Conspiracy theorists say the BJP has been soft on Raj as it is weighing the option of dumping Shiv Sena, its current and demanding ally and aligning with a more muscular MNS ahead of the next Lok Sabha polls. Whatever. In the meantime, the “nationalism” discourse has reached ludicrous proportions. It has come to such a pass that neutral citizens are called upon to prove their “patriotism” on a daily basis. As the semantics change from “nationalism” to “patriotism” to “nationalistic patriot” to “ultra nationalism”, the intensity of the pseudo debate is looming menacingly large.
Some time ago Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray had a face off with Times Now editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami. As Arnab began to grill him in his usual raucous style, an irked Raj did the unthinkable. He fired a volley of barbs at Arnab. Mid-way through the interview, the MNS chief retorted: “For your TRP, you twist sentences and instigate people… Don’t do much drama for your TRP…” As a sheepish Arnab sat, his tail firmly between his legs, Thackeray roared: who are you to decide what is in the national interest…?. It, really, was a Kodak moment – two peddlers of “nationalism” trying to outscore each other on prime time TV.
Raj Thackeray is no Frank Costello, the real Godfather, who was immortalised by the fictional character Don Vito Corleone in the bestselling American-Italian author Mario Puzo’s crime thriller series in the early seventies. Thackeray is no criminal, he does not run illegal syndicates; he is a bona fide politician and head of a political party. Suddenly I have become an admirer of Raj, his brains and brawns in equal measure. He has made a constituency for himself by dispensing instant, parochial justice. Last month, he waded into the international arena by packing off acclaimed Pakistani actor Fawad Khan to Islamabad with ease, emerging the most muscular proponent of ultra nationalism. He even forced, literally at gun point, film producer Karan Johar to declare Rs.5 crore (as “penance”) to the Indian Army; a pittance rejected by the self-respecting military brass who saw through the “patriotic” games.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and chief minister Devendra Fadnavis were reduced to mere spectators in this nationalistic one-upmanship while Bollywood celebs looked like nincompoops. India is not a banana republic; a super power in the making and yet an extra-constitutional entity was allowed to dictate terms. How is it possible that a leader whose party has zero presence in Parliament and a lone MLA in the Maharashtra legislative assembly (out of 288) and zilch in cosmopolitan Mumbai and lost deposits in 203 seats in the 2014 elections, wield so much fear and authority that he made all the actors in this patriotic soap opera eat crow and discomfited even the Indian Army?
Raj might be having the last laugh as he successfully engaged himself in competitive nationalism emerging as a parallel power centre. For the uninitiated, after the Uri incident on September 18, when 19 Indian soldiers were ambushed and killed by Pakistan facilitated terrorists, the Indian Army retaliated by carrying out surgical strikes across the border. The attack and the reprisal occurred on the eve of release of Karan Johar’s multi-starrer Ae Dil Hai Mushkil (ADHM) featuring, apart from Fawad Khan, Bolloywood elites such as Ranbir Kapoor, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Anushka Sharma, Shah Rukh Khan, Alia Bhatt, Lisa Haydon and Deepti Naval— all very well connected to the powers in Mumbai and Delhi.
If BJP was basking under the glory of “surgical strikes”, a sneaky Thackeray seized the opportunity to carry out a surgical strike at the star-studded ADHM. MNS activists threatened to vandalise theatres showing ADHM unless Fawad Khan left India within 48 hours. Rattled film producers met home minister Rajnath Singh seeking his intervention, but the poor HM was apparently unable to rein in Raj. A worried papa Rishi Kapoor tried to pull strings with the Prime Minister’s Office for the smooth release of the film (don’t forget his son Ranbir is in the lead role) by meeting Jitendra Singh, minister of state in the PMO, but in vain. Aishwarya Rai’s father-in-law Amitabh Bachchan, a well-connected government brand ambassador, who is a phone call away from the PMO, either did not use his clout or failed in his attempt.
And finally, the stakeholders were forced to prostrate before Raj to get the film released on the scheduled date. It was a law and order issue and ordinarily the local top cop could have resolved it. Or else, being an issue involving diplomacy and a foreign country, the PMO should have been proactive or the chief minister should have called Thackeray’s bluff. Nothing of the sort happened.
Instead, Raj, Fadnavis, Karan Johar and other stake holders confabulated at the CM’s residence to facilitate MNS boss lift the ban on ADHM. It was unbecoming of a CM to have taken recourse to an unconstitutional route to resolve the impasse. Later, under fire from civil society, Fadnavis proffered the dim-witted excuse that he mediated to maintain law and order considering that Diwali is around the corner. It means that if any hooligan chooses a festive season to strike, the CM will treat him with kid gloves. He then went on to justify the faux pas by the specious argument that if talks can be held with Hurriyat and Naxals, why not MNS?
This is not the first time Raj smelt blood. Karan Johar had set a wrong precedent in October 2009 when MNS workers disrupted screening of his film “Wake Up Sid” in Pune and Mumbai theatres on the flimsy ground that the movie had some references to “Bombay” rather than “Mumbai”. Johar visited him at his residence, apologised for the lapse and reportedly agreed to all his terms. Such things happen in Godfather’s own country or in the absence of State.
Conspiracy theorists say the BJP has been soft on Raj as it is weighing the option of dumping Shiv Sena, its current and demanding ally and aligning with a more muscular MNS ahead of the next Lok Sabha polls. Whatever. In the meantime, the “nationalism” discourse has reached ludicrous proportions. It has come to such a pass that neutral citizens are called upon to prove their “patriotism” on a daily basis. As the semantics change from “nationalism” to “patriotism” to “nationalistic patriot” to “ultra nationalism”, the intensity of the pseudo debate is looming menacingly large.
