This is a triumph for DC comics. The most comprehensive put-down for a leader of the Opposition that India’s finance minister could think of appeared to have come out of the DC universe. Nirmala Sitharaman labelled the former Congress president, Rahul Gandhi, the Doomsday Man for India in Parliament, making it clear that the figure no longer inhabited a comic series but was stalking the makers of achchhe din in the real India today. Debate and dissent in Parliament have almost vanished. Now it is quite routine to hear a string of appellations flying towards the Opposition from the treasury benches whenever critical questions are asked. Mr Gandhi has consistently raised issues — from the effects of demonetization, the seriousness of Covid, the tragedy of migrant labourers and so on to China and the farmers’ movement — that Narendra Modi’s government will simply not address. Mr Gandhi is doing his job — as Opposition member he is unrelenting and most visible among other critics of the government. Hence Ms Sitharaman’s fanciful appellation in remarks claiming that Mr Gandhi’s ‘fake narratives’ of doom and humiliation of India by his criticism of Constitutional authorities such as the president, prime minister, Speaker and so on demonstrate his lack of belief in the democratically elected Parliament.

When an Opposition politician’s rightful role in Parliament is described as his loss of belief in it, the distortion of India’s formative values seems complete. Dissent and protest from the people who have elected representatives within Parliament are being penalized daily by arrests and long detentions of the protesters. Ms Sitharaman accused Mr Gandhi of abuse and destructive politics, of becoming part of the ‘fringe’ of the ‘destroy-India-image’ brigade. This reveals the Modi-led regime’s attitude that questioning an elected government is equivalent to ‘demeaning’ or ‘humiliating’ India. This belief — its repetition suggests it is a belief, not just an attitude — encapsulates the true danger to democracy and is intimately tied up with the government’s furious reaction to all criticism and refusal to answer questions, whether they come from the Opposition or the people. The ruler can do no wrong. Mr Modi’s government wishes to erase its elected origin and turn its electors into subjects who are not permitted to criticize the rulers. Ms Sitharaman was representing that agenda, not the people or parliamentary democracy.