The loudest, not the most
After the successful completion of the second rung of the lawyers’ movement, and after the government’s first major confrontation with the judiciary – the NRO cases – came a constitutional crisis of sorts. The judges case. Who decides who gets to be a judge of the apex judiciary? Without getting into the merits and demerits of the arguments on either side, it would be helpful to point to a statement of the then chief of the Supreme Court bar. In a blatant disregard for the spirit of the constitution, the gentleman had said that the judiciary was a far better choice than the parliament for making decisions of this sort because, whereas the judiciary had sacrificed a lot for the country, the parliament was filled with thieves and looters.
The statement had attracted uproar. Even the Pakistani media, out usually with pitchforks against the political class, was taken aback. Such accusation against a collective that happens to be an aggregation of our teeming millions?
Contrast that with the situation with India. Hundreds of activists out on the streets giving one soundbite after the other about being anti-parliament. Unequivocal statements. A movement that has caught the imaginations of the Indian urban middle-class had yielded in a group that isn’t really ashamed of being anti-representative democracy.
Why is that the case? Perhaps decades of a fluent democratic process (pock-marked as it might be) has blunted the instincts of both the Indian people and the Indian political critics (some of the best there are in the world) from picking up on anti-democracy signals. And not subtle signals, these; footage of Ramlila ground comes with quite an interesting soundtrack.
There is a call for an Anna-like movement in Pakistan. The ingredients certainly are here. There is rampant corruption in the country, some of it with absolute impunity. Strictly logistically speaking, there is also a measure of convenience; the demographic that refuses to be patient with the politicians is that same urban middle-class. This lot dominates the media. Expect to see some rather well-done TV packages.
The Indian government’s kow-towing to the demands of this civil society group shows the disproportionate power that unelected civil society groups (the ones that manage to make the most noise) yield now.
A word of caution here.
