Talking Shop: Too true to tell

“The truth will set you

free. But not until it

is finished with you.”

—David Foster Wallace

The United Nations last week joined a fast-turning-flatulent list of detractors dishing out sermons to India when a spokesperson for its Secretary-General Antonio Guterres spoke on the immediate need for a level playing field for all concerned players in ongoing or upcoming activities in the country. The statement was a near-stillborn offspring of the freezing of bank accounts of the Indian National Congress party and the detention of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for alleged irregularities in the crafting and implementation of a new Excise Policy in the National Capital. The statement by the UN came in the wake of similar sentiments aired earlier in the week by Germany and the United States, with the latter’s State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller echoing the sentiment, making a veiled hint at the looming General Elections in India.

As is wont and was expected, these dogmatic “remarks into matters internal” haven’t gone down well with the authorities; so much so that the country’s Vice-President Jagdeep Dhankhar intervened and reiterated the Government’s indignation at the unsolicited and unrequited advice, saying “India has a robust judiciary and does not need lessons from anyone”. Yes, it is time for the country to take a resolute stand, regardless of the direction that we decide to turn in. It is also time to say our piece and clamp down lid on this gun, as the recoil can be deadly. No, it isn’t appropriate or diplomatically suave to point the barrel at the guffaw-worthy fiascos faced by the US and Germany themselves in their Presidential and Chancellorship campaigns.

For us as much as for them, some things are too true to tell.

Much is happening

Look at what has happened with Electoral Bonds and the way the issue has been managed. A matter that should have been kept internal and tackled firmly has been allowed to blow up to rancid proportions, with the world speaking of our country in less than conciliatory terms. The largest bank in India has been repeatedly reprimanded by the highest court in the land, with the threat of strictures and contempt being bandied around like marshmallows on a skewer—it was a foregone conclusion that playing merry-go-round with fire would leave both charred and burnt. Well, they are sooty in the face, as is the countenance of the world’s third-largest economy.

Look at three recent media-centric ceremonies, with the awards becoming as much of a sham as the winning mediapersons themselves, for both rub off one-another. Things got so ridiculous that even those in the audience were left sniggering, especially as most award-winners were media-sinners, having made a mockery of news reportage and displayed sycophancy in its crudest, most basic form. In the august halls that felicitated these so-called journalistic stalwarts also sat some intrepid loyalists of all things real Fourth Estate, wringing their hands and other body parts in frustration.

Move northward to Ladakh, where a man and his followers sat on a fast for three weeks, demanding implementation of the autonomy that was promised to them in better times and climes. Today, with temperatures still at sub-zero levels, those pledges have been disinherited and disowned, making Sonam Wangchuk a redoubtable ‘4th Idiot’ in his own land. He now threatens to walk to the Line of Actual Control and delve into non-cooperation in a bid to paralyze the Ladakhi administration.

And walk he should, for some things are too true to tell.

Uphill terrain indeed

Having spoken on Ladakh, here’s more. In 1989, when I was all of 20 years old, the road to Ladakh was thrown open to the public. We have since been trying to turn it into another Shimla, Mussoorie and Nainital, with people and animals gasping for breath and sustenance. My verbiage may be less-than-malleable, and that’s because it perhaps is. The new-found affluence for some is deadly for many, a mental pyorrhoea taking a toll on values and beliefs. Riches and financial empowerment have to be tenable, else they become unsustainable. A holiday is nice, as are fancy apartments, swanky cars and glitzy hotels, but they are no good to the 80 crore Indians living on free rations, nor is it healthy or palatable for any society that a person who tills and toils earns Rs 27 per day.

The moral is simple—we need systems and processes to ensure all-round growth. A short visit to the hills underscores the sheer scale of disparity between the haves and the have-nots. Given the many have-nots who end up in our homes and offices for employment, the economic inequality only further breaches our social fabric, catalysing a feeling of discontent and increased crime, especially as people trapped in poverty see little chance to climb up the social ladder. Inclusivity and growth are the only path to a healthy society; why should only a few enjoy fancy holidays? Deep inside, everyone wants to live life by a compass, not a clock, but no one will write on this fact of life.

Is it because some things are too true to tell?

Repeated oft-enough

Any writeup on truth wilfully warped or misrepresented leads us to Adolf Hitler, the German Fuehrer whose biggest contributions to mankind were World War II and Jewish Concentration Camps. But nearly a century after the holocaust and the brutal killing of millions of Jews in the name of scientific advancement and ethnic cleansing, questions are being raised on whether they were targeted at all. That, ahem, would make Dachau, Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald and Auschwitz the hottest picnic spots of the 1940s (paradoxically, that is what they are now for tourists from around the world).

Mistruths also lead us on to Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s confidante and the German ‘Minister of Propaganda’ who was instrumental in convincing the masses to support the Nazi regime. After Hitler and Eva Braun’s suicide, Goebbels served as Chancellor of Germany for a single day before he and his wife, Magda, had their six children poisoned and took their own lives. In the context of this story, what is Joseph Goebbels’ contribution to humanity? Well, he did say if you lied and lied and lied, you would start believing in the feint yourself. “Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth” is the reprehensible statement attributed to Goebbels, which reminds us of people closer home too.

The simple truth is that similar to a child, the truth can also be a friend or foe, depending on how we nurture it. Handle it right and it pays back in heaps and dividends, ill-treat it and it can eventually throw a monkey wrench into our own works. Oscar Wilde probably realized this when he said: “The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”

Perhaps I have too, because I know that some things are too true to tell.

The writer is a veteran journalist and communications specialist. He can be reached on narayanrajeev2006@gmail.com. Views expressed are personal