Bad taste can be ignored. However, a society that responds to a joke about an ongoing tragedy is not guilty of bad taste but of callous cruelty. Recently, Narendra Modi, the prime minister of India, amused his audience with a joke he used to hear in his childhood, in which a professor is enraged at the mistakes in his daughter’s suicide note. In what planet is that funny? But Mr Modi’s listeners laughed with the same delight that another audience had displayed at an overseas meet right after the announcement of demonetisation. This is hardly a skewed sense of humour, because humour is inclusive, tolerant, even compassionate, not insensitive and smug, enjoying other people’s misery. And the attitude is stupid, because suicide is not the hurt that ‘other people’ bear, it knocks on everyone’s door. In 2021, 1,64, 033 suicides were recorded by the National Crime Records Bureau.Mr Modi’s and his audience’s laughter could be perceived by the bereaved, no doubt mistakenly, to be directed against the 450 persons dying by their own hand every day. Under Mr Modi’s governance, the data indicated a rise of 7.2% in suicides over 2020.

When the prime minister cracks a joke about suicide, he is pointing the way for the people. The Narendra Modi government has overseen the rise of hatred in the country: divisiveness, aggression and the erosion of the rights of the underprivileged have become the dominant culture. That turns shared laughter into mockery of the less fortunate. Meanwhile, issues of mental health, always played down in Indian society because of stigma as well as a lack of awareness, have become inconsequential in this government’s scale of values. A survey by the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences in 2020 showed that 150 million Indians needed mental health care, but less than 30 million were being treated. The scarcity of mental health professionals, especially in villages, adds to the problem — although not for a government that allocated less than 1% of its 2022 budget for mental health. A 2017 survey had shown that of 197 million people needing care, 45.7 million had depressive disorders and 44.9 million anxiety disorders. This is a terrifying picture for a Ram rajya in the making.

Mr Modi was joking about mistakes in a young girl’s suicide note. In the latest record, more than one-third of suicides were in the 18-30 age group and 31% between 30 and 45. That is a huge percentage of the productive and future population; more important, it reflects deep tragedies that span the country, perpetuating mental health issues. Expensive education, insecurity and unemployment, aggravated casteism, increasing frustration and hopelessness may lead to suicide. But not all suicides are reported or recorded, especially those of women. The biggest cover-up is by the political leadership: it not only ignores the people’s pain and their daily tragedies, but also leads its followers in diminishing these with laughter.