Preface
I recall reading the Preface to Arun Shourie’s The Only Fatherland where he recounts a standard Communist technique. I’ve written about it here in my review of the book.
The book opens with Shourie recounting his experience of how he was warmly received by the CPI(M) of Kerala. They apparently wanted to translate a book he had written. He narrates its subsequent shelving because of a singular instance: he wrote a series in the Illustrated Weekly about the Communists’ role in sabotaging the Quit India Movement.
That’s when they applied their technique which Shourie narrates in the same preface as:
The denunciation and abuse and pasting of motives commenced at once. And they were a torrent. “it is an old canard…” (they shouted) But how did that affect its significance or veracity? […] E.M.S. Namboodripad… (he) declared that I was an agent of the right…the forces of which I was a mouthpiece… (which) had been unnerved by the growing strength of progressive and secular forces.
Fast foward to a few years down time. In Eminent Historians, Shourie notes another instance of the same technique in the context of a Zee TV talk show. On the show, an “eminent” historian stated that the Vedas contained references to beef eating. His bluff was called. A few days after the programme, he wrote a scathing piece on Shourie anointing him with the usual labels. It is noteworthy that his article didn’t bother to refute Shourie’s point.
Fast forward again to the present–the same technique is in action, this time it is subtle, almost unnoticeable.
And systematic.
Failed Frontal Attack
This post is a wake up call to those who happily glowed that Brinda “Baiter” Karat beat a hasty retreat after her unplanned attack against Swami Ramdev.
The battle however, is far from finished.
Brinda was forced to flee and seethe silently after prominent thugs politicans rushed to Swami Ramdev’s support. The Communist Party as usual, faithfully dished out a solidarity statement.
Karat’s frontal attack was thus foiled. A post-war analysis shows that Karat erred by grossly underestimating Swami Ramdev’s astounding popularity before she launched her assault.
The Snake-in-the-Grass Approach
But then, desi Communist history has ample instances to show that our comrades are made of sterner stuff. When a straightforward attack fails, they resort to more insidious artful methods. Examples 1 and 2.
These methods are implemented by their faithful lieutenants in the media.
So when the Indian Express begins a “series” to “uncover the truth fearlessly” following its lofty principles of courageous journalism, what we really get to see is a skillful mixture of tried and tested method of presenting Leftist arguments. Indian Express is surely not deterred by Swami Ramdev’s supporters. Journalism of Courage, indeed: truth at all costs.
In the same spirit of courage and adherence to truth, I’ll begin to examine its shocking findings about Ayurveda.
For that you’ll have to wait for Part 2 of this post.
Tags: Commentary, Indian Politics, Media Watch, Pseudo Secularism Hall of Shame, War on Communism
On 01.05.06 Kshetrajna says:
fact that in those glory days when the Govt. of India was the only one running telephone exchanges, it used to tap the ruling party’s (read: Congress’) adversaries’ phones left, right and center! Sandeep also comments on the Left’s behaviour in thispost. Meanwhile, our PM-ji weighs in with his usual profundity that doesn’t bother with responding to questions asked: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday said tapping of telephones was a “serious matter” and it should be “given a thought.”
On 01.07.06 POV says:
have to take. Imagine Anil Ambani and Navin Jindal swearing to uphold Socialist India, and we can see the casualness with which we accept lies in our society. If the very oath that we swear is false - then what’s the point! Sandeep rants aboutreservationsin the private sector, and Sakshi about the issue of date rape. Libertarian calls for India to become the centre of the Islamic world. Amardeep Singh has an interesting blog post on how the HIndu Right
On 01.12.06 Communist Terror says:
Brishti Sengupta laments about the havoc caused by Communist rule in West Bengal. Brishti Sengupta’s Blog : The enigma called CPI(M) Sandeep’s take on the Communists’ sudden concern about India’s securitySeriously Sandeep: Doing Everything in Their Power
On 01.16.06 The Acorn says:
ayatollahs (the irony of the term ) and end up wrecking the deal. So it is voting in favour of Iran that risks giving truth to the ‘either-or’ scenario. In fact, now more than ever, it is clear that the Iranian regime has decided on a course ofconfrontation on the nuclear issue. It is also clear that it is unwilling to accept any compromise that does not leave it with a capacity to produce weapons-grade uranium at short notice, perhaps within months. Iran
On 01.16.06 terror in delhi 10/29 says:
Sandeepalerts us to the Jaichands whose tribe still exist among the Indian political class: The J-K Police today said that “foreign militants have got mainstream politicians involved in their nexus, who are acting like their eyes and ears’’ thus turning the
On 01.31.06 Something like life says:
Sandeep in thispostwrites, what I think should be the answer to “Hinduism has survived for blah blah years and will continue to survive”, “… I’ve read and heard several intelligent, educated people talking about the innate strength of Hinduism that has enabled it to
On 02.01.06 Jaffna says:
Sandeep,
I blame a lot of the current anti-Hindu sentiment on the failure of the Vajpayee administration to reverse the intellectual tide when it briefly had the where-with-all to do so. The Indian intelligentsia has had a strong anti-Hindu animus since Nehru in the 1950s. The state sponsored the clout of the left be it in academia or the media. The incentive structure was such that it was Ok to be pro-minority or pro-caste but Hinduism itself was banned from the public space except to condemn it or “deconstruct” it. Nehru had no qualms to place a Buddha statue in parliament. He repeatedly used Buddhist symbols to define Indian statehood. It was Ok to keep Muslim personal law intact but Hindu law had to be (quite correctly though in my view) “reformed”. The state could interfere in Hindu schools but not Christian schools since the latter had constitutional protection. It was Ok to invite the Pope to say mass as a state guest or provide “Mother” Theresa a state funeral while denying any such privilege to a Hindu ecclesiastical authority. India was one of two or three countries in Asia/Middle East to allow foreign Christian missionaries to evangelize. Nagaland, Mizoram and Meghalaya only became Christian majority states in the 1950s, not before. It was Ok for an allegedly secular country to repeatedly endeavor to join the Riyadh-based World Islamic Conference but fall shy of anything smacking of Hinduism. And the intellectuals repeatedly attacked Hindu doctrines, customs, scriptures etc in the public domain. Witness Meera Nanda for instance!
The BJP had the opportunity to reverse this skewed incentive structure but it failed to do so. The Gujarat riots not only represented a complete and shameful break down in governance but it served to further fuel the self-righteous and selective indignation of the secular-left. No mention was made of the ethnic cleansing of Hindus from Kashmir. The shoddy effort to revise school textbooks was another instance. Murli Manohar Joshi failed to convene neutral historans to revamp the biased text books but chose academics of less substance. The India shining campaign was another instance of complete hype. The BJP had made silly alliances (with Jayalalithaa for instance) jettisoning time-tested allies such as Karunanidhi and Ram Vilas Paswan through an arrogance and stupidity that cost it its electoral win in 2004. Winning elections in India is now all about alliances and the BJP should have focused on retaining key allies who had with them the numbers in the legislature.
The challenge ahead is phenomenal but individuals such as us will need to unroll the in-built bias against all things Hindu in the Indian establishment today - step by step - while retaining all the safeguards against religious tyranny of the majority. Its time for an enlightened liberalism, not the secular-left bias (epitomized by the current regime’s policy of reservations for instance) entrenched in India today.
On 02.01.06 Sandeep says:
Jaffna,
I’m frankly overwhelmed. The BJP as you said, squandered its chance no thanks to it. It failed on tens of counts a prime reason is its defensive posture when it was relentlessly attacked by the media. The results showed almost immediately after its poll disaster. I have absolutely no sympathy for a party that can get this demoralized after a single defeat.
>>The challenge ahead is phenomenal but individuals such as us will need to unroll the in-built bias against all things Hindu in the Indian establishment today - step by step…
Which is true and going by the variety of blogs it is quite a heartening development. What’s more, the people of our generation (70s-80s) have a far better historical consciousness than our predecessors ever did.
On 02.02.06 Niketan says:
As part of the late-sixties genration, I have seen quite a lot. From the shortages era (1970’s) to the rapid degradation in the 80’s to the partial liberalisation of the 90’s. There were many people in the 50’s too who did not think like Nehru (Sardar Patel, Minoo Masani, CR, Dr SP Mukherji etc), but their voices were simply drowned out in Nehru’s ’secular, socialist’ vision for India.
After the 90’s and the BJP’s ascendance, there was hope that these idiocies would be corrected.
You are right. There are blogs that truly reflect what pluralism is and how corrupted the word secularism has become. However there are some blogs - winning awards that keep parroting the same idiocies and winning awards to boot. Will not mention them here. But I think you know who the worthies are.
What I find surprising is how people from a generation that grew up in the 90’s keeps harping on the same discarded ideas
On 03.09.06 varnam says:
Dead Sea Scrolls
On 05.03.06 Desicritics.org: Media, Culture, Politics, Sports and More with a South Asian Focus says:
perversely, of Shakespeare, “as flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport”. Just before His Educational Eminence, Arjun Singh announced this divisive move, other Reservation champions in the Manmohan Singh governmenthad already threatened to unleash Reservations in the private sector. Thanks to people like Azim Premji, this move has been thwarted. For now. Amid opposition from the private sector to reserving jobs for SCs and STs, the Government on Tuesday said it will not impose quotas on India, Inc., but only wanted more
On 06.01.06 Cynical Nerd’s says:
entire regions of our nation. Meanwhlile, the Spanish Government has announced a prize of 50,000 euros for her literary ‘contribution’. As an anarchist who does not believe in the concept of government, sherejected the UPA government’s conferring her the prestigious Sahitya Academy award. Now, let us see if she rejects the Spanish award as well since that too comes from a government-linked body. And since she supports the plea of oppressed people everywhere,