Daily Times

Kashmir is back in the news, so is the abduction of journalists in Pakistan. Apparently the two issues have little or no relevance with each other,but no issue has an isolated independent existence for they all relate to different forms of human exploitations, which are inherently identicalbecause ‘all of them are applied against the same object, the man [and] they all seek the source of their necessity in some edict of Biblical nature’ (Fanon).

The market economy has made the exploitative process impersonal. Everything including human beings are commodities regulated by the law of value and the necessity of productivity. The aged, vulnerable, and unemployed segmentredundant to the productive process,isleft to perish on its own, capital does not invest onHolocaust campsany longer, the remaining population can die with COVID, a barbaric outcome of neoliberalism. Abduction, a hideous method, introduced initially in the Latin American countries by the neoliberalism, carries astench of Auschwitz. If abduction is temporary, it’s the first step to the concentration camp, a warning to the individual to correct the course of his ship becoming rudderless lest in his adventure to explore the unchartered sea he ends up rocking it by the Caliban and drowning himself by chance or someone’s choice.

Back to Kashmir, where Ladakh became a simmering battle ground between China and India. The Indian state denied the Chinese advance in the Indian territory beyond the buffer zoneseparating the two armies. The Indian prime minister Modi brushed aside any claim of Chinese intrusion/ aggression, even on the day when in a combat Indian army lost its twenty soldiers. The media followed the line, and the army immediately acquiescedto the government’s narrative.

Despite the fascistic tendencies, Indian democracy has deep subterranean roots and severing them completely will be a cumbersomejob that cannot be accomplished without a stiff resistance. Keeping the critical tradition of democracy alive, Colonel (retired)Ajai Shukla, the strategic affairs editor at Business Standard, in an interview with The Wiresaid: “China’s People’s Liberation Army has refused to withdraw in the Hot Springs area and at Gogra Heights…it had shifted 12-15 kms in Depsang, 1 km in Galwan, 2-4 kms in Gogra and 8 kms in Pangong Lake…This would be the largest loss of territory to China since the 1962 war. The government was not presenting the real picture, it is misleading the media…. putting pressure on the army…. The army is spouting a line given by the NSA’s (National- Security- Advisor’s) office”.

For any developing state,Colonel Shukla’s revelations providethought-provoking conclusions, worth pondering. Foremost, of them is thescathing criticism of the premier and the intelligence failure, coming from a retired army officer, who knew not only the geographical but the political terrain too. He not only blew the whistle on Indian military retreat but revealed the facts behind the whole concoction of Chinese withdrawal from the buffer zone.The inference drawn from his statement exposed the government’s motive behind the glacial lie, the whole exercise was about maintaining the invincibility of the cult figureofModi,the charismatic man of destiny, the gifted economic leader,who could do no wrong.

Running a state in the name of cult dates to Nazism when big bourgeoisie backed Hitler to build his persona, which overtime became larger than its mentors’ thoughts. Behind the failure of 1944 coup, backed by the big bourgeoisie, which after achieving its motive of realizing the capital wanted to cast him into the dustbin, stood the fear of economic uncertainty and the figure of oversized personality of Hitler. By, then Adorno’s suburban barber had developed into a King Kong.

Second, Shukla’s statement has explained the position and role of the army viz- a- viz the government. Despite beingone of the largest armies of the worldand having two enemies, China and Pakistan, on its either side,the army followed instruction. Ittowed the line given by the civilian leadership and despite losing ground to the enemyfollowed the discipline of obeying the civilian command.

Unlike western capitalist class, where state functions as a proxy to the former, Indian bourgeoisie has not developed into an autonomous force that can exercise the social function independently

Third important factor highlights the beauty of democracy, no matter how hollow and Orwellian it has become. Capitalist democracy was always about making noise while testifying to the established realitysimultaneously but with neoliberalism in stride, even the dissenting space is squeezing and the existential question ‘where one can go, and scream’ posed by Lainghas become relevant.

In case of Colonel Shukla, a lone wolf who opposed a premier with fascistic tendencies, one could see the glimpses of the remnant of an eclipsing democracy. He was neither abducted nor declared a subversive traitor working against the Indian state. One might think being a retired Colonel, Ajia Shukla was spared the scourge of the state, but his interviewer Karan Thapar,who invited him at a prestigious platform remainedunscathed too. Despite censoring Modi and his government, implying that India lost the territory quietly to guard one man’s image,no one had to sufferthe consequences.Today’s intolerant capitalism in a bygone era did not feel any threatfrom the jingling the rebellious bell created, theclank the bunch of keys of itsunreasonproducedwas loud enough to drown the rebellious shrill.

Unlike western capitalist class, where state functions as a proxy to the former, Indian bourgeoisie has not developed into an autonomous force that can exercise the social function independently. It needs to have the support of the state to control the market hence the government is elevated to function as the dominant force, sensing itsmight even the bourgeoisie appears reluctant to question its authority on economic front. Transformation from Nehru’s socialism to Modi’s neoliberalism has taken its time, so has its conversion from ‘mandated democracy’ to the ‘competitive form’ of democracy, though the past has been successfully erased, the minds have been created but the structure is taking its time to evaporate.

The capitalistic democratic facade requiring political competition needs a process of consent which isa process of manipulation, butto be acceptable themanipulation needs to carry an illusion of transparency. Capital knows that free speech and freedom of thought are no barriers to the mental coordination of the people with the established reality. People tolerate the hegemony offered through electoral consent,but in an authoritarian state people suffer the established policies. The only protest appears on the social media, that too is muted and masquerades itself in ‘the desperate laughter and the cynical defiance of the fool’, in the end, pain gives into jovial denial.

In an authoritarian statea selected premier, lives with Claudio’s guilt, with a hapless Hamlet constantly irritating his conscience and a specter in khaki holding his gun at his temple. His own potential role is further constrained by his dumbness that forces him to oscillate between prevarication and vacillation.

Like all other capitalist leaders, Modi and Imran are the products of the objective conditions, of certain socio-political relations which they have not created. They strove to become Faustus without knowing his fate andare facing their inferno. Their desire and destiny have unfolded in a nightmare, but thenno one Gramsci says,’can become a Kerensky voluntarily, so also one does not escape being a Kerensky just by wilfully refusing to be a Kerensky’. Meanwhile Kashmir, a desire than the desired and the undesired Baluchistan continue to burn.

The writer, an Australian Pakistani has authored books on socialism and history