A Reflection on Tharoor’s Politics

Dr Shashi Tharoor is not a politician really. He has certain noble objectives like making his country better if possible: economically, culturally, and intellectually too – for all rather than a select few. That is why he keeps making statements like “The nation is more important than politics.”

His party, the Congress, cannot understand such notions because its leaders are all politicians. And politics is all about power and little else.

Politics is pursuit of power. It has nothing to do with serving the people. If you want to serve people, become a useful professional like a doctor, a teacher, an engineer, and so on, and contribute to the welfare of the people.

Politics is all about dominating, controlling, and influencing others and wilfully working to have your way against the opposition of others. That is why politicians spend huge sums of money on propaganda and self-publicity. They resort to all sorts of strategies to ensure that their domination is as total as it possibly can. For that, they may rewrite history, misuse the state machinery like the Enforcement Directorate and the judiciary, employ rhetoric in mass media programmes such as Mann ki Baat, and so on.

And also decimate other political parties. 

Shashi Tharoor’s invitation to head a foreign delegation is a highly political act on the part of PM Modi. Dr Tharoor is arguably the best choice for this purpose. Yet, it is impossible to think that Modi is acting with the welfare of the nation in mind. Modi is the prototypical politician: one who cannot live without absolute power over a lot of people. His ambition is to be the Viswaguru, the world’s master.

Dr Tharoor can be an asset in Modi’s gameplans. In the process, this appointment can turn the Congress against Tharoor and thus get him kicked out of the party. Who loses? The Congress loses a statesman and diplomat, a person who is a lot more than your average politician. Modi will have shot down two birds with one bullet.

The plain truth is that the Congress doesn’t deserve someone like Dr Tharoor. The present-day Congress is nothing more than a gang of some mediocre politicians who are trying to grab what little of power is available to a dying party. These politicians have never acknowledged the greatness of a man like Dr Tharoor. It is only natural that Tharoor feels frustrated in his party which doesn’t let him do any good merely because they are all afraid that he will grow too big for the party. They are afraid that the little powers they have will be lost.

My only prayer (to gods who may care to listen) is that Tharoor doesn’t join Modi’s political party against which he has written book after book. Modi’s party, as Tharoor is well aware, is meant only for keeping one man in the top seat. All others are just pawns on the immense political chess board. A few are lucky to be the bishops, rooks, and knights. There is a queen too, though she has the looks of a man. The multitude of pawns shout slogans for Modi, kill a few so-called enemies of the nation once in a while, and sacrifice themselves for all the illusions that are being peddled in the name of the nation and its ancient religion.

Seven years ago, Tharoor wrote about Modi that the “New India” which Modi was trying to create “appears littered with the wreckage of all that was good and noble about the old India.” [The Paradoxical Prime Minister] The wrecking is almost complete now. And a new India is being forged out of the debris. A new India of a few elite individuals. The old caste system is back with a bang in an entirely new shape. The power structure has changed outward. The bones within are still the same old ossified oligarchy if not kleptocracy.