In The Name Of The Father, The Daughter & Grandsons .. Amen!

Just a sample: “Rajiv Gandhi Breakfast Scheme, Pondicherry; Rajiv Ratna Awas Yojana, Delhi; Rajiv Arogyasri Health Insurance scheme, Andhra Pradesh; Rajiv Gandhi Computer Literacy Mission, Assam; Rajiv Gandhi Bridges and Roads Infrastructure Development Programme, Haryana; Rajiv Gandhi Vidyarthi Suraksha Yojana, Maharastra; Rajiv Gandhi Tourism Development Mission, Rajasthan; Indira Kranthi Patham Scheme and Indira Jeevitha Bima Pathakam, Andhra Pradesh; Indira Gandhi Niradhar Yojana and Indira Gandhi Landless Agriculture Labour Scheme, Maharastra; Indira Gandhi Priyadarshini Vivah Shagun Yojana, Haryana; Indira Gandhi Calf-Rearing Scheme, Andhra Pradesh”. The sample is from A. Surya Prakash’s “All in the name of the Nehru-Gandhis”.

So when the Supreme Court asks the GOI and State govts to explain why it spends crores on political ads paying tributes to their leaders it is responding to a PIL that only partly addresses the issue. "The political parties in power are blatantly squandering taxpayers' money to highlight their achievements and to glorify their leaders of present or past. Such a practice is either aimed to avail unfair advantage in elections by political parties or to assert loyalties towards the political leadership of the party in power. This wasteful and wholly unnecessary exercise cannot be justified in any manner" the petition said. But if one adds up all the people in whose honour the ads are released I doubt the number would be very high. Most of these ads naturally come from the Congress which pays frequent homages to members of the Nehru-Gandhi family.

Surya Prakash’s article mentions over 450 Central and State schemes and projects named after the Nehru-Gandhi family. Yes, even Sanjay Gandhi has projects or monuments named after him. That article is over a year old and it is safe to estimate this would have crossed 500 schemes by now. The PIL in SC addresses only the ads related to birth and death anniversaries of political leaders but if one looks at the ads for various schemes “branded” with names of political leaders it is a much larger pie. This is how a political establishment is created. This is how the media is co-opted into the branding exercise as the biggest beneficiary of the doles (Also read The Gandhi Septology). And we are not even getting into "paid news" in the discussion.

People have seen small posters at shops where consumer durables are sold; these are commonly called POPs (Point of purchase). Not everybody who walks into a store looks at these POPs or reads the messages. So who reads them? It’s the shopkeeper and his employees who cannot help reading them day in and day out. They have no escape. As they read it frequently some of them internalise the message. Now imagine, that there are millions of people working in all the Nehru-Gandhi projects, they read the messages every single day. There are media house who are beneficiaries who read the messages every single day. There are the beneficiaries of the scheme; the poor, the villagers, the farmers and they read the messages frequently. Consciously or unconsciously all these people are bought into the establishment by the branded schemes, projects and ads. The beneficiaries are hammered the message into believing “This scheme is brought to you by the Nehru-Gandhi family”.

The babus and other employees who work on these branded projects slowly become the victim of the belief that their employment is brought to them by the “Nehru-Gandhi” projects and they would otherwise be in some other job or at worst jobless. The biggest cash-beneficiary is, of course, the media. It’s a tap that turns on the cash for them. Why would they even complain about it? Apart from these “branded” ads the GOI holds the power to dole out other ads like for PF, ESIC, Customs which may not have the slightest relevance to the time of the release (see here). The PIL also overlooks another issue. Most of us live in the belief that these “branded” ads and birth and death anniversary ads are the only method used by the govt. This is a fallacy.

Supposing I were a Minister and my friendly channel called me up seeking sponsorship for a frivolous event what would it take to dole out a favour? A contractor who handles large contracts worth thousands of crores for the govt wouldn’t really mind shelling out a few lakhs or crores on various events in the media. Take a little trouble and check on who sponsors all those “Indians of the Year” or “Indians of the decade” awards and shows. You might find that some of the biggest govt contractors shell out money for events which are totally unrelated to their business. Take HindustanTimes Summit 2012 for instance. Most of the sponsorship of the event came with your money. Most of large sponsors of the event are giant PSUs/Govt companies. Surprisingly, some of them don’t even advertise in the normal course of life. 

Given all these doles and generous lifelines who do you think the media is going to stand by in their reporting? You? Fat chance! They will support the propaganda and stand in defence of the hand that feeds them. It’s now widely recognised as the ‘Politico-Media complex’. On his 20th death anniversary there were 11 Rajiv Gandhi ads in Hindustan Times alone, there were 9 in the TOI and 8 in Indian Express. That’s just three newspapers and you can imagine the count for the rest (Reuters)

Take a look at the first ad on this post. Twenty years after his death Rajiv Gandhi is still fulfilling the dreams of the urban poor. For all you know he will continue to do so for another hundred years. There must be someone else who is doing his or her bit for the rural poor and the semi-urban poor. A small handful of people have been turned into the “Mai-Baap” of a country, with your money. It is not improper to say a small thanksgiving prayer… In the name of the father, the daughter and the grandsons… Amen!

PS: The book “Social media as watchdog” is now available. You can order a copy from HERE.

The Gandhi Septology

A few nights ago a couple of friends and I were having dinner at a restaurant. One of them is a top professional from the Pharma industry and the other is an economy expert. One was a visitor to Gujarat, so the chat inevitably veered around to Narendra Modi at some point. It was the usual set of questions visitors to Gujarat have about Modi, the “Will he, won’t he?” types. No, not if he will win Gujarat but if he will pitch for Delhi in 2014 or anytime general elections are held, as a PM candidate. And whether he will able to tame or win over the Delhi Establishment. Since there were news channels on with their usual debates on TV at the restaurant, the other question was how certain channels that were doing badly financially were still around. Answer to the second question is simpler; if the channels are part of the “establishment” in a ‘Banana republic’ it’s not a problem.

So what about the “establishment”? “… It includes leading politicians, senior civil servants, the most important financiers and industrialists, governors of the BBC, and the Royal Court…  The term in this sense was coined by the British journalist Henry Fairlie, who in September 1955 in the London magazine The Spectator defined that network of prominent, well-connected people as "the Establishment", explaining: "By the 'Establishment', I do not only mean the centres of official power—though they are certainly part of it—but rather the whole matrix of official and social relations within which power is exercised”. That sums it up quite neatly, doesn’t it? But do replace the BBC with India’s Doordarshan and most of the private TV channels and the Royal Court with the Indian ‘Royal Court’ and the picture is complete. Now does it explain how loss-making TV channels survive? If most political funding is from “anonymous donors” and if so much black money goes into electioneering is it any different in the media? Corrupt crooks in the Politico-Media complex are not about to produce receipts for “paid news”.

Then, creating this Establishment requires years of brand building. There are many tiny corners in this vast country of ours where people, young and old, still believe Indira Gandhi was the daughter of Mahatma Gandhi. Who’s gonna complain about that, eh? That guy who said “What’s in a name..” would have stabbed himself in the back, twice, and then run his own truck over himself, again twice. Ever observed the credits of a modern-day, hi-tech Hollywood movie? It takes anywhere between 500 and 1000 people to make one of those plus a dozen odd companies that provide the effects, marketing, distribution. Then it’s released in over 3000 screens at a time. The same goes for creating the “establishment”. In fact it takes lakhs of people. One of the key features of building the establishment is in using the magic name and like the movie ‘Terminator’ protect and propagate the brand. Find success and create a trilogy. The credits for an “establishment” movie might run like this (2:24 mins):

That’s just a small part of all the schemes and projects in the Nehru-Gandhi brand name and scrolling at high-speed. If I were to include all the 450 schemes that A. Surya Prakash has listed and scrolled it at normal speed, it would take at least 30 minutes to read all the credits. (And he says those 450 are only in the last 18 years). Those 450 brand-builders are quite a handful and can "Terminate" any challenge to power. Also, Surya Prakash’s list doesn’t include Mahatma Gandhi since he doesn’t belong to the “family”. But hey, the “Gandhi” brand name is what it is and has the same effect on the ground. So instead of a trilogy it could have been a Septology. Mahatma Gandhi à Nehru à Indira Gandhi à Rajiv Gandhi à Sanjay Gandhi à Sonia Gandhi à Rahul Gandhi. Oh, and there’s Priyanka Vadra in the wings who can any day turn into Priyanka Gandhi if and when required. If trilogy is about a series of 3, septology is a series of 7.

What does Sanjay Gandhi have? Not much, but there’s a prominent National Park in Borivali, Mumbai named after him? What about Sonia Gandhi? Ha! You’ll be surprised. Since there was nothing else possible, Padma Shri horticulturist Haji Kaleemullah Khan has named a ‘mango variety’ after Sonia Gandhi. Haha! Sounds fair for the ‘Mango Man’, doesn’t it? What about Rahul Gandhi? He is too busy to bother about these things so the Congress UP branch decided to name his birthday as “Farmers’ Rights Day”. If you thought that is all, you just got lucky. You see RG is fond of eating at various homes and places. So this Canteen in M.S.University in Baroda named all the dishes after RG and each dish is accompanied by a nice picture of him. So you could order RahulGandhi-Samosas, RahulGandhi-Rotis or just RahulGandhi-Coffee. And you will be served!  

We can ignore the light-hearted menu at the RG canteen. We can also grant the projects in the name of Mahatma Gandhi, given that he is now an international icon. There are streets and monuments to his name across the world. A report in 2008 mentioned there’s a campaign to rename 185 streets in 39 countries after the Mahatma. Not much to read in that but in India The Gandhi Septology also forms a great part of the “establishment”. That’s the challenge for any non-Congress or non-Gandhi family person to seek high offices. We can even accept a few monuments and projects in the name of Nehru-Gandhi but surely 450 is an excess that is too glaring. Does the MSM protest or complain?

This “establishment” includes govt schemes and projects, organisations funded by the govt. They also include NGOs and individuals, educational institutions, many govt titles (Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna?), think-tanks, many media beneficiaries and wannabe beneficiaries. Most of them receive public land and money one way or another. Collectively they could directly or indirectly employ a million people or more. Would they want to let go of what they have been enjoying under this Septology? So apart from official govt and political propaganda these million plus people also spread the good word. In a brilliant article Minhaz Merchant exposes how “How black economy subverts India’s politics” and how the officially declared “funds” can hardly cover election expenses for any party.

Well, my answer to the friend who asked the question was that many media channels also survive on such funds. Think about another one: Does Reliance really expect to earn money from an investment in TV-18 group? Does it expect to earn money from any media group? With investments like 1500 or 2000 crores, which is peanuts for Reliance, what do they really aim to earn? Your guess is as good as mine. These 450 Nehru-Gandhi schemes and projects are mostly moderate to heavy advertisers. Even at a measly 5 ads per annum to each friendly media house that would be 2250 ads. Even at a heavily discounted rate, of say Rs.20000/- per ad, you do the math for each media outlet. Then add to that all the anniversaries of those who feed the “establishment”, it’s quite a feast. Isn’t it? Suddenly there’s a Motilal Nehru ad, in colour. Sure, celebrate his birth anniversary but why an ad? Also add those individuals and groups who aren’t part of the govt but operate NGOs and other feeder organisations. All of this with your money! Why would they want to kill this goose? Motilal Nehru? That just made it Octalogy, didn’t it?