Importance of dissent

I f the long arm of the state has begun to investigate NGOs, browbeat Internet websites, cancel the rights of television companies to record parliamentary proceedings, harass activists like the members of Team Anna and coerce the press, dissent in India will have only one option — it will take to the streets.

Whether it is an individual or a group of people, letting off steam is an integral part of coping with difficult situations and the media, social networks and activism are some of the ways in which modern societies manage to bear up to anger and disappointment.

His hectoring, in-your-face, finger wagging style might have come in for a lot of criticism but I am pretty certain that Times Now’s Arnab Goswami has crafted his personae quite deliberately to serve as a lightening rod for middle-class angst.

There he is up on the screen, the vision of his shellacked hair as close to a modern-day halo as we can get, acting out our shock/horror at the powers that be, channeling our disgust with life around us and affording us a feeling that our voice is being heard.

Every evening, prime time news on TV has turned into a therapy session for the Indian middle-class. Take that away and the vicarious genteel protest may turn into something uglier and more urgent.

It was the writer Javed Akhtar, one of the cleverest interpreters of urban Indian angst (he part-created Bachchan’s Angry Young Man persona), who shared a fascinating insight into human nature and the art of protest a few years ago with me. “Protesting works on many levels of the human psyche,” he said. “When you criticise someone, what you are also subtly doing is seizing the high moral ground for yourself. The problem is ‘out there’, so the gaze shifts away from you and you can feel smug about yourself.”

Measured thus, professional activists must feel very good about themselves most of the time I reckon.

Many moons ago, when we were all very young and innocent, and agencies like the Moral Re-armament and Peace Corps hadn’t come under the government scanner, I remember a song sung to a sea of little Indian school kids by bands of high-minded American undergrads. “When you point your finger at someone/there are three more pointing at you,” they trilled, to bring home the importance self-examination and not passing the buck.

Obviously, the lesson was lost as young people from both the countries grew up and assumed leadership roles in their governments, who now stand accused of hypocrisy and sanctimony. Critics of both India and the US will reel off a list of reasons why the moral high ground and finger-wagging stance of both nations get their goat.

Which brings me back to the nature of protest, dissent and opposition. Whether or not it achieves its more obvious goals or redresses a situation, it is vital for individuals or groups because it reinforces their own sense of righteousness and gives them a feeling of participation.

Take that away from them, their web sites where they post their armchair criticism, their news-anchors through whom they vicariously hector the powers that be and their NGOs, which work towards change, and you will strip them of their last fundamental right: The right to feel “I’m OK — You’re Not”.

Malavika Sangghvi is a Mumbai-based writer malavikasangghvi@hotmail.com