A Lott unlike us

What did the senator from Mississippi say that no apology could then make up for in the US? On December 5, at the 100th birthday party of Senator Strom Thurmond, who also-ran for president in 1948 on an openly racist platform, Lott announced: ‘‘I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over all these years, either.’’

Those comments kicked up a firestorm in the US. There was outrage over what was seen as Lott’s undisguised longing for the intolerance of the old South. When integration was a crime and racism was a vast set of laws designed to marginalise one group of people on the basis of colour. That storm has subsided, but only after Lott’s resignation following Bush’s public rebuke. Lott’s comments, said a stern-faced George W, do not reflect the ‘spirit of our country’; his words were ‘offensive’ and ‘wrong’.

Of course, distance deceives. It is possible Lott went for reasons that don’t all have to do with moral outrage. It may be that Lott’s contrition and resignation were merely the observance of etiquette as a device for defusing conflict. Image control, say others. Lott is a scapegoat, they say, for a White House which wants to project the image of inclusiveness without embracing real change. By sacrificing Lott, the Republicans have bought themselves the freedom to go on with race-baiting as usual. And Americans can go back to pretending racism is a thing of the past, or of the South.

It could be any or all of the above; there is probably truth in what the sceptics say. But anyone who has followed this debate in the US media will agree that that’s not the whole explanation. What was blindingly clear in the entire Lott business was this: the tangible sense that the senator’s comments had crossed a line in American political discourse and no apologies could make it all right again. No quibbling over his words, no psychologising/sociologising/historicising of his motives could blunt the offence. Lott’s comments went against the clear understanding that part of the meaning of democracy is that no group of citizens should feel humiliated by the state. And that the norms of political discourse should not systematically alienate particular classes of citizens. So Lott had to pay.

In India, in case you missed it, the rehabilitation party has begun. Critics of Modi, declared and undeclared, are on the backfoot. Ever since the verdict in Gujarat, they feel compelled to lay down arms.

It began with Atal Bihari Vajpayee flying down to attend Modi’s swearing-in. Now many who condemned Modi for his campaign of hate are craning their necks to spot and to hug a kinder, gentler Modi — the friendly neighbourhood CM who would forgive the boy who sent him death threats by e-mail. Others stand subdued at the altar of his proven genius, so what if it is evil. Master Divider Modi, the Badshah of Hate, Organiser of the Massive Mandate. In all the chatter of Moditva and the Modi model, you can see awe is getting the better of judgement.

What explains the difference? Why is it that the political expression of intolerance is punished so swiftly in the US while a more naked form prospers in India? There, Lott’s divisive rhetoric shortcircuited his political career. Here, Modi’s minority-bashing is rewarded first with the vote in his state and then acceptance beyond its boundaries.

There are many reasons for Modi’s election-day victory in Gujarat. But it was the choice exercised by one electorate, in one state, presented with a particular set of alternatives, or rather, lack of them. Modi’s ongoing rehabilitation in the larger political scheme, however, points to a more enduring problem.

In the short-term politics that prevails, it is easy for the day’s winner to take all. There are no larger, overarching norms that govern our political practice and debate. No indelible boundaries that we expect political leaders to respect, so that democracy doesn’t descend into majoritarianism. Despite a Constitution that pronounces us secular, we have yet to arrive at a consensus on what constitutes secularism. More than fifty years down the road, we are still caught up in the secular-communal debate in which, every now and then, the terms are redefined and signposts are shifted, to suit the powerful.

Several factors contribute to this continuing incoherence. One, a shared cynicism about politics. Politicians are not expected to abide by any consistent standards of conduct anyway. Two, a political leadership that then exploits the fact that the people have set the bar so low.

No one has made more merry on this score than Vajpayee. His recent interventions are a study in political acrobatics. In Gujarat, he reminds Modi of a rajdharma not observed. From Goa, he exhorts the nation to ask: who lit the fire first? After electoral triumph in Gujarat, he laments that Muslim society has not, to the last man, expressed remorse for Godhra. And now, from Goa again, he posts musings on a defanged Hindutva that sounds like a sort of secularism.

In the prevailing free-for-all on the canons of political behaviour for majority and minority in a multi-cultural society, Modi gets away with his brazenly divisive politics. Trent Lott wasn’t as lucky; he had to go. Because, through a long and open conversation, American society has worked out commonly accepted definitions and commonly observed boundaries of acceptable political behaviour on race. It is our failure to articulate and commit ourselves to similarly shared norms of mutual coexistence that allows Modi to stay on in public life. And even grow in stature.