Direct speech?

In this season of political rancour,it takes real talent to stand out the way Nitin Gadkari does. The BJP president has perfected the low,personalised insult even while making a point with potentially serious import,what startles most listeners is his willingness to take it to the mud-pit. He has compared Sonia Gandhis commitment to fighting corruption to Pakistans commitment to fighting terrorism,called the Congress a party of thugs,declared that Digvijaya Singh had lost his mental balance and now,alleging that Sonia Gandhi was directly responsible for putting Suresh Kalmadi in charge of the Commonwealth Games,Gadkari dared any mard ka baccha to file a defamation suit.

Gadkari might fancy himself a straight-shooter,an outsider from Maharashtra who has no patience with Delhis silky courtiers. He often frames his approach in terms of machismo defending the Bellary brothers earlier,he has spoken of himself as a mard rajneta,someone with the backbone to support those who had been with the party through good and bad times. However,that impatience with the often hypocritical manners of public rhetoric often goes too far in his effort not to be another Delhi smooth-talker,he ends up flouting the norms of basic civility.

As the leader of our main opposition party at a time when it should be doggedly holding the government to account,Gadkaris kind of coarse confrontation helps no one. It fritters away the BJPs real advantage at the moment,and changes the subject to one of injury and insult. Right now,when public discourse is so polarised,the effort should be to expand the realm of reasonable disagreement,rather than crank up the heat.