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Correspondent

23 August 2024 at 4:29:04 pm

Manufactured Martyrs

The attempt by the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) to turn activist Sonam Wangchuk into the next Anna Hazare has exposed how manufactured symbolism cannot compensate for the absence of genuine public outrage. What began as a grievance over the NEET paper leak, one of India’s gravest examination scandals in recent times, has drifted into an exercise in political pageantry, where the cause has been eclipsed by its chosen mascots. Wangchuk’s indefinite hunger strike was plainly meant to recreate a...

Manufactured Martyrs

The attempt by the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) to turn activist Sonam Wangchuk into the next Anna Hazare has exposed how manufactured symbolism cannot compensate for the absence of genuine public outrage. What began as a grievance over the NEET paper leak, one of India’s gravest examination scandals in recent times, has drifted into an exercise in political pageantry, where the cause has been eclipsed by its chosen mascots. Wangchuk’s indefinite hunger strike was plainly meant to recreate a familiar script where an allegedly unassuming public figure embraces personal sacrifice and a reluctant government buckles under mounting moral pressure. But history does not repeat itself on command. Anna Hazare’s fast in 2011 succeeded not because fasting possesses mystical political powers, but because it rode a tidal wave of public anger against corruption. Millions identified with the cause. That equation is conspicuously absent today. The platform that ought to have belonged to students who suffered from the NEET paper leak, or to parents whose children bore its consequences, instead became crowded with the usual constellation of professional activists, ideological campaigners and political fellow travellers. The faces dominating the stage were not those most directly affected by the scandal. A movement demanding educational accountability gradually came to look like another gathering of Delhi’s permanently aggrieved activist class. Even Wangchuk appeared to sense the contradiction. During the protest he reportedly lamented that while he was observing an indefinite fast, many around him were happily eating meals, urging at least a token one-day fast in solidarity. Successful protest movements depend upon authenticity. Once the public begins suspecting that an individual is being deployed less as a leader than as a moral accessory for someone else’s ideological project, sympathy quickly evaporates. Nor does Wangchuk arrive without controversy. Questions have been raised over the cancellation of the FCRA licence of SECMOL, the educational organisation associated with him, and over allegations regarding subsequent foreign funding arrangements. Critics have also challenged aspects of the carefully cultivated public mythology surrounding his achievements, from the origins of the ice-stupa concept to the popular belief that he inspired the protagonist of 3 Idiots. These matters deserve scrutiny on their own merits rather than hagiography or character assassination. The greater failure here surely belongs to the protest’s organisers. The CJP has mistaken optics for momentum and symbolism for public sentiment. Instead of allowing the victims of the NEET scandal to speak for themselves, they attempted to manufacture another national conscience by placing a familiar face at the centre of the stage. Political legitimacy cannot be outsourced to celebrity. Nor can mass movements be assembled from social-media influencers and habitual protesters. Anna Hazare became powerful because the public chose him. Attempts to manufacture his successor merely underline how rare such moments really are.

Home Shame

There are defeats, and then there are indictments. India’s 2–1 ODI series loss to New Zealand at home, sealed by a 41-run defeat in Indore, belongs firmly in the latter category.  The even stranger question is how are the Kiwis, of all teams, shattering India’s once-vaunted home turf invincibility for the second time in less than two years?


New Zealand first inflicted a historic defeat when they whitewashed India 3–0 at home in 2024, a feat that was described as the first such clean sweep by a touring side in about 91 years of Test history for India in home Test series involving three or more matches.


And now comes the Indore ODI win for New Zealand who clinched the series despite not having their best players with them. The bare numbers sting. Chasing 338, India folded at 296 despite Virat Kohli’s imperious 124 from 108 balls, an innings of vintage authority cruelly wasted. New Zealand, clinical and unflustered, had earlier defended their total with discipline, Michael Bracewell’s 3 for 54 and Jacob Duffy’s timely strikes puncturing India’s chase.


Yet, his was not New Zealand at full strength. There was no Kane Williamson, no Rachin Ravindra, no Trent Boult or Matt Henry. What arrived instead was a side closer to New Zealand’s experimental bench than its first XI.


Under head coach Gautam Gambhir and his rhetorical swagger, Indian cricket has lurched from setback to setback. A heavy Border-Gavaskar Trophy loss in Australia. An ODI series defeat to Sri Lanka. Home Test series losses to New Zealand and South Africa. And now, ignominy piled upon ignominy, a home ODI series defeat to what critics dubbed New Zealand’s ‘C team’ which out-bowled and outplayed India in Indian conditions.


The backlash against Gambhir and chief selector Ajit Agarkar is justified given their tenure has been marked by bizarre selection choices and ‘strategic’ experiments that have yielded perplexity more than progress: dropping in-form Ruturaj Gaikwad after a century, leaving out seasoned campaigners like Mohammed Shami and Axar Patel, and an almost compulsive tinkering that denies any unit the stability to build momentum.


These are the symptoms of incoherent leadership and misplaced priorities. The richest board in world cricket, with the deepest reservoir of talent, should not be reduced to an experimental lab where proven performers are discarded on ideological grounds. Yet that is where India finds itself today.


Worse still, these defeats have a corrosive effect on belief. Test and ODI defeats on home pitches, once the inviolate bedrock of Indian confidence, now only foreshadow more losses. What should have been routine triumphs have now become sources of existential angst. A generation of fans, accustomed to dominance, is now forced to reckon with Indian vulnerability.


Whether New Zealand possesses some mystical key to conquering India is beside the point. The real question is why India no longer feels like the team it once was at home. 


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