements were born alongside the anti-colonial nationalist movement in South Asia. In the lead up to independence, the relationship between these radical movements and the mainstream freedom struggle constantly toggled between contest and cooperation. With the exit of the Europeans, the anti-colonialists from the ruling castes degenerated into Ethno-nationalists. Their politics partitioned the most populated region in the world into false nationalities. The BJP alone is not responsible for turning India into a Hindi-Hindu-Hindutva nation. They inherited a country where the UAPA, AFSPA and FCRA laws were already in operation. Trade unionism, cow slaughter and the fight for Jal-Jangal-Jameen had been criminalised. The cultural groundwork of Muslim stereotyping had already been laid, godmen were already influential, and farmer suicides were already an epidemic. Long before the current regime took power, the public sector, healthcare and education had been served up for privatisation. Affirmative action had been brazenly hollowed out, and government policy was already being guided by multinational cartels and domestic crony capitalists.March for Rohit VemulaThose who fought this degeneration of the Indian state at every step have reason to be worried about the opposition coming back to power, like in Bangladesh. All these concerns are legitimate at a time like this. But what is unreasonable is the expectation of ideological purity from a spontaneous uprising of the masses. If this revolt is to bring change, somebody will have to receive the baby that has floated up in a bulrush basket. This infant could be the Moses that liberates us from the rule of Pharaohs.  From revolt to revolution One of the defining features of the emerging world order is that the fight against fascism is getting serious. But in this emotionally turbulent time, there isn’t much nostalgia for elites of the old order. Mainstream bipartisan politics is no longer attractive.India faces what is today a global question before electoral democracies. What’s the point of defeating the right wing when the centre has moved right and the traditional Left is bereft? Umar Khalid at a protest march The spontaneous 1789 uprising in France, which started with the famous ‘Storming of the Bastille’, did not immediately become the French Revolution. It took a few more years and a lot more bloodshed before the monarchy was finally uprooted and a new charter was adopted with Liberty-Equality-Fraternity as its clarion call. Vladimir Lenin spent his youth convincing people that the conditions in Russia under the Czar were ripe for a revolution. He was all but dismissed as a false prophet and was living in exile in Zurich in the weeks before Russia turned upside down. Deeply demoralised, he spent his days gloomily lecturing young socialists in Zurich that he would never see the proletarian revolution in his lifetime. The father of the first communist revolution was completely blindsided when the February 1917 revolt began in Petrograd, and the Tsar abdicated days later. But it still took another six years and a civil war with survivors of the old order for Lenin and his Bolshevik party to establish the new soviet socialist republic. The Gen Z protestors have shown what radical love can look like. They give hope to the belief that revolutions need not necessarily be bloody. But the spontaneity of this moment has to be tempered with a cause larger than the resignation of the education minister or the end of the Modi regime.The lessons to be imparted Who will connect the dots between the NEET paper leak and the privatisation, saffronisation and overall fall in the quality of education? It is touching to see them invoking Bhagat Singh, Ashfaquallah Khan and Ramprasad Bismil. But who will introduce them to the icons of the second freedom struggle that started after the Europeans left?Who will tell this generation that they have inherited the legacy of Anitha, Rohith Vemula, Payal Tadvi, Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam? The Hindus who feel cheated by Hindutva need to be saved from the alluring politics of soft Hindutva as well as liberal Brahminism. They need to be made aware of their chains. Aware that their spiritual and economic salvation can only be achieved through fraternities with other communities. That all their problems are connected to just two things – Capitalism and Brahminism.Those who are critical of the apolitical nature of the nationwide protests could wallow and lose this historic opportunity. Or, they can find ways to build a genuine connection with this new generation.They still need to be educated in Marxism, Ambedkarism, and feminism, even though they already embody the spirit of these ideologies. They need an introduction to the scriptures. If imparting this education requires conducting ideology classes during a cosplay event, let’s go dressed as The Avengers!Views expressed are the author’s own.