By virtue of being a father to two lawyers, I have the opportunity to come across certain legal parlance from time to time. One such legal construct is that of a “reasonable man”. This standard can be found in quite a few laws as well as judgments passed by judicial authorities in most jurisdictions. The reasonable man or woman standard is typically employed to examine the conduct of a particular person against what may be considered as “reasonable” according to most people. Cases that fall outside of this wide berth of reasonableness are ones that usually attract judicial or legal scrutiny.

In India, we have now been introduced to a completely new social or political standard, all thanks to the Bharatiya Janata Party and our Honourable Prime Minister. This new standard is that of the ‘Misled Man’. The concept is fairly easy to understand and apparently refers to all Indians who are being “misled” by either foreign powers or the Opposition or by experts when it comes to matters of opposing this Government’s poorly thought through policies.

One of the earliest applications of the Misled Man standard was during the Prime Minister’s now-infamous decision around demonetisation. We were told that demonetisation was a “surgical strike” on black money and targets only those people who have something to hide. Therefore, when renowned economists, public policy experts and members of the Opposition raised questions about the manner in which the policy was implemented without prior consultation and without expertise, we were told by the Prime Minister that the public was being misled. Similarly, when people brought forward evidence of how during demonetisation the only people who benefitted were corrupt bank officials or how there is just as much — if not more — counterfeiting with the new currency as with the old, the Prime Minister once again said that we were being misled. At no point, however, has the Prime Minister taken any questions from the Press or from the public or taken the opportunity to rescue our misled public. Instead all we got was an introduction to what future years proved was the BJP’s go-to explanation behind a protest or any sort of push back from the general public — that in reality there are no problems at all and that any sort of protest was a result of the lamb-like public being misled by people with vested interests.

Demonetisation was just the beginning; we also saw the BJP and the Prime Minister rely on the same excuse when it came to the issue of One Rank One Pension or OROP, an issue that our servicemen have been fighting for. The BJP Government has come out and claimed that they have, in fact, implemented OROP. However, the former service men and soldiers who, one can safely assume, know enough about the issue, are staunchly of the view that OROP in fact has not been implemented at all by the BJP Government. Here too, we saw the Prime Minister say that the public is being misled on OROP.

The most recent application of this excuse has been the explanation for the huge protests by farmers that we have seen taking place in and around New Delhi. Since the introduction of  the three Central Government farm laws that were passed in a controversial and frankly undemocratic fashion in the Rajya Sabha on September 20, the protesting farmers have consistently maintained their protest and have marched in large numbers demanding that the Central Government roll back the controversial farm laws. The Congress has highlighted and consistently support the fight of the farmers by arguing that the controversial farm laws take away any real support for the average farmer and give an open road for powerful industrialists and businesses to control the entire farming system and thereby expose farmers to great risk and barely any negotiating power. What the Congress has most significantly argued against is the manner in which these farm laws were passed without talking to the stakeholders who will actually be directly affected by the laws — the farmers.

There is widespread anger among farmer unions about the high-handed and arrogant manner in which the Central Government has conducted itself during this entire process. It should be obvious to the BJP and the Prime Minister that these concerns are genuine and which is why we see tens of thousands of farmers on the road demanding that the Government listen to their demands. However, here too the BJP and the Prime Minister could not resist relying on the old faithful theory that the farmers are being “misled”.

This pathetic explanation is forwarded by many in the present administration and not just by the Prime Minister. For example, a BJP Union Minister said that the farmer protests are essentially being motivated and sponsored by Pakistan and China. One cannot blame the Union Minister who merely decided to take a leaf out of the Prime Minister’s handbook. Such a response is unbecoming of a Government of a major democracy. It assumes that India is meant to be led by a ‘messiah’ who knows the one true path and that all of us are merely sheep who should have no say in the matter. It is antithetical to the basic tenets of a functional democracy which relies on peaceful protest and public participation while making laws. Perhaps, this is why Niti Aayog chief Amitabh Kant said that “too much democracy” makes law-making hard in India. The Government should realise that law-making is meant to be hard because it requires public participation of which peaceful protest is the last recourse. The first option for most people, if the Government had paid attention, is to be involved as stakeholders in the decision-making process. Instead by labelling the public, representatives of the public, our soldiers and now our farmers as “misled”, the BJP is insulting the intelligence of all Indians.

The Prime Minister is right about a few things though. We are currently not only misled but also misgoverned and misunderstood. If the Prime Minister wants to attribute blame on who is responsible for our pitiful state, his Government would be a good place to start.

(The author is former IPS and member of the Congress Party)

By virtue of being a father to two lawyers, I have the opportunity to come across certain legal parlance from time to time. One such legal construct is that of a “reasonable man”. This standard can be found in quite a few laws as well as judgments passed by judicial authorities in most jurisdictions. The reasonable man or woman standard is typically employed to examine the conduct of a particular person against what may be considered as “reasonable” according to most people. Cases that fall outside of this wide berth of reasonableness are ones that usually attract judicial or legal scrutiny.

In India, we have now been introduced to a completely new social or political standard, all thanks to the Bharatiya Janata Party and our Honourable Prime Minister. This new standard is that of the ‘Misled Man’. The concept is fairly easy to understand and apparently refers to all Indians who are being “misled” by either foreign powers or the Opposition or by experts when it comes to matters of opposing this Government’s poorly thought through policies.

One of the earliest applications of the Misled Man standard was during the Prime Minister’s now-infamous decision around demonetisation. We were told that demonetisation was a “surgical strike” on black money and targets only those people who have something to hide. Therefore, when renowned economists, public policy experts and members of the Opposition raised questions about the manner in which the policy was implemented without prior consultation and without expertise, we were told by the Prime Minister that the public was being misled. Similarly, when people brought forward evidence of how during demonetisation the only people who benefitted were corrupt bank officials or how there is just as much — if not more — counterfeiting with the new currency as with the old, the Prime Minister once again said that we were being misled. At no point, however, has the Prime Minister taken any questions from the Press or from the public or taken the opportunity to rescue our misled public. Instead all we got was an introduction to what future years proved was the BJP’s go-to explanation behind a protest or any sort of push back from the general public — that in reality there are no problems at all and that any sort of protest was a result of the lamb-like public being misled by people with vested interests.

Demonetisation was just the beginning; we also saw the BJP and the Prime Minister rely on the same excuse when it came to the issue of One Rank One Pension or OROP, an issue that our servicemen have been fighting for. The BJP Government has come out and claimed that they have, in fact, implemented OROP. However, the former service men and soldiers who, one can safely assume, know enough about the issue, are staunchly of the view that OROP in fact has not been implemented at all by the BJP Government. Here too, we saw the Prime Minister say that the public is being misled on OROP.

The most recent application of this excuse has been the explanation for the huge protests by farmers that we have seen taking place in and around New Delhi. Since the introduction of  the three Central Government farm laws that were passed in a controversial and frankly undemocratic fashion in the Rajya Sabha on September 20, the protesting farmers have consistently maintained their protest and have marched in large numbers demanding that the Central Government roll back the controversial farm laws. The Congress has highlighted and consistently support the fight of the farmers by arguing that the controversial farm laws take away any real support for the average farmer and give an open road for powerful industrialists and businesses to control the entire farming system and thereby expose farmers to great risk and barely any negotiating power. What the Congress has most significantly argued against is the manner in which these farm laws were passed without talking to the stakeholders who will actually be directly affected by the laws — the farmers.

There is widespread anger among farmer unions about the high-handed and arrogant manner in which the Central Government has conducted itself during this entire process. It should be obvious to the BJP and the Prime Minister that these concerns are genuine and which is why we see tens of thousands of farmers on the road demanding that the Government listen to their demands. However, here too the BJP and the Prime Minister could not resist relying on the old faithful theory that the farmers are being “misled”.

This pathetic explanation is forwarded by many in the present administration and not just by the Prime Minister. For example, a BJP Union Minister said that the farmer protests are essentially being motivated and sponsored by Pakistan and China. One cannot blame the Union Minister who merely decided to take a leaf out of the Prime Minister’s handbook. Such a response is unbecoming of a Government of a major democracy. It assumes that India is meant to be led by a ‘messiah’ who knows the one true path and that all of us are merely sheep who should have no say in the matter. It is antithetical to the basic tenets of a functional democracy which relies on peaceful protest and public participation while making laws. Perhaps, this is why Niti Aayog chief Amitabh Kant said that “too much democracy” makes law-making hard in India. The Government should realise that law-making is meant to be hard because it requires public participation of which peaceful protest is the last recourse. The first option for most people, if the Government had paid attention, is to be involved as stakeholders in the decision-making process. Instead by labelling the public, representatives of the public, our soldiers and now our farmers as “misled”, the BJP is insulting the intelligence of all Indians.

The Prime Minister is right about a few things though. We are currently not only misled but also misgoverned and misunderstood. If the Prime Minister wants to attribute blame on who is responsible for our pitiful state, his Government would be a good place to start.

(The author is former IPS and member of the Congress Party)