The man who is a pessimist before 48 knows too much; if he is an optimist after it, he knows too little – Mark Twain

I’m a pessimist because of intelligence and an optimist because of will -- Antonio Gramsci

In our world of splenetic sensibilities and incurable ideological inflexibility, my most recent essay on the Bharat Jodo Yatra (BJY) and its doughty challenge to an authoritarian regime has expectedly elicited a hostile response. As happens to any hack, I have copped reactions that have ranged from the dismissive (‘hope this is his last foray into writing on politics which he knows nothing about’) to the downright venomous (‘the writer could be behind bars as happened in some countries recently. Being a minority doesn’t give an unfettered right of majority bashing!’ – Apart from hoping for my arrest for hate speech, my worthy senior equates criticism of this regime to majority bashing!) Then there was the terse putdown: (“Congress chamcha!”) and the irrefutable reminders of my repeated failures in political soothsaying (“You’ve never got things right, so shut up!”).

In contrast, quite a few kindly folk have commended me, sadly not for my way with words or inventive thinking but for exuding hope for the future, which they see as a refreshing departure from my characteristic pessimism. They have clearly magnified my tentative hopefulness about the BJY and its prospects. 

The brute reality is that, amidst a deepening gloom, I see in the BJY a sliver of hope in what is an unequal David versus Goliath showdown, but so equally desperate for good cheer are these kindred souls that they too are clutching at straws against the saffron whirlwind. And why not? 

These well-wishers have reminded me that life and the future should be faced with hope rather than be mired in fear or pessimism. Besides, constantly peering over my shoulder is my sociology professor mentor, urging me to push back against cynicism because only then good things can happen. Hence, I have decided to take a stab at positive thinking with this disquisition on the perfect world – Utopia.  

Endorsing my choice is the wag who declaimed that “anybody who is not a utopian is a schmuck!” I’m not so sure that a dotard, visualizing a better world, will break the darkness, but then there’s no harm in dreaming. So here goes!

Etymologically, “Utopia” – first manifest as the title of a fictional work by Sir Thomas More – is forged from the Greek terms “ou-topos” meaning ‘nowhere’ and ‘eu-topos’ which translates as ‘a good place’. Sir More coined the term to define the perfect, ideal society free of poverty, suffering or conflict, with communal ownership, complete religious toleration and no lawyers because of the simplicity of the laws. Over time, the term “Utopia” has not only engendered critiques on what such a putatively perfect world be like to live in but has also invoked a range of interpretations on what it signifies. But more on that some other time. 

Significantly, the original architect of “Utopia”, Thomas More was also a politician, elected to the English Parliament at the age of 26, later Lord High Chancellor to King Henry VIII, who was ultimately convicted of treason and executed for his principled stand of opposing the Protestant Reformation and for refusing to acknowledge the authoritarian Henry as the Supreme Head of the Church of England. The statesman was willing to sacrifice his life for his principles, so unlike our present-day political class who would sell their souls for self-preservation or power. 

The politician today also builds utopias but of a different kind from the pure fiction conceived by Thomas More. While every one of us at some time dreams of the perfect world, our personal Utopia, the political creature goes one better and routinely draws up paradigms of a utopia that is just round the corner, though we never get there. The utopias that our current breed of politicians construct are best defined as ‘castles in the air’ which they fabricate to beguile their constituents. These cock and bull utopias are advertised in election speeches, in party manifestos, on the floor of Parliament and from the ramparts of the Red Fort. And a gullible populace is beguiled!

The consummate purveyor of the most expansive utopian promises to his people is indubitably our very own Vishwaguru. He has conceived of the perfect blueprint for a resurgent India based predominantly on bluster. In 2018, he thunderously announced to the Indian diaspora in the US that the 21st Century is India’s. He has already taken fulsome credit for making the country Open Defecation Free (So what if bare bottoms still dot the landscape in countless endemically water-scarce, sanitation-challenged areas?), and providing electric connections in every home in the country (So what if this boast is far from true?). And a gullible population laps it up.

One cannot help admiring the audacity of our Vishwaguru in making promises that are fantastic. What’s even more stunning, an adoring populace seems satisfied that the Vishwaguru has the best intentions for his people and it’s no big deal if his promises do not materialize; what is of the essence is that he cares. 

As proof of his altruism, there is the unblushing self-promotion of the PM CARES FUND that is funded by private individuals and organizations to provide relief in any kind of emergency or calamity, the funds of which he controls and for which largesse he garners all the credit. In periodic flights of fancy, the Vishwaguru has promised to put Rs 15 lakhs into every bank account, to double farmers’ income, to provide houses to all by 2022, to bring back black money, to provide crores of jobs, to root out corruption and nepotism. So, what if they are largely figments of the Vishwaguru’s munificent imagination!

Reality and truth have a nasty way of knocking you down when you are desperately looking for positives. The latest Oxfam report “Survival of the Richest: the India Story” released this January has dampened our hopes of a better tomorrow. A regime that claims to be working for the poor has actively fostered an environment where the number of billionaires has increased from 102 in 2020 to 168 in 2022, even as our country today has the world’s highest number of poor at 228.9 million. The top one percent own nearly 40.6 percent of the total wealth in India, actively abetted by a government that reduced the corporate tax slabs in 2019 from 30 percent to 22 and 15 percent. In a country that has drifted far from its moral moorings, this government is flagrantly punishing the poor by hiking the GST and excise duties on fuel, and taxing everything, even what the poor man buys for his survival. This is no country for the poor! 

But I digress. Having resolved to stay positive, the least I can do is to end on a positive note. Inspired by Victor Hugo’s counsel, “If you don’t build castles in the air, you won’t build anything on the ground”, I’ve drawn up a blueprint for transforming my beloved country into a utopia. Out of an inexhaustible list, here are my most desired, craved-for castles in the air:

-    Poverty is eradicated; India has a $8 trillion GDP.
-    Fraternity and peace reign.
-    Religion is banned from the public square.
-    Men respect women.
-    The institutions of governance recover their democratic spirit.
-    India and Pakistan become blood brothers once again.
-    China returns our territory, and there is peaceful co-existence.
-    Finally, from a purely personal standpoint, my dear spouse and best friend lives up to the assessment made in her school report card: “Obedient and soft-spoken.”

The depressing paradox of visualizing such a perfect world is that it is mere bootless speculation. But hang on.  More’s Utopia set the greatest store on justice and the rule of law as fundamental to an ideal society. Although in the last few years injustice has reigned like never before in our benighted land, aided by the break down of institutions and the complicit silence of the educated, there has now emerged, out of nowhere, a ripple of hope for justice on account of happenings over the last couple of weeks which most certainly have discountenanced the Vishwaguru and his cabal. 

I refer to the BBC documentary on the Gujarat pogrom of 2002, which a guilt-ridden government tried to block to no avail, and the Hindenburg expose of the biggest financial and stock market scam ever, which makes the shenanigans of Harshad Mehta, Nirav Modi, Vijay Mallya and others look like schoolboy pranks. Significantly, both these scoops are “foreign conspiracies”, which raise legitimate questions about the impartiality of our institutions, the integrity of the law-enforcement agencies, the calibre of our investigative journalism and the shrinking of our democracy. 

On the issue of democracy, one is beholden to the patriarch, L.K. Advani, for delivering a sharp rap on the knuckles of Vice-President Dhankar and the non-entity, Kiren Rijiju for their uneducated comments on the Basic Structure doctrine of the Constitution.

Suddenly, this all-powerful regime seems vulnerable, evident from its conciliatory tone of late. In contrast to the usual majoritarian braggadocio and brute power politics, the PM asked the party cadres to reach out to the minorities, offered a Chadar to the Ajmer Sharif dargah, warned against making “unnecessary remarks” on films, and got the President to wax eloquent about our Constitution and secular ethos in her Republic Day address to the nation. These spurious acts of goodwill betray an uncharacteristic edginess that has possibly been accentuated by intimations of the Adani Groups’ crimes, which are only beginning to unravel.  

The Adani’s humongous corporate fraud threatens to lay bare the systemic corruption, cronyism and subversion of normal commercial rules engineered by this government. Cynics believe that this scandal will get blown away like the infamous Pegasus snooping and Rafale deal because of the sheer might of the criminals involved. But a little voice tells me that in a country that for too long has been on the side of the oppressor, the worm has turned, and retributive justice is at hand! “Even the darkest night will end, and the sun will rise” (Les Misérables)!

(The writer is a former civil servant The views are personal)