Booker prize winning author and social activist Arundhati Roy has accused that the union government led by Narendra Modi is trying to ratcheting up a communal narrative to make people forget hardships caused by COVID-19. She also claimed that the only opposition leader openly attacking the dispensation is former Congress President Rahul Gandhi, who does not enjoy “much support”.
Arundhati Roy said this during a webinar with Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and intellectual Tariq Ali on ‘Coronavirus, War and Empire’ organised by ‘Stop the War Coalition’.
“The government will change the narrative, to make people forget the economic hardships, COVID-19, by ratcheting up Hindu nationalist, anti Muslim rhetoric by preaching vicious bile. They will sell this hatred. Modi can sell anything as he is adored particularly by the powerful middle class and media. He can even sell a comb to a bald person, who will end up combing his bald head. There is a kind of fear in business and media,” Arundhati Roy said.
“The only politician who is openly opposing Modi is Rahul Gandhi. He doesn’t really have much support. But he is doing it. Everyone else, whether they are state parties, they are in complete disarray. One doesn’t know why. All of them have some sort of cases. One by one they have been cornered into kind of keeping quiet or facing legal process. I don’t know the reasons,” Roy added.
She said all she knew was that whether it was a politician or bureaucrat or industrialist, everyone’s brains are “frozen in a kind of fear”. “The moment they open their mouth, they are attacked viciously. Being trolled, threatened and all of that is one part. The attack is merciless. So there is so much fear,” she said.
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