The Olympics provided another opportunity for us to assess the two political options we face today. The differences are stark and consequential
In the last 14 days, the PM was the loudest and most prominent cheerleader for our players (for both winners and almost-winners)
Rahul Gandhi meanwhile spent the week working hard to turn a horrifying gangrape of a child into an opportunity to create inter-caste discord
Modi’s message has always been that our best days are ahead of us
Our new heroes – the ones building the unicorns, the medallists in Tokyo, the ones making chowmein of the enemy at Galwan all belong to this viewpoint
Lot’s of work to do. We will do it and build a great tomorrow
Rahul and the old elite have a very different message. Our best days were the days of old and we need to go back there
The tool they have chosen to persuade us is to clinically exploit India’s oldest and deepest fault lines. To make us feel afraid and misremember the past
Rahul will fail to persuade many – especially those who don’t suffer dementia and remember life in old Bharat
He will be successful with the young, vocal citizens of United States of India. Kids who were zealously protected from India’s realities by their resourceful parents
India’s future depends on ensuring that people who believe our best lies ahead easily outnumber those who feel that we need to go back to the utopia of 1970s India
The more heroes we have like the ones created in the last 10 days, the better.
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BJP wins a state election - then goes around methodically targeting the opposition
People get murdered all around, women get gangraped. Evidence begins to emerge that particularly Muslim women are being targeted
Now imagine the resulting domestic AND international narrative. The daily headlines, the op-eds abroad, the protests in front of our embassies, the petitions, the short-films, the Insta posts.
Antony Blinken would only talk about this with Jaishankar
Mani Shankar Aiyer has just begun a room on clubhouse to discuss how Rajiv Gandhi built digital India. Please join and record for use in 2024. Pretty sure he will end up insulting all kinds of people
Sam Pitroda has also joined. He is speaking very slowly. As if every word is being first approved by 10 JP first
Jai ram Ramesh has now joined. Jai ram has no profile picture. Is he losing his famous hair?
Thrilling conversation on Clubhouse right now - some disco Khalistanis from America alongside some desi Woko Haram trying very very hard to subtly justify the Hindu deaths in the Delhi riots
An American lady EXTREMELY confidently claiming BJP will lose Maharastra if elections are held today. Not sure about Bengal
A lovely lady from Tamil Nadu confidently claims - Dalits are not Hindus. Her argument slightly diluted by the 5 mins she took to pronounce Hindutva
A carefully planned long-term campaign of disinformation creates a fertile ground for justifying extreme acts of violence which otherwise would be indefensible
Since 2019, there has been a well-coordinated and consistent international effort to paint Modi as a tyrant – in 2019 the reason was Kashmir, in 2000 it was CAA and this year the farmers protest
The features of the narrative building have been remarkably similar every instance – untethered from facts, present anti-Modi operatives as neutral experts, out of context visuals and use of democratic freedoms to paralyze the host country