The morning newspaper headline read that the government in power in India was going populist as an effect of the dynamics between them and an ally who was in the process of severing their coalition. Today I think of the term ‘populist’ as the sanctum sanctorum in a mansion called the body politic. Today is a Bharat Bandh, a fancy nationalised euphemism for a method of proven impotent protest. Today, my neighbour asked me if there was any t20 match India was playing in the ongoing world cup in Sri Lanka; he said it would make the Bandh more enjoyable. Today, out here in the perimeters, there are no stars; out here, we’re all stoned immaculate.
Stoned by a new drug to a few and an ancient one to others. This isn’t the opium of the masses; sorry Mr. Marx, not religion and sorry Mr. Zizek, not ecology. This is a more potent LSD-laced crystal-meth-laden high ball that is being injected into our systems through all our senses, through subliminal neural signals penetrating us even as we read this sentence. Ah, the senses; so beautiful and sinister. “Stimulate. Consume”, they say. “Stimulate till that climax. Consume till consumed.”
Today, we are hog-tied leather-clad sex slaves of our own sensory worlds. All they need to do is to whip and utilise. The idealist is either dead or lost in the middle of an endless desert, wandering in hopeless night. “All great things must first wear terrifying and monstrous masks in order to inscribe themselves on the hearts of humanity.” Almost-true words by Freidrich Nietzsche. ‘True’ because these are masks but ‘almost’ because these are pretty, hypnotic and inviting. The monster hides behind it.
I close my eyes. What comes to me is a vision of revolving doors. On every glass pane, the etching is clear and it whispers, “Pane 1: We must start with conviction and stiff righteous resolve against the monstrous machine. Pane 2: We must then dress up like ballerinas and peep through the frills of our tutu to make them soft and salivating. Pane 3: We must then allow the fanfare to lavish us, pamper us until we forget the muddy roots and until we are enamoured by the dewdrops on the lilac petals of the new trinket flush. Pane 4: We must pluck and dry these flowers; powder them and allow the monster to roll up a banknote and snort us up his nostrils like a line of cocaine.”
Look at them all. Look at rock n roll from the civil rights anti-Vietnam flower-child fields of the 60’s to the consumerist decadence of the 80’s. Whenever an art-form or movement of any meaning is dressed up for ‘marketing’, it gets consumed back into the system it had originally set out to overthrow. But this isn’t a fact in absolution. Some beasts simply scratch on the panes of these revolving doors, smiling, internalising the verses and reaching the pyramid summit by eye-washing the masses without them second-guessing any intent. The seed of such revolutions are usually ‘populist’ and factually correct. The public agendas, however, are always quite different from the future purpose. Arvind Kejriwal, thank you for proving this right. Anyway, let’s assume the righteous resolve was honest. But as soon as the door pirouettes from the first to the second pane, we should smash all its windows and build a new one. And so he said, “When the music’s over, turn out the lights.”
For as long as the machine is oiled and chugging, I will always be a word-man better than a birdman. I’ll unleash my beak at the peak of powers. Words dissemble, words be quick, words resemble walking sticks. Plant them and they will grow. Watch them waver so. It is imperative that we remain at the first pane and remember that the doors could also revolve the other way. Small, underground, worshipped by few, hated by many, the truth survives and will remain to survive in these dark alleys. The Sensex is on the rise. Peace.
