---“Do not wait to strike till the iron is hot; but make it hot by striking." William Butler Yeats
---"It is unnatural for a majority to rule, for a majority can seldom be organized and united for specific action, and a minority can." Jean- Jacque Rousseau
Varun Gandhi’s debut into the ‘Great Indian General Election’ must draw inspiration from the above quoted thoughts in equal measure.
Even the shrewdest political observers can mistake petty demagoguery for strategy. Alas, here it is not the case. What was said is of much lesser consequence. Who said it, is the nub of the issue.
- Who is the agent provocateur?
- Who has grabbed this as a possible election tool?
- Who is going to benefit the most?
- Are those political executives who prosecute him actually in cohorts with those who support him?
- Is he being built up, demolished or actually (and simply) being punished for a wrong?
- We have no answers but believe that by asking the right questions truth shall be delineated…..
In Indian politics, there is a hoary tradition of seizing the moment and riding the wave. Gandhi in Chamaparan, Sardar Patel in Bardoli, Shyama Prasad Mukerjee in J&K , Indira Gandhi in Belchi ......what changed was that rhetoric was declutched from ideology, vulgarism got welded to gross opportunism and the drum beaters are also now the directors. As if at some point, quantity converted to quality and the mob becomes the political agenda setters.
Watch this unfolding of events and its seemingly tangential trajectory. It has the potential to ricochet into the sanctum sanctorum of Indian polity……
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carpe diem quam minimum credula postero (Horace Odes) You all can look up the translation, like I did ;-).
ReplyDeleteBut Latin aside, Varun Gandhi's stratgey has got him more coverage then he has had till date. As they say, "There is no such thing as bad press." More people now know that there is another Gandhi who is in the race to be a politician and that is not a bad place to be.
The key will be, when does he get off the hardliner bandwagon and becomes a centrist a-la Vajpayee.
VG, has smartly seized centre stage in the BJP, which cannot ignore his utterances whatever there mellowed agenda to see Advani through. Henceforth, they cannot ignore him going forward a la allocation of say a seat in Videsha or a future General Secretaryship of the party..
ReplyDeleteThe TRP ratings for him were higher than IPL...