On the inter-planetary planes of ancient Hindus Whichever cowardly copy editor dignified this madness with the word controversial instead of stupid or absurd might have done so only under pressure. This exercise in unforced self-discrediting is not without predictable unnecessary benefits for the Hindu fascists and unintended foreboding of an eventual doom that usually follows when the self-deluded overreach themselves with tactless use of power. What is at work in this foolish pronouncements from the podium of the highest scientific professional body of the country is an old fascist technique of bringing the matters of one specialist field requiring expert knowledge to the public gaze and gaining easy populist propagandistic victories. Immediate profits of this immoderation might not necessarily be enduring. A notorious and oft repeated example for this fascist field-conflation is denouncing and attacking the avant-garde artworks and bringing them to the people on street and appealing to their shock. It was successful when Hitler did it, so were numerous Hindu fascist attacks on artists, long before Modi became Prime Minister. Now this audacity, extending the same populist trick to the scientific field, at least the popular understanding of its history, will more or less raise more supportive hands than the disapproving eye brows in the gallery. Those uninitiated in both science and history would be more likely to side with this crackpot than with any sane opposition to it, if at all there would be any forthcoming and also receiving the equal media attention. Not that mostly-Brahmin, mostly religious, even ritual-observing Indian scientific community is going to express outrage at this, and step in to set the record straight. Indian scientific educational and research establishments are one of the main support base and recruiting pools for the Hindu fascists. This community goes about its business by maintaining both ritualistic personal/ public practices and also conforming to the inevitable scientific protocols while doing science. They are trained in a culture of keeping them separate, to have them both. Conflation of these distinct ways of their personal and professional lives might not go down well with all of them. Though it is not unthinkable that some of the scientists might tell themselves that as long as this stupidity doesnt affect their actual work in the lab or library, and it will only help to have a more self-confident view of our history, there is no threat to the scientific establishments and science as such. But much bigger discomfort to the scientific community comes with the clear and loud message to them about the encroaching of the scientific communitys own turf. One of the most autonomous and almost unanswerable of all the state-funded institutions, probably next only to judiciary in being so, the scientific community is likely to notice not only that their field is trampled upon by the outsiders and the unqualified but also that the present government doesnt even have necessary talent-search mechanisms for finding people doing the Sanghs own bidding with necessary credentials. The Hindu Fuehrer seems to be the most popular politician on the face of earth at the moment. And, his electoral victories and ever growing acceptance and support or surrender of the people do not seem to stop anytime soon. Yet, his obsession with the word governance might well be a sign that he might be failing precisely in that respect and also sensing it. But you cannot rule only with mere votes and popularity and even force. The incurable illiteracy and semi-literacy of the Sangh has no quick fixes either (usually political education and expertise takes longer than a typical fascist rules lifetime). It is already highlighting its weakness whatever the short-term publicity gains such lack of expertise might fetch. The Hindu Fuhrers rather boringly simple method of letting Sangh Parivar (the family of Hindu fascist organizations) push their limits while he sticking to what he thinks is a statesman-ly register is, well, so far kind of working. But it does so, only until the world is looking away or allowed to feign ignorance of the danger he and his party pose to the world at large. Instances such as HRD ministrys easily demonstrable falsehoods about the infamous Christmas circular, this shocking abuse of a preeminent scientific organization for laughably foolish assertions with no regard for scientific common sense and the worlds opinion, happily for us, only provoke greater scrutiny by the international community of what is happening in India. Most of the top-notch scientific institutions in the country anyway produce high-paid clerks for corporates or integrated the research into military-related goals or limit themselves to subsidiary work for the research projects formulated elsewhere. Open and routinized superstitions are practiced more blatantly in scientific institutions than anywhere else. Though extreme, this nonsense of Hindu interplanetary planes unlikely to damage too much the already low levels of scientific spirit in the country and its professional ethics and morale of the scientific community. Real and lasting damage is to the public relations requirements of the fascist government in the eyes of the world and the need for keeping its own supporters and non-opponents among the scientific community undisturbed.
Posted on: Sun, 04 Jan 2015 23:54:15 +0000
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