Hypocrisy dies hard in India. All that a Xavier's College Principal wanted to tell us was 'don't vote for Modi', but he goes about it in a roundabout way by discussing the Gujarat model and the food security act.

If there is one thing that the message sent by the principal of Mumbai’s St Xavier’s College to students proves, it is this: in this election, almost no one is really non-partisan. Plus, if you want to send a political message when you shouldn’t, it is possible to couch it in all kinds of high-sounding ideas and still get your message across.

The message Principal Frazer Mascarenhas wanted to send his students, and the world at large, was simple: don’t vote for Narendra Modi. Since he did not want to do this directly, he chose to send it indirectly. He used the ruse of a discussion on the Gujarat model and human development indicators and the Food Security Act to tell his students whom to vote for.

If he had used the occasion to even discuss the Gujarat model threadbare, he would have done some good. But he didn’t, for a genuine discussion would call for looking at both the good points and the bad points of the Gujarat model in some detail. Even if his chosen focus was to be on human development indicators – where, Gujarat admittedly, lags – he could have been more even-handed. But that was obviously not his purpose.

Mascarenhas chose to frame the discussion around what he calls two views that have come up in “stark” contrast, but effectively runs away from really discussing these views. He posits the growth of big business against the quality of life of the majority – as though these are either/or options. This is the way he frames the debate in his email to students, and which is also on the college’s website (read here). “Is the growth of big business, the making of huge profits, the achievement of high production – what we seek? Or is it the quality of life for the majority in terms of affordable basic goods and services and the freedom to take forward the cultural aspirations of our plural social groups that make up India?”

If Dr Mascarenhas had been listening to Modi’s speeches recently, he has not talked one word about corporate interests – only development for the masses, the poor farmer, the poor worker. But that doesn’t serve the principal’s purpose.

Moreover, is Mascarenhas under the impression that the 2G, Coalgate, Commonwealth and Adarsh Society scams are about meeting the aspirations of the majority? Sure, he may have had the Adani-Ambani issues raised by the Aam Aadmi Party in mind when he wrote this, but surely no party or state leadership has really been free from connections to big business – either for election funding or to seek investments?

Every state seeks big investments, and these require the wooing of big business to create jobs. If Adani and Ambani have done so in Gujarat, so have GVK and GMR in Andhra Pradesh, various steel companies in Odisha, etc. Which world is the principal living in?

Or is the Good Principal under the illusion that inflation, lack of jobs and slow growth are somehow irrelevant to the toiling masses? This is exactly what happened under UPA. Gujarat, in contrast, has among the lowest unemployment rates in the country (read here and here), but this is not apparently an important plus for the Gujarat model.

Then, Mascarenhas takes more direct potshots at the Gujarat model – which is the code he wants his students to understand. He makes a sweeping statement condemning Gujarat’s performance in human indicators, saying the state’s “Human Development Index indicators and the cultural polarisation of the population show that Gujarat has had a terrible experience in the last 10 years.”

Gujarat had a terrible experience in its riots of 2002. Since then it has largely focused on development – and minorities have been a part of this growth story. Social polarisation is a reality in the state, but so is it in many other states.

Sure, Gujarat needs to improve its social indicators, but Mascarenhas fails to consider any counter-view. He could have read this article, or this one, where the author suggests that Gujarat’s growth has been more inclusive than you think. Surely, the head of an educational institution is not supposed to have blinkered, one-sided views. This is what stands out in “stark” contrast.

Then, the email suddenly gets into a private gripe. After saying higher education has “not been allowed to move forward” in Gujarat, Mascarenhas brings up his own private complaint: “St. Xavier’s College, Ahmedabad, thrice NAAC-accredited with an equivalent of the A grade, has not been able to gain permission from the Gujarat Government for academic autonomy, for the last 10 years and has finally won a battle in the high court to approach the UGC directly for this status.”

There’s no better example of using a private grouse to tell people to vote against someone.

After giving his convoluted reasons for why you shouldn’t vote for Modi, Mascarenhas then comes to the point on who you could vote for. Again in obvious code.

He writes: “As opposed to this (ie, Gujarat model, etc), efforts like the Rojgar Yojana and the Food Security Act have been called ‘election sops’. However some of our best social scientists like Amartya Sen and Jean Dreze have supported these as necessary in the emergency economic situation the country and the world is facing.”

Surely, Mascarenhas knows that the Food Security Bill was passed with the support of the BJP? Modi has not said one word against it. Chhattisgarh, a BJP-ruled state, is even said to have a good food security apparatus, and it was lauded by the same Jean Dreze.

But when you talk about what Amartya Sen’s views are on food security, does it not make sense to discuss counter-views, those of Jagdish Bhagwati and Arvind Panagariya?

Mascarenhas comes to the conclusion that “those who support big business and its unethical profits will never agree to such public expenditure for the masses” – expenditure in education and health. But the BJP manifesto specifically talks of huge investments in education and health. The Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan was started by the NDA – and taken forward by the UPA.

The Xavier’s College principal then makes it clear who he is actually targeting: “The prospect of an alliance of corporate capital and communal forces coming to power constitutes a real threat to the future of our secular democracy.”

Since “communal” is short-hand for BJP/Modi in our public discourse, it is clear what Mascarenhas is talking about. The truth is, if Mascarenhas really had his eyes open, the “alliance of corporate forces and communal forces” can be spotted in other political combos too – the Congress and its alliance with minority-based parties in centre and states, the regional players in various ways.

Wouldn’t it have been more honest of Dr Mascarenhas to say simply: Don’t vote for Modi? Why go through the rigmarole of discussing the Gujarat model and the food security act? As a citizen of a free country, he can speak his mind. No need to beat round the bush.

