Waiting for the Stateless State

Had Marx been alive today, he would have prognosticated that the social classes simply must act in a Machiavellian manner. The fracas in Ut...

Had Marx been alive today, he would have prognosticated that the social classes simply must act in a Machiavellian manner. The fracas in Uttar Pradesh which has now been overshadowed by the one in Delhi would be ample apostrophe. Why Marx? Even an ignoramus could have extemporised, given the situation. A great political subterfuge has been perpetrated by the BJP in the state, purging or trying to appropriate other political forces. It is now difficult to ascertain precisely who is acting on behalf of which class.

After the BSP withdrew support, Kalyan Raj expanded to jumbo size, amid unprecedented horse-trading that brought to the surface of the political mix its worst scum. The BJP, which loved to point fingers at criminal legislatures8217;, swore in history-sheeters without a qualm. Indeed, the social classes have acted subtly. Temporarily, the caste-class formulation is in abeyance.

A State gone awry! And we have lived through all the possible States that political science could ever have dreamed up. From the Amateur State Laloo Raj to the Welfare State Kalyan Raj; from the Delusional State Maya Raj to the Enlightened State Jyoti Raj, we have experienced all possible States, and thus repudiated them. Do we qualify to be the fittest to have survived the worst? Maybe.

Marx said that the bourgeoisie had sprouted from the ruins of feudal society. The Amateur State and the Delusional State belong to feudal times. The Welfare State and the Enlightened State are harbingers of the modern age. Thus did Laloo Raj and Maya Raj wither away. But Marx had also made another prognostication, one which society forgets at its considerable peril. He said that the very weapons with which the bourgeoisie felled feudalism would now be turned against itself. The Welfare and the Enlightened States might have demolished feudalism, but they couldn8217;t do away with class antagonism.

In West Bengal, Jyoti Raj has turned against proletarian hawkers with Operation Sunshine, which is supposed to spruce up the city. In UP, there is a seamless merger of crime with politics. The party which was so concerned about the nation has turned against the national interest. Of course, without the party, how can national interest ever be secured? It must now do it by claiming to champion the Dalit cause. Next time, possibly, it will take a Hindu Muslim bhai bhai line.

Now we, the hoodwinked masses, are completely flummoxed by all these developments. The Enlightened State owns a socialist market economy but it is subservient to its ideological enemy, the multinational corporations. The Welfare State runs an indigenously developed economic system called swadeshi 8212; and finds itself unable to stand up to Enron. The bourgeoisie want society as it stands today, minus the divisive elements.

And Lenin would add that they omit, obscure or distort the revolutionary soul of Marxism. They extol what is 8212; or at least seems to be 8212; acceptable to the bourgeoisie. All the social chauvinists are now Marxists8217;.

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Then where is one to seek class differences? Is the State not reconciling the different classes? Marx had predicted that the State will wither away and the crux of the matter is that it is indeed withering away. Laloo Raj and Maya Raj have withered away and over in West Bengal, Jyotida is waiting for his State to follow suit.

Had Marx been alive today, he would have turned his theory upside down, because history is not progressing on course. On the other hand, he would have confidently augured that the first State which must wither away is Uttar Pradesh. A Stateless state! I wish Marx were alive today to see it happen.