It has only just been a few weeks since the death of one of the most powerful Babas that independent India produced, Satya Sai Baba. The man (God to his followers) managed to do what no one else could do; organize the rich and the famous around himself and do charity. He sat on a throne (later a wheel chair also) and let his benevolent gaze fall on the humble and the miserable. The latter drew great solace from his generosity (which was not to individuals but to entire regions) and his kindness and also from his message of love all (no that is not the tennis score at the French Open). Great cricketers such as Sunil Gavaskar and Sachin Tendulkar worshipped his lotus feet while (former) Prime Ministers such as P.V. Narasimha Rao prostrated to him in obeisance in full public view. The Baba was a know all. He even claimed that he was Krishna in the Mahabharatha and of course, Shirdi Sai Baba as well. So when this divine cosmic being left earth one day, it was the end of an era. However, the world cannot be without great people, especially in India. So in the land of many Suns when one sets, another rises. Now all hail the New Baba, Baba Ramdev.
Strictly speaking Baba Ramdev is not new. He has been around a while. As is usually the case with people of his ilk he was at many a times at the centre of various unsavoury controversies. At one time it was reported that what he sold as herbal medicine actually contained extracts from animal proteins and later the Baba courted controversy by advising his followers to give up Western medicine. He started with the idea that Statins such as Atoverstatin should not be used every day and that they did not help in anyway (he may have been right there). He then started Christian evangelist type camps that would have made faith healers such as Billy Graham feel small. The Baba preached the merits of yoga and of Pranayama and while he was listening to his pious devotees he kept performing Pranayama in public. People stood up and narrated how his methods had led to weight loss, cure for hypertension and diabetes. The Baba benevolently thanked the narrators for sharing the stories and exhorted the other people in the camp or those watching the proceeding on Aastha TV channel to follow those examples. To some Baba Ramdev was just an eccentric figure, to some others he was a facile fraud but to most he was manna from heaven.
This manna from heaven has been behind the revivification of the spiritual realm among the Hindus in India, with ever greater numbers flocking to his side in order to discover or re-discover their own spiritual side. You had a problem, Baba Ramdev had a solution. You are overweight, go to Baba Ramdev; you are asthmatic, go to Baba Ramdev; you are hypertensive/diabetic, go to Baba Ramdev; you have aches and pains in your body, go to Baba Ramdev; you are confused by your existence and are a restless soul, just go to Baba Ramdev. So whatever Baba Ramdev may otherwise be, he is a larger than life figure, one who has the panacea for all bodily and spiritual problems. Now however, this larger than life figure is not only providing solutions to problems pertaining to the body and the soul but for problems pertaining to society and politics as well. A quantum leap into a new thing as far as some people are concerned, but just a logical extension of what he has been doing thus far, to most of his followers, who are in crores. You see that is the beauty of spiritualism. Spiritualism claims that cleanse things at the level of spirit and automatically you can see the cleansing of other things as well. Even though to his followers what Ramdev is doing is just an extension of spiritual cleansing, it is in effect a move away from the spiritual realm and straight into the heart of the temporal realm. This gives us the right to drop the Baba prefix and from now on address him as Ramdev simply.
Before moving further ahead, we need to clarify one thing. Ramdev's Babathva (like in Hinduthva) is significantly different from the Babathva of Satya Sai Baba. While latter claimed divinity and the ability to effortless navigate the entire Cosmos whenever he felt like, the former tied himself to Yoga. Ideally he should have been called Yogi Ramdev but for some reason he preferred Baba. Ramdev's appearance which is lean but strong and his confident demeanour have made people believe that he is one who practices what he preaches. The mythical Greek character Achilles had a heel which was his weak point and Ramdev has an eye that opens and closes at its own bidding. So he has the Ramdev eye which is his weakness. The eye weakness is metaphorical and not literal. What is undeniable is that Ramdev has started enjoying the spotlight or the limelight or whatever light. Apparently with this growing enjoyment is also a growing ambition and to move into newer areas of fame, fortune and glory. Though he claims he is a saint he loves all the three things that have been just mentioned. So this saint owns an island in Scotland, has thousands of crores of rupees and many other temporal entitlement. But the saint is no longer content with his saintliness and has decided to become a warrior. So Ramdev has transformed into a Warrior-Saint (an oxymoron but people don't see that) and has launched himself into politics.
The whole process began a bit like what one finds in Madrasas or in Friday prayers in Masjids when people are told to do things for society. This practice was once common even in Christian Churches where the members of the congregation were advised to act in a particular way when confronted with certain types of situations. The daring and open corruption followed by the UPA Government (Raja and the 2G Telecom Scam, Arjun Singh's deemed universities, Suresh Kalmadi's Common Wealth Games scam, the Adarsh Housing Society scam to name a few) provided Ramdev with the ideal opportunity to pontificate during his Yoga meetings. Slowly the Yoga content in this meetings came down and the political content increased exponentially. Ramdev used his meetings to carry out his variety of political propaganda first by asking people to fight corruption and then joining the fight himself. The opportunity to actively join the fight was presented to Ramdev by Anna Hazare who launched his fast unto death at the Jantar Mantar in Delhi fighting for the Lok Pal (Ombudsman) Bill to be introduced in the Indian Parliament. Among many of the people who pledged support to Hazare was Ramdev. I guess it was no coincidence that a number of the supporters were from the right wing politics and Hazare whose credentials are unknown has now been pushed into the back and Ramdev has come right to the forefront of things. So apart from the legion of followers that he has, who is supporting him?
The RSS, the BJP, the Bajrang Dal, the Shiv Sena and all such right wing Hinduthva parties are supporting him. In fact, it is claimed by some that he is actually fronting for them. The right wingers have been wise in their choice of front man if that particular claim is true. Hazare claimed he was a Gandhian and Gandhi has never been a favourite of the right wingers since he preached religious tolerance. So Hazare could not be the figure to rally around unless he gave up his public posture of Gandhianism. Anyway he is also an old man. Not so Ramdev. Young and dynamic, forceful and with a large following of people already is the right figure. It also helps that the middle class of the country feels cheated of its wealth (that much is evident from the debates on Facebook) and are looking for a figure around whom they can rally. It also helps that many from the middle class are Hindus and therefore do not really find his call for traditionalism very disturbing.
Other politicians are savvy and have already started throwing their weight behind Ramdev and his much publicized fast at the Ramlila Maidan in Delhi. This is an ideal setting; this is the ground on which Ravana the arch enemy of Rama is burnt on the Vijaya Dasami Day, a day when good triumphed over evil. Ramdev the good will now have to triumph over the first of the evils, corruption. Ramdev has placed a list of demands in front of the Government; demands that range from the silly through the bizarre to the obnoxious. I am sure all of you have seen them so I shall spare you of the details. But I shall discuss one or two things which are of some significance. The first of these is the idea of Capital Punishment for the corrupt. Ramdev is getting ready to unleash a Goebbels and also inaugurate an era of McCarthyism in India. Just imagine how much burden there will be on ombudsman bodies when everybody points a finger at the other. It could even lead to the "guilty until proven innocent" system of justice delivery. The other deals with his demand for technical education in vernacular (here I request you to read that as technical education in Hindi). The reason behind the demand is very clear. Ramdev is articulating a demand that will warm the cockles of the Hindi heartland where he chooses to become a leader first. In various posts of mine, I have already talked of how in India this kind of jingoism led to the emergence of rubbish in the form of social sciences and humanities. Now Ramdev wants to do the same thing to technical education.
This myopic vision of his (no doubt influenced at least in part by his uncontrolled eye lash) can not only doom education in this country and make it completely inefficient. Vernacular education will mean that two people in the same discipline cannot converse anymore since they speak different languages (I would like to point out here that translating relevant bodies of knowledge into vernacular is a task that even Hercules and Atlas will not be able to accomplish). This is in addition to the pitfalls of traditionalism. We could have the legitimation of Khap Panchayats that will dole out punishments the way they like without any concern for the law of the land, of likes of Pramod Muthalik and his followers who will ask that girls stay indoors and cover themselves in ghoonghat, of month long Ganesh and Durga navratris, communal intolerance and righteousness of one culture over others and finally disintegration of nationalism. In all this there will be increase of corruption; designated custodians of morality will police the streets and take their mamools apart from the regular police; extortion will widen and deepen so that traditional festivals can be celebrated with vigour and those who oppose the extortion will face instant punishment. Ramdev knowingly or unknowingly has an agenda that can unleash a reign of terror that may embarrass Robespierre and the Jacobins. Ramdev is what this country does not need at this juncture or any other. I hope and pray that my countrymen and women can see through him and nip his aspirations in the bud, otherwise we could end up creating a monster that will consume us all.
P.S: Please bear with mistakes since I have not proof read the piece.
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