India has been under a lockdown for over a fortnight now, as part of the government’s strategy to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. Since its outbreak in the country, the virus has infected over five thousand people out of which close to 180 have succumbed to the illness.
For its role in managing the ongoing crisis, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led central government, as well as those in the provinces, deserve credit where it is due. One is certainly free to appreciate the efforts made by the government. There is, however, a thin line that separates appreciation of government action from frenziedly exhorting people to rally behind the government while dismissing critical voices.
Unfortunately, this exact attitude has come to characterise the behaviour of a large section of India’s middle class in the wake of the rising COVID-19 caseload.
Middle class Indians are now often found, both in the real and virtual worlds, combatively asserting the merits of the government’s decisions, reminding people of the extraordinary situation on the shoulders of the country’s leaders, how they are doing their best in the prevailing circumstances. Following from this, they have been insisting on the need to stand behind these leaders, instead of sitting at home and finding faults in their actions.
Such arguments, patronising as they may sound, tend to implicitly suggest going easy on the government. This is what makes such forms of reasoning deeply problematic, especially at a time when the government’s actions have come to acquire even greater implication for people’s lives. But what explains an attitude of this nature?
The answer probably lies in the inability of many to understand that the public end of the government’s actions makes it imperative to negotiate them within the domain of politics, and not by circumventing it.
How could the Prime Minister justify that he cares about the poor when his government’s aid package amounts to just 1 per cent of the GDP? What is the stand of the Union Home Ministry regarding the police brutality witnessed in certain states following the lockdown? What is the rationale behind raising MNREGA wages at a time when work has been halted across the country? Why isn’t the central government releasing the required supplies of masks, sanitisiers, PPEs and other medical aid requested by various states, especially those that are ruled by opposition parties? Has the government done enough to diffuse the growing communalisation and racialisation of the on-going medical crisis?
Questions like these concern people’s lives and those at the helm of affairs are expected to take cognisance of them. The government’s performance in managing the ongoing crisis must be assessed on the basis of its ability to address the diverse range of issues that have emerged as a result of the pandemic itself, and the ensuing nationwide lockdown.
Those whose gullibility makes them effortlessly overlook the government’s lapses in handling the lockdown and condemn others who question them have sadly abdicated their responsibility as citizens.
Such complacency of the middle class over the government’s role stems from a sense of indifference that most of them feel towards matters that extend beyond their private wellbeing. Of course, they are quick to express token concerns for most things. As India remains under a lockdown, the private world of the middle classes continue to remain largely stable, with unimpeded access to income savings, permanent employment, formal and informal supply networks, home delivery services, and online classrooms and workplaces.
Not only does the material situation of the middle class limits its dependence on the State, but it also consequently curtails the need to have any sustained negotiation with the government regarding its management of the crisis. This makes many believe that public deliberation of government’s choices is unnecessary – a mere waste of time that stifles the benign intentions of the executive.
In the process, the middle class also comes to lose the inter-subjectivity that is necessary to realise that unlike itself, India’s underclasses are heavily dependent on the State, more so at a time when a majority of them are out of work, do not have access to adequate food supplies, and remain stranded. As such, it has become even more important now to rigorously evaluate the government’s priorities and actions.
The fallout of middle class India’s acquiescence could be quite serious. Through its insistence on minimising debate regarding the government’s management of the COVID-19 crisis, the middle class is also concurrently paving the way for the de-politicisation of the public sphere. By being contemptuous of contesting narratives, it is not only delegitimising and alienating critical voices, but also preparing the ground for the government to disempower them with impunity.
As the public sphere gradually begins to erode, middle class sensibilities come to be increasingly structured by the narrative of the government and it begins to look at the world only through the ideology of those in power. The recent arrest of two rights activists from Assam – Soneswar Nath and Pranab Doley – for questioning irregularities in distribution of lockdown-related relief and the near complete silence of the civil society in its wake is illustrative of the dire predicament towards which we are headed.
Views are the author’s own.
Abhinav Borbora is a Guwahati-based political commentator. He can be contacted at abhinav92ac@outlook.com.
Featured image: On 5 March, many Indians lit candles and diyas (earthen lamps) in their balconies while in lockdown, following an appeal from Prime Minister Narendra Modi | Image from Flickr.
