Last Sunday one of India’s finest poets, Jayanta Mahapatra returned his Padma Shri. The reasons he gave in his letter to the President of India were somewhat similar to what other poets, film makers, intellectuals and scientists had cited when they recently returned their awards. I have known Jayanta for three decades now. I brought out his first book of poems when he was struggling to find a publisher. And this much I can vouchsafe for, he has not a single political bone in his body. He is not the protesting type either. His poems are private and introspective. He never sought recognition. It came his way late in life because he never sought it out.

While returning his award, Jayanta wrote something about the moral asymmetry growing in the country. I do not quite understand what he means by that (poets have their own language, their own personal idiom) but I certainly sympathise with him when he describes his act as a small and insignificant step of a personal nature, not to be treated as an attempt to bring dishonour to the country. He said this because, I guess, a lot of people are trying to muddy the waters by trying to describe such acts as political, with the intent of shaming the current regime. While that may well be the intent of a few, most of the people I know who are returning their awards are doing so because they know no other way to voice their anguish at the current scenario. The anguish is not against the current regime. Nor is it against Modi. The anguish is against the way our country is going. It is against the dying of a dream.

Unfortunately, the media has over simplified this as a battle against intolerance. Intolerance is but only one of the many reasons why our creative community is distressed today. And not everyone returning an award is protesting against intolerance. Many are unhappy over other issues as well. Increasing violence, stifling of creative expression, crackpot bans and the intervention of the state in our private lives, the insecurity of minorities, murder of rationalist thinkers: these are but a few of the concerns. I do not think the blame for all these can be left at Modi’s door. But it is important for him to stop the decline. A Governor who thinks Hindustan is only for Hindus should be asked to step down. A minister who thinks APJ was a good President even though he was a Muslim deserves a rap on his knuckles, not APJ’s bungalow. And then, there are the familiar motor mouths constantly out to create mayhem wherever possible. Only Modi can tell them to shut up.

For all this is vitiating the atmosphere. Thinking people are unhappy. No, it’s not political. It’s not against the current dispensation. If anything, it is the voice of a new India trying to be heard over the raucous din. The frustration comes from the fact that the illiberalism of the past has now been replaced by a new illiberalism, in some ways more ferocious. It is not what we expected from the new regime. Those who are returning their awards are sad, disappointed people. And they are sadder because their motives are being misconstrued.

I have seen some of them trying to explain themselves on news TV and failing. It’s not always easy to explain or justify one’s disappointment and journalists are eager to capture conflict. So they ask questions that force people, even thinking people, on the back foot. Most of them have no convincing answers to give when they were asked why they did not protest earlier, during the Congress years, when equally wrong things happened. Why didn’t you return your awards then? Such questions have no real answers. Protests are seldom timed to perfection. They happen.

The fact is: It’s a long time since we expected anything from our politicians. The Congress killed all our hope, particularly during its second UPA tenure. It was Modi who gave us hope with his high pitched election campaign. We suddenly began to believe in the possibility of change, real change. That is exactly why we are so disappointed today. The mandate for change was also a mandate for hope. And that hope has been belied. That’s all. Modi’s minders are reading too much politics into it.

If the same things had happened during a Congress regime, no one would have felt so anguished. They are anguished today because they expected far better from Modi. Modi had promised them that he would change India. He had not promised them crackpot bans or lynch mobs. He had promised hope and change. So, in their heads, Modi (and no, not the BJP) has a personal responsibility to put things right. When Modi chooses to keep quiet or look away (like Manmohan Singh used to do) people are even more frustrated.

The award returnees are not lemmings resorting to mass suicide. They are just 60 people, intelligent people, thinking people trying to express a view. This is no vile conspiracy. This is just a simple warning sign. And Modi’s advisers would do well to notice it and try to build the consensus Modi had promised us during his election campaign.

No one is asking for a change in government. (Not as yet.) What we want is a change in the quality of governance. Is that too much to ask for?

I say no. That is why I am hanging on to my awards.