The Mahabharat Moment

At times like these, one has to choose whether to laugh or to cry.

At times like these, one has to choose whether to laugh or to cry. The 8216;unveiling8217; of wads of currency notes was shocking though at the same time a comic moment. It was shocking because even by Lok Sabha standards, this was over the top. I am not sure whether the notion was that bribing MPs was something so unusual that we should be all outraged. The Speaker would then suspend the session and no trust vote would follow. If that was the case then they were naiuml;ve beyond belief. In a political culture where bribing of everyone, including MPs, is routine and widespread, the shock was to have all those dirty bundles taken out of a bag. The conclusion was obvious; make currency notes of higher denominations, say a one lakh each, so we don8217;t get this ugly spectacle.

The shame was not the money but the impossibility for most speakers to be heard. In the House of Lords, we hear each other in total silence; even better than the House of Commons where members do stand up to interrupt a speaker who is on his/her feet. But the impossibility of hearing the PM8217;s reply to his motion as a small mob stood in front and shouted him down was obscene. If they are going to carry on like this why do Lok Sabha MPs bother to speak or even come to listen? Why not just file every speech in to the record and save time? Why not stay at home and do it online?

The hero of the hour was Somnath Chatterjee. He was like Bhishma Pitamaha, helpless as Parliament was being stripped like Draupadi, with no Krishna in sight to save her from shame. For all his efforts he got expelled from the CPIM. Still he should be grateful; in the old days, Bolsheviks used to send them to the Gulag, as they did to Bukharin; Trotsky8217;s fate was even worse. On his 80th birthday he has had a reprieve; may be now he can be free as well as happy in the many remaining years of his life.

The Prime Minister had his Asvatthama moment. Recall how Yudhishthir was faced with the question: Is Asvatthama dead as Bhima was saying? Facing a worried father and his teacher Drona, he said 8216;Yes, Asvatthama is dead8217;, and then, added in whisper 8216;man or elephant I know not8217;. After that, his chariot which always floated a few inches above the ground, fell to earth. Perfection is too costly in politics; to win you have to lose. That is the message of the Mahabharat which admits that morality is a complex tangle. Any way, Yudhishthira still walked to heaven while all his brothers, Draupadi and even his dog fell by the wayside.

But staying with the epics, I am astonished that the Rama Sethu saga is still running. Last year, there was a clash of the North and South interpretations of the Ramayana. Karunanidhi took his stand on Periyar8217;s pamphlet and denounced the godhood of Rama and the Northern invasion of the South. Now it is claimed that there is a divine sanction after all for the destruction of the sethu. They say it is in Kamban8217;s Ramayana. So then Rama is a hero again for DMK and he not only gave orders to his devoted vanarsena to build the bridge but also to destroy it. So the rationalist legacy of the Periyar goes down the drain; money to be earned in dredging the sethu speaks louder than any rationalist could. It is not the environmental damage that concerns our larger political parties. It is what Rama did or did not which still rules the roost for the DMK and BJP.

The loser of the week was not BJP but Mayawati. Her hopes were raised and she was playing her cards well. It is only when the vote took place that she realised that she was playing poker with a handful of jokers. The BJP had realised that if UPA had lost the vote, the credit would go to behenji. She must know; Brahmin blood is thicker than water.

The writer is Professor Emeritus of Economics at London School of Economics and a Labour Peer

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