EDITORIAL: DECLINE AND FALL OF DEMOCRACY IN THE WORLD’S OLDEST AND LARGEST “DEMOCRACIES”
Vinod Mubayi
The precipitous decline of routine democratic functioning in both the U.S. and India, exemplified by free and fair elections, adherence to the rule of law, freedom of speech and assembly, freedom of the press, and a viable political opposition allowed to function without harassment, has become a matter of frequent comment in the media in both countries in recent months. Trump’s daily attacks on any and every conceivable opposition have become commonplace, as have the cries of protest from those affected or afflicted by his actions. Here is one from a small NGO: “With the stroke of a pen, Donald Trump issued a Presidential Memorandum instructing the Department of Justice to target the one tool we rely on to organize, resist, and win. It’s an open declaration of war on small-dollar donors, on activists, on our right to resist.” This is eerily similar to the Modi regime’s use of the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act (FCRA) a few years ago to attack and drive out of existence several human rights NGOs in India that used to get donations from foreign donors.
The playbooks of most dictatorial regimes have similar entries; Trump’s U.S. and Modi’s India offer many such examples:
- Weaponizing majoritarianism. In Trump’s U.S., it takes the form of attacks on immigrants, and in Modi’s India, attacks on religious minorities.
- Electoral shenanigans. Gerrymandering of electoral constituencies in Republican dominated states in Trump’s America. Duplicate voting, fake voters, and other voter fraud in Modi’s India.
- The impotence of the legislative branch of government in both countries in curbing, let alone stopping, the authoritarian impulses of the executive. Republican majorities in both houses of Congress are loath (terrified would likely be more appropriate) to oppose Trump, afraid of angering him or losing the MAGA voting base. In India, the Parliament has been a virtual rubber stamp for Modi ever since his party gained control of the Upper House several years ago.
- The fecklessness or pusillanimity or, even worse, complicity, of the judiciary in failing to uphold the law and the constitution and ultimately give a green signal to authoritarianism. The most egregious example here is that of Trump, who was convicted on 34 counts in a New York State court but adjudged to be a virtual monarch not subject to laws by a 6-3 ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court; three of the court’s judges had been appointed by Trump in his first term as President. The Indian judiciary in Modi’s rule is hardly any better. In 2019, the Indian Supreme Court issued a biased ruling distinguished only by its supreme lack of logic; the destroyers of the 16th century Babri mosque were roundly castigated for their heinous act but were then rewarded by the judgment with the prize of the land on which the mosque had stood so they could construct a grand Hindu temple dedicated to Lord Rama at that site.
- Finally, the use of neutral agencies of the modern state, such as the tax authorities, the investigation agencies, the police, and, now, even the military, as political arms of the executive branch and the current rulers to harass opponents from all walks of society; political, environmental, intellectual, scientific, religious, and cultural. Trump is sending in troops to major cities on the utterly specious and made-up claims of skyrocketing crime, when all major sources of crime data point to the exact opposite of his claims. Trump has also launched an all-out attack on science in the environmental and medical areas, with denials of climate change, and trashing of vaccines and other long-established medicines. Modi’s use of the tax department, the Enforcement Directorate, which was set up to investigate financial fraud, and the Central Bureau of Investigation to jail opposition politicians, make it very difficult for human rights NGOs to function, and the persecution of scholars and journalists who dare to expose Modi’s policies has been going on for over a decade.
But there is one arena that literally cries out for attention as a stunning moral failure on the part of both the U.S. and India, where Trump’s (and, earlier, Biden’s) U.S. is guilty of the more serious crime of an act of commission, while Modi’s India is guilty mainly of an act of omission. This is the ongoing genocide in Gaza being carried out relentlessly every day for almost the last two years by the government of Israel, which is now seemingly embarked on a virtual extermination and/or expulsion of the civilian population of Gaza. This diabolical policy has been aided to the hilt by the endless supply of munitions and total political support from the U.S. Trump has labelled both the war criminal Netanyahu and himself as “war heroes.” A more morally repulsive and disgusting appellation is difficult to imagine. Modi’s India on this issue is guilty of silence – a refusal to condemn Israel for its actions, as shown by some of its earlier abstentions in the United Nations on votes to condemn Israel. Beyond the silence is the collaboration of some of Adani’s companies with Israeli weapons manufacturers like Elbit, making drones that are being used to surveil and kill Palestinians.
Another nail in the coffin of Indian democracy is the widespread and credible allegation of voter fraud that has brought the reputation of the validity of election outcomes at both the national and state levels to a new low. The most heavily implicated body is the Election Commission of India (ECI). This constitutionally neutral and independent body had enjoyed a stellar reputation for several decades of conducting free and fair elections. The members of this body were formerly selected by a panel consisting of the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Modi used his parliamentary majority some years ago to pass a bill that removed the Chief Justice from the selection panel and replaced him with a Minister from Modi’s regime giving him an automatic majority on the selection of ECI members. Since then, detailed and weighty accusations have been launched against the ECI and its conduct of elections involving possible corrupt collaboration with Modi’s BJP party as evidenced by the results themselves. The ECI chief has so far responded to the allegations with bluster and threats that have further diminished the ECI’s credibility.
Trump’s daily violation of democratic norms has become almost routine. He cancels programs adopted earlier by Congress with complete abandon, confident that the Republican majority is too scared of inciting his wrath or that of the MAGA voting base. However, Trump’s actions of trashing science, installing a crank anti-vaccine activist at the helm of the health department, dismantling much of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), slashing federal research funding by the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health and Centers for Disease Control at leading U.S. universities, and, above all, completely denying the well= established science of climate change not only negatively impact the U.S. but the whole world as the U.S. is the world’s largest cumulative emitter of greenhouse gases that are mainly responsible for global warming. The Trump regime’s blatant disregard of democratic norms and principles has potentially far more severe and wide-ranging consequences across the globe than the actions of smaller wannabe dictators like Modi, which can, at most, affect their own or neighboring countries.
Trump’s disregard for any rules or norms of democratic functioning has reached its nadir in the arena of global trade with his whimsical imposition of tariffs on various countries. As lower courts and the appeals court have ruled against Trump on this issue, deciding that tariffs are the province of Congress, it will be interesting to see what the U.S. Supreme Court does when it rules on the issue. In the meantime, there is Trump’s imposition of a punitive 50% tariff on the imports of a wide range of goods from, of all countries, India. This is surprising for several reasons, not the least of which is Modi’s assiduous pursuit of a BFF relationship with Trump, beginning with the “Howdy Modi” jamboree in Houston, TX, during Trump’s first term, which was followed by the “Namaste Trump” event in Ahmedabad, India. After Trump’s re-election, Modi was one of the early leaders to rush to Washington, DC in February to meet and greet Trump. What went wrong between them has all the markings of a big, world-class bully beating up on a smaller bully. Trump has repeatedly claimed credit for single-handedly stopping the brief 4-day war between India and Pakistan in April this year. The veracity of this claim like many other Trump pronouncements, is anybody’s guess, but there is absolutely no way Modi could agree for fear of seriously denting his domestic strongman image, especially in all matters concerning Pakistan. The fact that Pakistan tacitly agreed with Trump and adroitly nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize, an award devoutly coveted by Trump, no doubt added salt to Modi’s wound, further exacerbated, reportedly, by a testy Modi-Trump phone call in June, after which Trump announced his punishing tariffs. Meanwhile, U.S. criticism of India has mounted for purchasing Russian oil in large quantities, and one of Trump’s cohorts went so far as to make India responsible for prolonging the Ukraine war and accused it of being an “oil money laundromat for the Kremlin.”
For the last two or three decades, and particularly after Modi assumed power in 2014, the Indian business elite and political leadership have pursued a fervent pro-American foreign policy that explicitly jettisoned the non-aligned policy of the Nehruvian era. As one commentator wrote, India seemed to be “auditioning for a role as a junior partner in a world order run by the U.S.” Now that Trump seems to have signaled a lack of interest in any world order and a repudiation of any privileged role for Modi’s India, the billionaire Indian class led by Ambani and Adani who have been Modi’s firmest supporters and cheerleaders and who have benefitted enormously from the U.S. connection will have to figure out along with Modi who and where to turn to.
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