By Nalini Ranjan Mohanty
There is a distinction between the government and the state\ nation. But Piyush Goyals of the world are blissfully ignorant of that distinction. Doesn’t that portend a danger for a vibrant democracy?
I watched an interview of railway minister Piyush Goyal on India Today TV recently. Rahul Kanwal, the host, began the discussion with a question on the death toll in Balakot. Goyal blew his top, chastised Rahul for having been sold over to the anti-national narrative of the opposition parties. I was happy that instead of caving in, Rahul gave it back, telling the minister that he did not need a certificate for his nationalistic credentials from a politician.
It is important that in a democracy the pseudo-nationalists are put in their place. They tend to equate the government with the nation. If you ask a critical question to the government, they dub you as an anti-national.
There is no denying that the Pulwama massacre was a man-made disaster; the tragic killings did happen because of the colossal failure of the central government, which is currently lording over Jammu and Kashmir as well. It was a massive goof-up by the intelligence.
How could a young native Kashmiri suicide bomber escape thousands of prying eyes in a highly militarised state and manage to liase with a Pakistan-based terrorist organisation like Jaish-e-Mohammed and load such a large quantity of explosives in a vehicle without detection is a serious question. But if you raise it, you are branded as anti-national.
Are the managers of the security set-up so dunderheads that they allowed a large convoy of 80 vehicles – a carrying 2500 CRPF jawans – travel in a single file? If that was an operational imperative, why wasn’t the route sanitised?
But if you ask these inconvenient questions, you would be accused of questioning the competence of our security forces and be branded as anti-national. Jammu and Kashmir governor Satyapal Malik raised the issue of intelligence failure soon after the Pulwama terror attack. He has been since silenced (though he is a Modi appointee). Newspaper reports tell us that Malik is now serving as a lame-duck governor and would soon be replaced. He has to pay this price because he, like most ‘anti-nationals’, highlighted the incompetence of the security establishment.
Is this the kind of pseudo-nationalism we should be proud of in a country we call a vibrant democracy?
(Mohanty is a veteran journalist based in New Delhi)
