Ever since my shelves got filled with books, the Kindle has been my refuge. Not only does it give me a huge amount of space, it is like an electronic bookshop that helps me read many books at the same time. By accident more than by design, I came across a novella called The Light on Faraway Hill, written by J R Packard. The book is no more than a hundred pages, but it conveyed to me a message that struck home. It is the story of a lighthouse dominated by mice who have captured it from rats. The rulers tried to root out ‘anti-miceism’ and any deviation attracted severe penalties. The mice ruled over the rats through nine authoritarian mice, called the Ninth Society. One bright day, the Ninth Society presented a small owl at a meeting, which they said would be the symbol of sovereignty. The owl grew and grew, and one day called the Ninth Society anti-nationals and destroyed them. Thereafter, the owl ruled and had a powerful mouse army at his command, which kept all in check—mice as well as rats. This continued until, one day, a tall and sturdy biped appeared among them, scattering both the mice and the rats.
The book is obviously an allegory on the onset of autocracy and perhaps colonialism. But it set me thinking about how dictators emerge and flourish. Again, Kindle found me another book—How to be a Dictator by Frank Dikötter, a Sinologist of repute. It’s a book based on his study of Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Mao, Kim Il-Sung, Duvalier, Ceausescu and Mengistu. A handbook on dictators for the people who cherish freedom and democratic rights.
The route to dictatorship need not necessarily be a violent revolution or a military coup. An autocrat can use the instruments of democracy. Hitler, despite his enormous oratorical skills and his ability to weave magic through his words, lost to Hindenberg in his presidential bid. Later, Hindenberg himself appointed Hitler chancellor to stave off a threat from Schleicher. On Hindenberg’s death in 1934, Hitler, who had by then assumed total authority through merciless repression, decided to merge the offices of president and chancellor. Again, he chose the democratic route and conducted a plebiscite. Nine in every ten Germans approved. As a Jewish scholar wrote in his diary, “One-third said yes out of fear, one-third out of intoxication and one-third out of fear and intoxication.” Democracy is by no means a bulwark against authoritarianism when instruments of governance are used to strengthen the autocrat.
“Politics in a dictatorship begins in the personality of the dictator,” said Chairman Mao’s personal physician Li Zhisui in his famous memoir, The Private Life of Chairman Mao. The one thread that is common to all narratives on dictatorship is the glorification of the dictator’s personal image. Every single State action, every benefit to the people, and even normal governmental activity would be attributed to him. The marketplace would abound with dictator memorabilia. The news media must repeat his name and his likeness ad nauseam. Hoardings, medallions, portraits and images have to proliferate. They lie to themselves and to the people, and the lies are supported and encouraged by the sycophants who surround them, wrote Dikötter. Closely aligned to self-projection is the creation of division in society. The Jews were ruthlessly crushed in Hitler’s Germany, the Bolsheviks in Mussolini’s Italy, and the bourgeois, the kulaks and ‘reactionaries’ in Communist dictatorships. The rule of law disappeared and repression became the mode of governance. The greater the hatred and mistrust generated against any community, the more power the dictator can wield.
Construction of magnificent edifices at high cost was another feature that characterised some dictatorships. The pharaohs built giant pyramids to entomb their remains, Shah Jahan built the Taj Mahal and forts all around. Shelley’s poem ‘Ozymandias’ immortalised the statue of Pharaoh Ramses II. It lays in ruins in a vast and desolate desert with the pedestal carrying the words, “Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!” Around the fallen statue, “the lone and level sands stretch far away”. Ceausescu built his still-incomplete Palace of the People, while Mussolini built his Esposizione Universale Roma, a gigantic world fair.
Dictators bask in the praise of foreign leaders. Mahatma Gandhi visited Mussolini twice and called him “one of the great statesmen of the time”. Churchill described him as “the Roman genius” and “the greatest lawgiver among living men”. About Stalin, Churchill said, “I like him the more I see him.” Roosevelt considered Stalin “a Christian gentleman” and wrote in his diary, “I can deal with Stalin. He is honest—but smart as hell.” Foreign dignitaries lined up to visit Ceausescu; US President Nixon was given a lavish reception. “He may be a Commie, but he is our Commie,” said Nixon. World leaders found it easier to play on the ego of autocrats to secure gains for their country and their industries.
In a country as diverse as India—divided in language, religion, culture, caste and even ethnicity—we need democracy to sustain us and move us forward. Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself has great faith in the Constitution and in democracy. Speaking to the United States House of Representatives in 2016, he said, “India lives as one, India grows as one and India celebrates as one.’’ He went on to say, “For my government, the Constitution is its real holy book. And, in that holy book, freedom of faith, speech and franchise, and equality of all citizens, regardless of background, are enshrined as fundamental rights.”
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He reiterated this conviction in his address to the US Congress in 2023: “Democracy is the spirit that supports equality and dignity. Democracy is the idea that welcomes debate and discourse. Democracy is the culture that gives wings to thought and expression. India is blessed to have such values from times immemorial.”
It is incumbent on the people of democratic India to completely eradicate any vestige of authoritarianism that creeps into governance at any level. “Eternal vigilance by the people is the price of liberty,” said US President Andrew Jackson as he left office in 1837. It is for the people of India to ensure that our Constitution is ever endangered at any level of governance. Helpless acceptance can destroy the foundations of freedom and democracy.
(kmchandrasekhar@gmail.com)