Alas, poor Mani Shankar Aiyar! I knew him well. After years of unshakeable loyalty to the Congress party and its ruling Nehru-Gandhi family, his membership of the party was peremptorily suspended by the newly anointed party president Rahul Gandhi on December 7. Now his detractors in the Congress — and their number is not minuscule — are dumping a substantial share of the blame for losing two elections — General Election 2014 and the Gujarat assembly election which concluded on December 18 — at his doorstep.
In 2014 on the eve of the General Election, in a reference to the opposition BJP’s prime ministerial candidate’s humble origins, Aiyar made a bloomer to the effect that Narendra Modi was unqualified to become prime minister, though he would make a good chaiwala (tea vendor). This remark was cleverly turned by Modi to his advantage by pinning the labels of elitism and anti-poor on the Congress, and undoubtedly cost the party millions of votes. And this time around on the eve of the Gujarat assembly election, he described the prime minister as a neech (low-down) individual.
It’s quite clear to the minority of English-savvy citizens, that Aiyar speaking in Hindi had literally translated the English word ‘low-down’ as neech in Hindi. But this word was also cleverly converted by Modi as a reference to his low caste origins by the brahmanical upper caste Aiyar and the Congress party. Once again Aiyar’s ill-advised vituperation cost the Congress dearly in the Gujarat assembly elections and resulted in his suspension.
The cognoscenti in Delhi and elsewhere are well aware that Aiyar, a highly educated (Doon School, St. Stephen’s College and Cambridge) true-blue liberal and brilliant debater, would never knowingly make a casteist remark. But with General Election 2019 around the corner, Aiyar is likely to be despatched to campaign in some distant constituency beyond the reach of media, to prevent him from unwittingly causing damage to the resurgent Congress.