Swaraj’s Sunny Deol moment
When the external affairs minister issues threats on Twitter, it’s time to worry.
The concept of justice is one that is often discussed in Sunny Deol’s movies. In Ziddi, there is a scene in which a cop is dragged into a room after being beaten up. He finds Deol’s character sitting on a high-judge like pedestal, and is told this is ‘Deva ki Adalat’. Deol’s character accuses him of custodial deaths. When the cop attempts to offer an explanation, Deol punches him mid-sentence, and reveals that the cop has also killed people in his gang (Deol plays a criminal in the film). Long story short, Deol asks the crowd whether the cop is guilty or not, and the crowd shouts ‘guilty’ unanimously. Deol eventually delivers justice by shooting the cop dead. In the movie Damini, Deol’s character says that if provoked, he will do ‘justice’ on the spot, without adalats and taareekhs.
Some random person tweeted to Sushma Swaraj, saying that Amazon’s Canadian website is selling doormats resembling the Indian Flag. Sushma Swaraj, India’s Minister of External Affairs, a ministry whose core function is something called ‘diplomacy’, responded *on twitter* itself by
a)Telling the Canadian High Commission that this was ‘unacceptable’ and asking the High Commission to ‘take this up at the highest level.’ I repeat, she did this on Twitter itself. (Small point of confusion: why didn’t she just tag Justin Trudeau since that would have in fact been the highest level?, or Donald Trump since Amazon is an American company, and I am certain Trump believes there is no level higher than him. But I digress.); and b) She asked Amazon to withdraw all products that insult the Indian National Flag and then threatened to cancel visas of all Amazon employees unless an unconditional apology was issued. Now, I am glad she didn’t choose these words when addressing the Canadian High Commission because flag desecration (burning, spitting on, stomping on, using as foot mat) is not illegal in Canada, and they may have had difficulty understanding how a flag can be insulted.
I’m not sure what the Canadian version of national pride is, but I do know that most people in Canada receive drinkable water in their taps. I know most people in Canada do not throw garbage on the streets, and I know that being homosexual is not illegal in Canada. I know marital rape is illegal there. I don’t know about you, but that is certainly a lot to be proud of. They seem to have done absolutely fine even though plenty of people disrespect their national flag. But hey, our priorities are clearly in the right order.
There are several countries in the world where flag desecration is not a crime. I wonder what will happen if to troll the minister, people start tweeting all offensive depictions of the Indian National Flag all over the world. To be fair, however, at least jobs will be created. Let me explain. This project of protecting national pride will involve monitoring not only every person in every cinema hall in the country (respecting national anthem), but also every nook and corner of the world to ensure that the Indian Flag is not offended. Such a mammoth task will require hiring lakhs of people and will go a long way towards fulfilling the Prime Minister’s promise of generating employment.
I was reminded of Deol’s movies because there was no formal letter/representation, or any pretence at any show cause notice founded in some law. Even if one assumes for the sake of argument that this was something that merited intervention, communication could have easily happened offline, which is the way serious governments work. But where’s the bravado in that, right?
The fact that Amazon is a marketplace and doesn’t actually sell products itself was of no consequence. The fact that there is a thing called the internet did not deter the minister either, but this I can understand because both courts as well as governments in India seem to have a lot of difficulty understanding how the internet works. The fact Indians presume that they can now tell companies how they can do their business in other countries is almost breath-taking.
I must confess to feeling most entertained when I saw these movies about a decade ago. But when governments start behaving like the macho ‘heroes’ in Deol’s movies, we need to start getting worried.
The concept of justice is one that is often discussed in Sunny Deol’s movies. In Ziddi, there is a scene in which a cop is dragged into a room after being beaten up. He finds Deol’s character sitting on a high-judge like pedestal, and is told this is ‘Deva ki Adalat’. Deol’s character accuses him of custodial deaths. When the cop attempts to offer an explanation, Deol punches him mid-sentence, and reveals that the cop has also killed people in his gang (Deol plays a criminal in the film). Long story short, Deol asks the crowd whether the cop is guilty or not, and the crowd shouts ‘guilty’ unanimously. Deol eventually delivers justice by shooting the cop dead. In the movie Damini, Deol’s character says that if provoked, he will do ‘justice’ on the spot, without adalats and taareekhs.
Some random person tweeted to Sushma Swaraj, saying that Amazon’s Canadian website is selling doormats resembling the Indian Flag. Sushma Swaraj, India’s Minister of External Affairs, a ministry whose core function is something called ‘diplomacy’, responded *on twitter* itself by
a)Telling the Canadian High Commission that this was ‘unacceptable’ and asking the High Commission to ‘take this up at the highest level.’ I repeat, she did this on Twitter itself. (Small point of confusion: why didn’t she just tag Justin Trudeau since that would have in fact been the highest level?, or Donald Trump since Amazon is an American company, and I am certain Trump believes there is no level higher than him. But I digress.); and b) She asked Amazon to withdraw all products that insult the Indian National Flag and then threatened to cancel visas of all Amazon employees unless an unconditional apology was issued. Now, I am glad she didn’t choose these words when addressing the Canadian High Commission because flag desecration (burning, spitting on, stomping on, using as foot mat) is not illegal in Canada, and they may have had difficulty understanding how a flag can be insulted.
I’m not sure what the Canadian version of national pride is, but I do know that most people in Canada receive drinkable water in their taps. I know most people in Canada do not throw garbage on the streets, and I know that being homosexual is not illegal in Canada. I know marital rape is illegal there. I don’t know about you, but that is certainly a lot to be proud of. They seem to have done absolutely fine even though plenty of people disrespect their national flag. But hey, our priorities are clearly in the right order.
There are several countries in the world where flag desecration is not a crime. I wonder what will happen if to troll the minister, people start tweeting all offensive depictions of the Indian National Flag all over the world. To be fair, however, at least jobs will be created. Let me explain. This project of protecting national pride will involve monitoring not only every person in every cinema hall in the country (respecting national anthem), but also every nook and corner of the world to ensure that the Indian Flag is not offended. Such a mammoth task will require hiring lakhs of people and will go a long way towards fulfilling the Prime Minister’s promise of generating employment.
I was reminded of Deol’s movies because there was no formal letter/representation, or any pretence at any show cause notice founded in some law. Even if one assumes for the sake of argument that this was something that merited intervention, communication could have easily happened offline, which is the way serious governments work. But where’s the bravado in that, right?
The fact that Amazon is a marketplace and doesn’t actually sell products itself was of no consequence. The fact that there is a thing called the internet did not deter the minister either, but this I can understand because both courts as well as governments in India seem to have a lot of difficulty understanding how the internet works. The fact Indians presume that they can now tell companies how they can do their business in other countries is almost breath-taking.
I must confess to feeling most entertained when I saw these movies about a decade ago. But when governments start behaving like the macho ‘heroes’ in Deol’s movies, we need to start getting worried.
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