This headline from the Indian Express is going to surprise you.
What? Is this for real? I mean, of course there were allegations of irregularities during voting in Kolkata municipal elections. That’s what elections in Bengal are all about – violence and intimidation by goons of the ruling party. It is an unbroken tradition of “liberalism,” handed down from Congress to CPI(M) to the TMC. And no, this is not the kind of “violence” you can report to Facebook and become a hero. In Bengal, ruling party supporters don’t bother with posting troll comments. In Bengal, there are no half-measures.
The surprise is how come an elite newspaper such as the Indian Express is reporting on this? Is the media really going to cut through the layers of liberal privilege and talk about the state that has been ground zero for lynching for the last 70 years? What will the liberals at the Press Club of India and India International Center say? Do they have no regard for secular and democratic values? This is not the India we grew up in.
In that India, there were 28,000 political murders in 20 years under Jyoti Basu, or a little over 5 political murders a day. And that’s just the official figure. No wonder Rahul Gandhi says he has never heard of “lynching” before 2014.
Relax. The elite media is not changing. To understand, read the line below the headline. They are talking about complaints from CPI(M) workers.
Wait! But isn’t the BJP the main opposition party in Bengal? Have they not made any complaints regarding election irregularities in Bengal?
Of course they have. But there’s no space for those complaints in this article. You can go read through the whole thing. You will find sentences such as:
“CPI(M) candidate from ward number 110 Tanusree Mondol said, “Our agents were forced to leave booths.“
“CPI(M) candidate of ward number 101 Atanu Chatterjee alleged that TMC polling agents were threatening his polling agent.”
“CPI (M) secretary of South 24 Parganas district Samik Lahiri said, “We are demanding re-polling ..””
The article goes on and on, quoting possibly every low level office bearer or candidate from CPI(M) that the reporters could possibly find. The word BJP does not appear anywhere in the article, let alone any quotes or reactions from its members.
That is liberal privilege. The people of Bengal may have elected the BJP as the main opposition to the TMC. But as far as elite media is concerned, the BJP does not exist. Apparently, there is no need to talk to them.
When we speak of the mandate of the people, we are generally thinking of who gets to be Prime Minister or Chief Minister. But we forget that when people are voting in a democracy, they are not just choosing a ruling party. They are also choosing an opposition. Once upon a time, the CPI(M) used to rule Bengal. Today they have been dethroned. But that doesn’t mean the CPI(M) automatically gets to be the “opposition.”
The people of Bengal also elected an opposition party, the BJP. The people gave 18 MPs and some 75 MLAs to the BJP. The CPIM does not own the opposition space in Bengal, they have to earn it. As of now, the people of Bengal have chosen the TMC to rule them. And they have also chosen the BJP to keep a check on possible excesses of the ruling party.
But the media does not seem to respect this mandate. For them, it is the CPIM that counts. Because the CPIM has liberal privilege. The CPIM is hurting, and so that is being reported. It is as if the BJP and its voters, workers and supporters, are all “unpersons.”
The people of Bengal might want the BJP to be the main opposition, but in the media, it is the CPIM that gets to have the voice.
How many seats does the CPIM have in Bengal? Zero. How many seats does CPIM have nationally? Maybe one or two. I didn’t check. But that stuff is all irrelevant. Because the CPIM has liberal privilege. Those with liberal privilege stand in the foreground, allowed to raise their voice. Those without liberal privilege are second class citizens at best, and “unpersons” at worst.
Don’t miss this headline either
Look, they mentioned the BJP! After the CPM of course. So things are changing. The second class citizens of Indian politics have at least got a mention in the headline of the article.
“CPM, BJP seek…” How do you like the sound of that? Party with 1-2 seats is mentioned before the party with 300 seats. Imagine putting the name of a gully cricketer in a headline before the name of Sachin Tendulkar. That’s the difference liberal privilege makes.
You might say who cares? We know that the BJP is the main opposition in Bengal, not CPIM. But that is not how liberals see it. Because your memories won’t last, the written word will. Fifty years from now, the written record will show that there was poll violence in Bengal, and CPIM was the victim. The BJP never existed. Because it was the party of the “unpersons.”
