Item — HN Reader

There is value in letting non-Indians know, which is the whole point of the documentary.

Everyone in India knows about Gujarat 2002, Babri Masjid, and the whole discourse and context around this, but not necessarily foreigners.

Btw, plenty of BJP voters (like my extended family) detest the anti-Muslim shit they do, but have no other choice because in a Parliamentary system, you are voting for your MP, not your national leader. I seriously hope the BBC brought that point up.

1 comments

>There is value in letting non-Indians know, which is the whole point of the documentary.

I don't see it. Most people outside India do not have enough interest in India's politics to want to spend enough time to develop a nuanced understanding. I don't see the value in people in other countries develop, for lack of a better word, a "John Oliver" level of understanding of my country's internal affairs.

>because in a Parliamentary system, you are voting for your MP, not your national leader

That is almost entirely opposite the case with Modi though. Most BJP voters vote directly for Modi (and BJP's electoral campaigns reflect this) because they like him and have trust in him, even if they don't particularly like/care about the local candidate of BJP. Modi has been quite successful in turning Indian elections quasi-presidential. Forget general elections, BJP goes even into state and even local municipal elections asking for votes in Modi's name.

for your first point, I agree that you don't want a John Oliver style treatment. That was just problematic and innacurate (sadly, as most John Oliver segments are. they're a Dem pastiche of Carlson Tucker tbh). That said, I just watched the Modi Question, and honestly, I don't see anything too surprising or "anti-national" in it. It seemed like a massive whattaburger around shit that is basically open knowledge about the Gujarat BJP and Modi himself.

With regards to your second point, it's plain wrong, at least in the state my family is from. The only reason they and the rest of their district vote BJP is because the INC MLA is a bootlegger who shot 2 police officers in 2019 and has open connections with heroin mafia types across the border in Punjab. Delhi is far away and our state still has extreme autonomy (and we tend to have a superiority complex over other states tbh). They don't care if Modi or Rahul or Kejri become PM, because at the end of the day, actual decisions in our area come down to the Panchayat, the MLA, and the CM. Btw, every tehsil except ours flipped to INC because of the complacent Modi worship you mentioned. It may play in states like UP or Bihar where margins of victory are massive, but not in states where an election can be changed by 1,000 votes.

Edit: thanks for the negative votes Desis on HN. This is why Paharis prevent non-Paharis from getting residency in our state - https://himachal.nic.in/WriteReadData/l892s/13_l892s/3618435...