Let reality in Manipur be damned, what matters is narrative

If you think only Manipur is going through violent convulsions including incidents of rape, hold that thought. Rajasthan, Bengal and Chhattisgarh are equally to blame for rapes but why is no one talking about these? Is it because Manipur is BJP-ruled while the rest is ruled by the Opposition? Better take this into account before you start blaming the BJP and its leader, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, for everything that is going wrong in this country.

Well, there you have it. An equivalence has been established between Manipur and some of the Opposition-ruled states. What appeared to be clearly a state in crisis in the midst of a civil war-like situation is not that bad considering that other states, particularly led by the Opposition, are not doing any better either.

Since the video of two Manipuri women being paraded naked and gang-raped went viral a few days ago, the BJP’s spin doctors have been at work frantically trying to dilute, if not divert, attention from the north-eastern state, hit by a violence of a kind rarely seen in independent India’s history.

If Manipur had been led by any other political party, it is difficult to fathom how the situation would have been handled. Probably the Centre would have stepped in with President’s rule. But then Manipur is ruled by the BJP. Whatever the real reasons, or imagined ones, it doesn’t matter. What has come across to a lay observer since May 3, when violence first broke out, is that the state is writhing with pain while the state government and the Centre appear clueless over how to douse the raging fire of animosity and social turmoil.

Also read: Manipur: NDA’s northeast allies demand removal of CM Biren Singh

Worse, neither the Centre nor the Manipur state government has come out with a comprehensive narration of what exactly is happening in the sensitive state bordering restive Myanmar and close to the neo-superpower, India’s rival China. But the BJP won’t allow itself to be caught on the wrong foot.

Shifting the narrative

After maintaining a stubborn silence on Manipur for nearly 80 days, the prime minister was finally forced into issuing a condemnation following the viral video of the two women, paraded naked. That was not all. Modi crucially brought in the Opposition-ruled states of Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh too into his statement, as if they were facing similar problems.

Before the Opposition could react to the leadership’s discomfiture, following the cue regarding Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh from the very top, the BJP’s MPs, legislators and office-bearers have started the chime to shift the narrative. And suddenly, Opposition governments find themselves having to defend sporadic gender-related crimes in their states when the issue in question is Manipur.

It does not require an expert to say that the situation in Manipur is unique, and does not come anywhere close to any other state. Yet, the BJP is trying hard to mix up perceptions and dilute the enormity of the crisis that Manipur is facing.

Once the signal is given at the top, amplified by godi media channels, the parivar superstructure down to the foot soldier and armchair sympathiser has spun the narrative across the various media. And, more often than not, this ploy has worked. Changing the narrative and giving a twirl to a straightforward perception, lathered with extensive whataboutery, have paid rich dividends to the BJP so far.

Also read: Manipur violence: Amid arson and killings, rapes were brushed aside

Manufactured perceptions

Narratives and manufactured perceptions are crucial to the BJP. The last nine years of the Modi government are littered with instances of shrewdly-twisted narratives. Among the latest is the issue of Opposition unity and the formation of the INDIA grouping. The reason behind the alliance has been sufficiently explained by the Opposition. Yet the BJP turns around and “accuses” the 26-party alliance of harbouring a single point agenda which is to “remove Modi”, or “Modi hatao”.

Now, Modi is the prime minister and the elected leader of the BJP in a democratic setup. He is not a feudal sovereign to be “dethroned”. Yet, the BJP would make it appear as if an unhealthy conspiracy is being hatched by the Opposition to oust the prime minister. In effect, the BJP’s spin masters attempt to dilute and cast aspersions on the Opposition’s efforts which are legitimate and is as per the norm in a parliamentary democracy.

After all, why are elections held periodically and why are there so many different political parties in the fray? Each wishes to come to power and head the government. So, is there anything wrong if INDIA wishes to replace the BJP in a free and fair election? Did not the NDA oust the UPA in 2014?  Yet,  the Opposition alliance will find itself defending its Constitutionally-legitimate attempt to come to power in the face of a BJP-engineered narrative.

Twisted tales

Giving an expert twirl to an existing discourse is not equivalent to straightforward fake news. It is more sinister. In the case of fake news, all it needs is for the news to be fact-checked to be neutralised in double quick time.

Take the case of the reported arrest of a Muslim individual in the Manipur naked-parade issue that went viral. A mainstream news agency, considered close to the government, circulated that story. Soon, major news outlets picked it up.

Also read: Desperate bid to manage headlines: Cong on Shah’s Manipur issue remark

For some time, it looked as if the Manipur viral video issue was on the verge of taking a communal turn that may have helped the BJP manage the narrative. Before long, following denials at the ground level, the agency issued a correction stating that the Muslim individual had been arrested in an unrelated case. Any possible chances of communalisation came to a grinding halt. So, fake news is easier to handle. But not so when a narrative is subtly tinkered with to evoke half-truths.

The Emergency refrain

Some tainted narratives have become so normalised that few give it a thought any longer. The constant refrain that India is slipping sharply in the world’s freedom index is something that irks the Modi government as it is frequently forced to explain it whenever the prime minister travels outside the country. In an attempt to counter this, the prime minister in international forums has variously termed India “the mother of democracies” or that “Democracy is in our DNA”, etc.

If pushed further, the BJP leadership and its minions will quickly “remind” Indians of the Emergency in 1975 and how its then promoter, the Congress, has no moral right to talk of democracy. This never fails to push the Congress and critics of the BJP into silence, unable to counter the fact that there was indeed an Emergency in 1975.

What is conveniently overlooked is that over 50 years have gone by since the Emergency; that the Congress under then prime minister Indira Gandhi was punished by the electorate in the 1977 Lok Sabha elections for its action and the party when in power subsequently has never attempted to repeat its mistake.

Watch: Ex-cop Thounaojam Brinda: ‘High time President’s rule was imposed in Manipur’

Let it, however, be said that a narrative, especially a contrived one, need not always be convincing. For the BJP, which had one of its worst administrative stints in Karnataka after forming government through the backdoor in 2019, the lesson was that in the face of harsh reality involving corruption and infighting, doctored narratives have their limitations. The voters emphatically rejected the party in the state’s Assembly election. The question, crucial for the BJP and the Opposition, is whether Manipur too will follow suit — in exposing fake narratives.