Tavleen Singh writes: In praise of Democracy

Indian Express

5 hours ago

In the week gone by, this newspaper has paid special attention to the Emergency. Long articles have been written by politicians and journalists who remembered what happened during those 19 months 50 years ago, when democracy was replaced by dictatorship. As someone who got my first job in an Indian newspaper barely a month before Indira Gandhi imposed press censorship, I value those 'dark days of the Emergency' because it was that time that taught me to revere democracy. It disturbed me last week that so many Congress leaders tried to defend the indefensible, in their puzzling compulsion to please their ruling family. What this revealed for everyone to see was the pathetic sycophancy of senior Congress party leaders. They should be ashamed.
The Emergency cannot and must not be defended because it caused lasting damage to our democracy. The pillars that are supposed to hold up democracy were all weakened, and it was then that the practice of turning political parties into family businesses began. This very bad idea has flourished since then and the more it has flourished, the weaker it has made our political parties and Parliament.
As a country we should have achieved a lot more than we have in our 75 years of existence as a modern nation. We have failed to provide our citizens with such basic things as clean water to drink and clean air to breathe. Our cities look like filthy, sprawling slums and our villages look worse. We have failed to build halfway decent schools and hospitals for those who cannot afford to pay for private services. But what shines amid these many failures is that we have managed against all odds to keep democracy alive in a neighbourhood of military dictatorships and theocracies.
Speaking of theocracies, it saddens me that the United States and Israel ended their war in Iran without a regime change. Since he became Supreme Leader in 1989, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has presided over a ruthless theocracy that has spread jihadist terrorism across the world and terrorised Iran's own people. The Ayatollah's regime has tortured thousands of women for the crime of not wearing a hijab 'properly' and his prisons are filled with thousands of people who have raised their voices against his brutal policies. Some have languished in jail cells for decades. Others have been hanged.
In between our borders and Iran is a country that is like Iran but led by military men instead of priests, and unlike Iran already has nuclear weapons. The Generals who are Pakistan's real rulers crush dissidence with violence and have used their army to spread jihadist terrorism, with India being the main target of their evil efforts. When you look at India on this wider canvas, you see how good we look and the reason for this is our democracy. This is why it is worrying that there are so many politicians, both on the Left and the Right, who believe that democracy is what has held India back.
In the 40 years that this column has existed, I have had the dubious pleasure of interviewing many political leaders. Conversations with Leftist Congress leaders have gone something like this — 'You see we cannot develop our infrastructure and our services in the way China can because we are a democracy, and this has often been a stumbling block.' On the Right, there are voices in the BJP that express similar misgivings about democracy and many secretly admire Indira Gandhi, whatever they might say publicly about the Emergency. As for ordinary Indians, it shames me to admit that I have talked to far too many people who believe that what we need is a 'benevolent dictator'. This is nonsense but I am willing to bet that you have met as many Indians who believe this as I have.
By an odd coincidence, on the day that I was writing this column, I happened to see on social media a clip of the famous 'Ich bin ein Berliner' speech by John F Kennedy on June 26, 1963, in West Berlin. This was nearly two years after the Berlin Wall was built by the Soviet Union to make sure that the people of East Berlin did not flee to the West. It is one of the finest speeches about democracy that any politician ever made. Kennedy says, 'Freedom has many difficulties and democracy is not perfect, but we have never had to put a wall up to keep our people in, to prevent them from leaving.'
It is a speech that should be compulsory reading for Indian politicians. As for me, if there is one thing that I truly believe, it is that if India had not been a democracy, however flawed our institutions have become because of the Emergency, we may not have survived as a nation. If we have not fragmented in the way the Islamist Republic next door has long hoped we would, it is because democracy has been the glue that has held us together.
Far from being the obstacle to progress that some of our politicians believe it has been, it is because of our democracy that India exists. We may not be the 'Mother of democracy' as our Prime Minister likes to tell the world, but in modern times, we have been a democratic republic, and this is something we should all be proud of. Democracy is something that we must cherish.