The prime minister’s appeal to fellow Indians to put their faith in science is welcome. Narendra Modi’s plea was made in an address in which he touched upon a crucial challenge confronting India: the festering public hesitancy towards the Covid-19 vaccination programme. The pace of inoculation has been woefully slow in the country; around 4 per cent of the citizens of this populous country have been fully vaccinated. The government’s numerous lapses account for a large part of the inertia. But it must also be conceded that public reluctance to receive the jab has had a role to play too; one survey pegged the national vaccine hesitancy at nearly 30 per cent. Lack of awareness, prejudiced opinion, illiteracy and — this cannot be ignored — irresponsible statements from public figures have compounded the problem.
It must be said that Mr Modi’s party has stolen a march on its rivals when it comes to disseminating patently unscientific views. Several leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party are on record endorsing, among other things, such outlandish cures for the coronavirus as cow urine, sun bathing, blowing conch shells, administering holy smoke, and so on. The flock has responded to these primitive entreaties enthusiastically: reports of cow urine therapy being administered publicly have not been unknown in New India. This is only to be expected in a country where the government has been keen to let the anti-science genie out of the bottle. Notwithstanding Mr Modi’s new-found respect for science, it must not be forgotten that the prime minister had thought nothing about blurring the lines between myth and reason: his claim of Ancient India mastering the modern marvels of cosmetic surgery and reproductive genetics bears testimony to this troubling conflation. At the root of the problem lies the tension between an authoritarian impulse and rationality. History has shown that the survival of repressive regimes is predicated upon the clouding of reason and judgment with falsehood. That is because reason — is it anathema to the BJP? — is the seed that sprouts into the fruit of enquiry.
