Mokyr's Warning: Why India's 'Republic of Outrage' Is DOOMING Its Future
Come October, India enters what I call the “Republic of
Outrage.” The so-called festival season now comes with its own ritual
choreography — not of lights, but of hashtags. First, the annual denunciation
of Gandhi: a flurry of posts calling him the “great appeaser,” followed by that
curious sect of Godse devotees who believe the man with the pistol was
history’s most misunderstood patriot. And then, inevitably, comes the annual
symphony on fireworks — the claim that bursting crackers is a time-honoured
Hindu tradition. Celebrities, industrialists, and TV anchors join in with
missionary zeal. Some sing solo, others harmonise, but they all hum the same
tune.
From television studios to X (that glorious temple of
half-truths), the chorus swells. Sudhir Chaudhary, our national priest of
prime-time patriotism, warns solemnly that “banning crackers is an attack on
faith.” Former Infosys CFO Mohandas Pai logs on to declare that “pollution
isn’t caused by crackers,” and that restrictions are “totalitarian.” The
faithful cheer. The skeptics are dismissed as “elitist liberals.” And amid the
din, the truth — that stubborn, inconvenient fellow — quietly leaves the room.
The fact — that inconvenient fellow — is simple. Fireworks were never part of
ancient Hindu ritual. Diwali was about light, not gunpowder. The Chinese
invention of fireworks arrived in India much later, and its adoption was driven
more by novelty and spectacle than scripture. But on social media, history
bends to hashtags. A lie, repeated by men in power or suits, soon acquires the
sanctity of gospel. Misinformation in India doesn’t need conspiracy; it thrives
on convenience.
That same convenience has an elder cousin in our politics and economics. Just
as tradition is rewritten to serve sentiment, laws are quietly rewritten to
serve capital. Consider the Adani Power plant in Godda, Jharkhand — built to
export electricity exclusively to Bangladesh. When Sheikh Hasina’s government
fell and the deal wobbled, the Ministry of Power suddenly discovered new
wisdom. Its 2018 guidelines were amended overnight, allowing Adani to sell that
electricity within India. Reuters noted that the timing was uncanny — the
change came within days of the political upheaval in Dhaka. What was once a
stranded private venture became a taxpayer-underwritten lifeline. Divine
intervention, perhaps. Or merely the miracle of connections.
Godda, of course, is no anomaly. From ports to coal,
airports to media, the invisible hand of the market now wears a political
glove. The slogan of “ease of doing business” has quietly mutated into the
“ease of being Adani.” Ours is a government pious in rhetoric and pragmatic in
favour, has perfected the art of underwriting the rich & powerful.
This is where the poison spreads. Misinformation and money
power blend into a lethal brew. “Crackers are tradition,” “big business is
nationalism” — both serve the same master: emotion. When public emotion is
hijacked, scrutiny collapses. The voter argues over religion and crackers while
policy quietly fattens the coffers of the chosen few. Misinformation soothes
the masses; disinformation secures consent. The result is not democracy, but
plutocracy — government of the rich, by the rich, for the rich, with the poor
clapping from the sidelines.
It is all so deceptively benign. Anchors debate “Hindu
pride” while the air turns unbreathable. Industrialists invoke nationalism
while bending rules in broad daylight. The institutions meant to question have
become the applause section. Our democracy is being sold retail — one
regulation, one contract, one narrative at a time.
It’s at this uneasy intersection of knowledge, power, and
money that Joel Mokyr, this year’s Nobel laureate in Economics, enters the
conversation. Mokyr reminds us that true progress doesn’t come from bluster or
blind faith, but from a delicate dance between useful knowledge (understanding
why and how things work), technical skill (the ability to build), and
institutions that encourage curiosity rather than crush it. When any of these
legs wobbles, innovation falls flat.
By Mokyr’s measure, India today limps. We reward spectacle,
not substance. Remember the Coronil episode during the pandemic? A “miracle
cure,” unveiled with ministerial blessings and TV fanfare, sold by the lakh
before anyone asked for evidence. No trials, no data — only patriotic
enthusiasm. It was, commercially speaking, a triumph. Intellectually, it was a
tragedy. Mokyr would call it institutional decay — when state, media, and
market together choose gullibility over rigor, truth dies gasping for breath.
Look beyond medicine to technology. We boast of satellites
and start-ups, yet our universities starve, our labs decay. We speak of “chip
sovereignty,” yet import nearly every chip we use. We celebrate “innovation,”
yet most of our start-ups are recycled Western ideas with Hindi names. We are
assembling dreams, not inventing them.
Meanwhile, the plutocrats march untroubled. They don’t need
innovation — they have influence. Gautam Adani’s ascent tells the story. For a
brief moment in 2022, he was the world’s second-richest man, ahead of those who
built real things. What did he invent? Nothing. His genius lies in
understanding power — not electricity, but proximity to it. His empire
stretches from ports to media, stitched together not by invention but by
concession. When charges of stock manipulation surfaced, his defenders cried “attack
on India.” Patriotism, it seems, has become the preferred armour of oligarchs.
India’s future won’t hinge on how many crackers we burst, or
how many lamps we line up on the ghats of Ayodhya. It will depend on how
fiercely we defend reason — that most fragile flame. If we can revive what
Mokyr calls the three engines of progress — knowledge, competence, and free
institutions — the lamps of Diwali will truly glow. If not, we’ll keep lighting
firecrackers while choking on their fumes, mistaking the noise for progress.
The choice, as always, is ours: to be dazzled by the sparkle
of plutocracy, or to steady the light of truth before it gutters out.
https://www.deccanchronicle.com/opinion/columnists/indranil-banerjie-knowledge-vital-to-development-does-india-fit-the-mokyr-bill-1911372
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