The Audacity of Hope?

The Audacity of Hope?

Dear Friends

Yesterday, one week after the terror attack in Bombay, I went to the Gateway of India, right next to the Taj Mahal Hotel.

I was not alone. A man called Suparn Verma had said on his blog passionforcinema.com last Saturday that he would stand in front of the Taj at six p.m. on December 3. What started as a one-man action became a tsunami. Thanks to blogs, Twittr, SMSes and E-Mails over 20’000 people descended on South Bombay, crowding not just the Gateway, but spilling over into the Regal Roundabout, and from there into the streets leading away from it, down the Colaba Causeway, past Leopold Café, right to the Nariman House lane.

There were no platforms, no official speakers, no public address system, no prepared agenda. People just walked along, stood around, assembled in small groups. From time to time slogans came up somewhere in the crowd, and died down, then someone started the National Anthem, making everyone stand still and join the singing, before the throng started again towards nowhere in particular, some with candles, some without.

Presumably, people had had the same reaction as we had, when the heard about it. They responded to the electronic messaging because they wanted to commemorate the dead, express their gratitude towards the soldiers, to the Hotel staffs. Or they wanted to express their disgust at the politicians and the State for having allowed terror to take over our life. The anger was palpabe. I saw an elderly Parsi gentleman standing in the middle of the road with others. A policeman nudged him gently aside, so that the cars stuck in the crowd could move again. He reacted sharply, brushed away the hand of the cop, and said something like ‘Leave me alone’.

Some people had come with placards, from small A4 sheets to large banners. They wore their agenda on their sleeves: ‘We the People’, said one, ‘Accountability and Anger’,’Enough of Gandhigiri. Now it’s tit-for-tat’. Some people cried ‘We want War’, ‘Ane eye for two eyes’ and ‘Pakistan Murdabad’ – ‘Death to Pakistan’. But if the mood turned belligerent at times, it wasn’t so much against Pakistan as against the politicians. A poster read: ‘We would prefer a dog visit out house than a politician’, another: ‘There are a few more terrorists in India, and they are Politicians’.

But on the whole, it was a peaceful demonstration of Bombay’s citizens, yearning for peace, surprised and relieved that they suddenly found themselves not alone, without the agenda of political parties, without the hammering voices of politicians. Many had done some homework, came with ‘agendas for action’.They attracted volunteers, decided to stay connected, to get engaged, to stand up and be counted.

It was a moving display of ‘people’s power’. I had not seen anything like that for 37 years. In December 1971, almost to the day, thousands of people had marched from the Gateway to Kala Ghoda, from there to Flora Fountain, and on to MG Road and Victoria Terminus. It had been in support of the Bangladesh freedom fighters and the Indian Army which had taken on the Pakistan Army. But another year also came to mind, again almost to the day: December 1992. In comparison to 1971, the demonstrations, against the destruction of the Babri Masjid in 1992, were a few lonely vigils at Flora Fountain and outside Mantralaya, and the exuberance of 1971 was replaced by fear and a deep sense of sadness.

This time, it was a mix of both. There was hope in the air, exhilaration that so many people came together, not only here, but also in Delhi, Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad. There was a new-found sense of ‘yes, we can’. But, unlike that recent night at Grant Park, Chicago, it was tempered by grief, a sense of angry impotence, and a deep-felt concern for the survival of ‘the Idea of India’. But there was anger also, and it had a clear edge over the other feelings. There was a sense of ‘Yes, we can (throw you out)!’.

Is this, perhaps, India’s Obama moment? A few days before, I had written to a friend that in India ‘the Audacity of Hope’ had been overtaken by the ‘Audacity of Terrror’. Do I now have to revisit this pessimistic conclusion? Do the bombs and grenades and gunshots made us stand up, rather than silencing us? Will they provide a catharsis, a chance to clean up public life, politics, a ‘call to arms’ for Civil Society, to take responsibility, get engaged?

I don’t know, and doubts persist. How can a multitude of groups, people, friends, neighbours take responsibility beyond their personal lives? Who will give leadership, who will, as the ‘Times of India’ titled an article, provide ‘the face of Mumbai’, like Rudi Giuliani did after 9/11?

From the steps of Regal Cinema, as I looked at the multitude of people floating in all directions, not aggressively, vaguely focussed, waiting for nothing in particular to happen, I felt a deep void of leadership. In India today, all the leaders seem to be politicians, and they have perverted the very concept of leadership. The good men shy away from politics, and there is a huge empty space waiting to be filled. Because ultimately, there must be leadership, there is no alternative to it.

There must be a Gandhi somewhere around, a man, a woman who can give shape, focus, expression to that diffuse sense of revolt and hope. Nobody seems to believe that an Indian Obama could suddenly appear on the horizon.In the last few weeks, newspapaers have convincingly argued that in the political system of India, its size and and social complexity, its many faultlines and different aspirations, this just isn’t possible.

But that was before 26/11.

The attacks on Bombay have woken up the urban middle class, the upper-class elite, the businessmen and the media, like nothing has before, perhaps since 1947. Will it last, turn from anger and enthusiasm into action and transformation? I doubt it will, if there aren’t leaders rising from this movement, giving clarity, focus and organisational force to it.

And yet, I wonder. Maybe, just maybe, technology has changed the rules of the game. The networking capacities of the net and the mobile phone have perhaps done away with the old model of ‘a leader, a cadre, an organisation, a mass following’. Maybe we are at the threshold of ‘a million mutinies, now’ - grassroot mutinies, spontaneous, focussed around local, topical, burning issues, with the capacity to mobilise thousands of people within hours, keeping them networked, then letting them disperse again, coming together around another issue, another set of people.

Maybe this is an audacious hope. Maybe it is just a momentaneous reaction, a gut response to the ‘audacity of terror’ and the huge public insecurity.

But then, as Gandhi, as Barack Obama have shown, one has to ‘dare to dream’.

December 4, 2008