Political Pantomime

The spectacle on Nagpur’s outskirts this week had all the trappings of rural discontent with tractors clogging highways, angry farmers waving placards and a fiery leader - Bachchu Kadu, the mercurial chief of the Prahar Janshakti Party – vowing to court arrest. Kadu and other leaders led a ‘Maha Elgar Morcha’ that paralysed National Highway 44 for nearly twenty kilometres, causing commuters much distress. The ostensible demand was a complete waiver of farm loans. Yet the choreography of the protest with respect to its timing – just ahead of the civic polls - and the government’s conspicuous inaction raises a different question. Is this dissent, or a display staged for electoral effect?

The High Court had ordered the highway cleared by 6 p.m. on Wednesday. By then, Kadu declared that his followers would obey the order. There was no lathi charge, no arrests, no water cannons; only patient police and cameras capturing the ‘defiance.’ Even Raju Shetti, the veteran farmer leader, joined the agitation, as did other familiar faces from Maharashtra’s small party circuit. Yet the Mahayuti government, otherwise swift to crush unruly demonstrations, remained curiously indulgent. For a ruling dispensation led by Devendra Fadnavis, known for his administrative discipline, such tolerance seems uncharacteristic. 

The CM, for his part, sounded almost conciliatory. He reminded reporters that his government was already considering a loan waiver, had announced a Rs. 32,000-crore relief package, and was transferring funds directly to farmers’ accounts. He urged the protesters to talk, not block roads. Yet, his tone lacked the sharpness one might expect when a national highway lies paralysed. 

The leniency invites speculation. Maharashtra’s civic polls are approaching, and Kadu’s base in Vidarbha could prove decisive in a few pockets where the ruling alliance is vulnerable. A noisy protest that stops short of violence but projects populist empathy might serve multiple purposes: allowing Kadu to refurbish his image as a rustic rebel while letting the government appear sensitive to agrarian distress. Both sides gain visibility and neither loses face. 

If that is indeed the subtext, the protest becomes less a cry of anger than a managed performance. In Indian politics, ‘scripted agitations’ are not rare. They offer the illusion of confrontation while keeping the actors within the same tent. For the public, however, the spectacle blurs accountability while causing needless commuting hassle.

Kadu’s insistence on immediate waiver by bypassing discussion seems designed to dramatize impatience rather than seek negotiation.

Yet, if the government truly wished to stop the disruption, it could have. Instead, it chose indulgence, allowing the protest to unfold. In an election season, outrage can be a convenient currency. 

Whatever the motive, the real losers remain the farmers themselves. Each wave of agitation raises expectations that the State will simply write off debt, discouraging reform of the credit system that perpetuates rural distress. Loan waivers offer temporary relief but little structural change. Maharashtra’s treasury, already strained, can scarcely sustain populism as policy.