Scathing indictment of theocratic nationalists running India

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, I want to ask about another issue that’s been crucial in this election and which many observers say has been critical to his victory. Corporations reportedly contributed as much as 12 times more money to the BJP than to those of the other six national parties combined, amounting to 93% of all corporate donations. Recent changes in campaign finance laws also allowed companies to conceal how much they donated and to which party. Earlier this month, we spoke to award-winning Indian author Arundhati Roy. We asked her about the role of money in these elections.

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So, if you could respond to what she said, both the distorted and overwhelming coverage of Modi in the media and how much money the BJP was able to raise?

SIDDHARTHA DEB: Yes. I think, in that sense, India is following a pattern that is—you know, again, you can see in the United States, that a democracy, substantive democracy, does not really exist, even in countries where you have—no matter how impressive these elections might sound, because of the kind of distorting influence of wealth.

Yes, the corporations have been behind Modi from a long time. This happened right after the Gujarat massacres in 2002, when some of them initially felt a little bit, you know, I think, hesitant about just the scale of the brutality of the violence. But they caved in. Modi was very, very strong. Modi was very, very—Modi took them on. They caved in. The Indian Chamber of Commerce sent him a letter of apology, saying, “We are sorry that we hurt your feelings,” because this is a man who cares deeply about his feelings, clearly. So, yes, the Indian corporations—because the Indian corporations are being enriched at enormous rates. Now, India, again, as I said, it’s a basket case economically, but there is massive wealth extraction going on in terms of natural resources—companies like Reliance, another company called Adani, which is very, very close to Modi. So there is a kind of an incredible crony capitalism that is present in India. There is a kind of enrichment that is happening at the same time as the impoverishment of the masses.

The corporations pretty much—and I worked in India as a journalist from the mid-'90s. Mainstream media in India, television, is completely—I think Arundhati Roy famously called them “Fox News on acid,” which is a great phrase. That is what Indian television is. It is unwatchable, because it is an unending wave of violence and denunciation, again, against Dalits, against Muslims, against leftists, against feminists. It's this incredible—it’s a kind of 24-hour rage. This is what the corporations produce. The same thing is true of the print media. Social media is a torrent of abuse, as well. So, yes, the media plays—and this answers another question that Nermeen asked earlier about the villages: Why are people [voting for Modi and his Hindu nationalist party]? They are manipulated by the electronic media, by the print media. It’s very—the outreach is very, very successful. And so, media does manage to spin the issue, so that they don’t think about the questions of employment or impoverishment.

Jashodaben continues to identify herself as the wife of Narendra Modi. She completed her education and had a career as a teacher.

Retired from teaching, Jashodaben lives a simple life of prayer. As the spouse of the prime minister, she is protected by a security detail, but has been unable to learn what their orders are or what rights she has in this position, despite filing suits with the government.

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In the Indian general election, 2014, Modi contested the Vadodara seat of the Parliament of India. Under the Representation of the People Act, Modi was asked to declare any previous marriage. In his response, for the first time in public and media, Modi acknowledged that he had a wife. Previously Modi had often said that he would evade corruption in India because he did not have a wife and family and he said "I am single, who will I be corrupt for?". Previously Modi had not responded to official documents asking about a spouse.