We are all prince-charmers

The century when the battle against social inequality, against racism and male domination, was joined. Communism may have collapsed and new elites may have sprung up to replace the old. Yet if youconsider the intentions that pervaded these movements it appears to have been a century marked by the struggle for freedom and for equality. By the attempt to wipe out discrimination on grounds of colour, sex and power.

By the urge to wrest greater control over one’s life and destiny. By the opening up of opportunities. It was as the BBC which has been telecasting a gripping series on the last hundred years calls it, the “People’s Century”. And as we reach its end we could do so in the knowledge that we live in a world that is far more equal, far more just and far freer thanks to battles fought over the last ten decades. We could. Except that just at that point, along come a couple of events that make you wonder about such assumptions.

Two years ago, it was the death of Diana. The virgin princess whose style choices, tumultuous marriage and alleged lovers made her a tabloid favourite became by her sudden and horrifying death, a changed entity. A pristine star. A saviour of the needy. The People’sPrincess. There were serious demands for her canonisation. And the memorial built to her was expected to draw adoring seekers forever.

Last fortnight the same frenzy threatened to repeat itself with the disappearance of the airplane carrying John F. Kennedy Jr., son of the beloved late president. As soon as the news hit the air America went into a thrall followed by deep mourning when the deaths were confirmed. Newspapers frontpaged the story. Television channels offered unending coverage, even going so far as to station a camera outside the church where the memorial service was taking place and to which the media had been banned. The aim: to catch a glimpse of the famous people who attended. There was, no doubt, an emotional factor at work, the loss felt at young lives being cut short, and a sense of destiny. (The three-year-old saluting the president, his father’s coffin himself felled). But the coverage, as The New York Times pointed out succinctly, was "about celebrity."

What however wassignificant was the language used in the coverage. Legend’, dynasty’, clan’, the children of Camelot,’ mythical allure’. In life all were agreed, John Jr. was a likeable, good looking bloke who apart from having famous parents and dating movie stars had done little to merit public attention. Yet in death, he was being hailed as a prince! "For those who consider America a healthily meritocratic country … the past week has been something of a revelation", said The Economist. "The instruments of the multimedia age have been bent on recreating the atmosphere of a medieval court, mourning the loss of a dauphin."

Should we in India be surprised? After all, we have long had our own tryst with dynasty, that is, the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. Indira Gandhi had at least some political experience when she became prime minister a few years after her father. But Rajiv Gandhi had hardly any. Yet he led his party to a thumping electoral victory in the wake of his mother’s death.

Sonia has even less experiencethan her ill-fated husband yet perfectly able men and women in the Congress party have been falling all over themselves to accept her leadership. It is not just the sycophancy-ridden Congress. In the press too, there is virtually no irony or condemnation when references are made to the dynasty’ or the possibility that Sonia might be keeping the seat warm for her children. The disease of inherited power is hardly confined to Delhi. The Mumbai papers last week were full of the rift between the annointed successors of Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray, his son and nephew. Nowhere of course, was their right to succeed him questioned.

What makes the world’s most thriving democracies throw aside all principles of justice and equality, principles that people endured jail terms and sacrificed their lives for? What makes them toss away notions of merit and willingly surrender such immense power and glory to a few on the specious grounds of birth/marriage and good looks?

Is it an ingrained sense of feudalism? Do wemiss our kings and gods so much that, having destroyed the old ones, we need to invent new ones to take their place? Isn’t this then a throwback to some retrograde past? Well, maybe not completely. In the old days kings were picked by the Gods. These days we get to choose our own.