Last Sunday, 15 September was commemorated as ‘International Democracy Day’ to promote and uphold the principles of democracy. In September, we also celebrate ‘Teachers Day’. “Two World Wars were fought to make the world safe for democracy”, were the words of a history teacher late Avelino Ozorio Fernandes, who taught in Regina Martyrum High School in Assolna many decades ago, which left a lasting impression on the minds of his students.
Favourite teachers often become influencers that fire liberal thoughts and anti-war, pro-democracy spirit in their students. What is the mysticism of this word, ‘democracy’ that makes us love it despite the heavy price that we pay all over the world to keep it alive? Is the world safe for democracy today while war continues in the Ukraine and in Gaza and apostles of peace and democrats like Sitaram Yechury fade away? I recollect his visionary words of ‘peace and democracy’ at the World Peace Conference held in Goa in 2014.
It is true that great teachers, veer their students towards independent thought, just like values which cannot be taught but caught. Critical democratic thought is the bedrock of a good educational system which results in good citizenry. Bio-history proposes that it is a disciplined, hard-working temperament that makes a society great, rooted in childhood, in control and direction by disciplined parents and teachers. Democracy has survived because of these joint efforts. Support for International Democracy Day stems from the core belief that democracy requires the participation of all citizens. It also highlights the important role of parliamentarians to understand their capacity and mandate to work for justice, peace, development and human rights.
This day is a grim reminder (ever since its inception in 2008, by the UNO) to review the state of democracy around the world. Each year highlights a specific theme, beginning with ‘Democracy and political tolerance’ in 2009 to ‘COVID-19: A Spotlight on Democracy’ in 2020. In 2022, it was ‘Protecting Press Freedom for Democracy’ and the next year it was ‘Empowering the next generation’. This year it is ‘Navigating AI for Governance and Citizen Engagement’. These themes have rightly changed with the needs of the changing times.
This year, International Democracy Day mourned the death of one of India’s greatest democrat, CPI(M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury who passed away on September 12, 2024. As a young Higher Secondary student, he stood first in the CBSE examination. Yechury was an alumni of JNU and St. Stephens. He went on to become the National President of the Student Federation of India and the first President not from Kerala or West Bengal. He was arrested during the emergency for his political activities, as a result of which he had to abandon his Ph. D at JNU. He is remembered for handing over a memorandum, as President of the JNU Students Union, demanding the resignation of the then Chancellor of JNU Indira Gandhi, post-emergency and she did resign a few days later! That photo frame was iconic.
Yechury was elected to the Rajya Sabha for two terms from 2005 to 2017 from West Bengal. Even though he was awarded with the ‘Best Parliamentarian Award’ in 2017, his party did not nominate him for the third tenure as it was against the CPI(M) policy. The Samajwadi Party offered to nominate him but he remained a lifelong communist. This is in stark contrast to today’s elected representatives changing parties for whatever reasons they give – people are not fools! In both the period of the United Front government in 1996 and later the UPA government, Yechury was one of the key interlocutors for the CPI(M), which was supporting these coalitions. He authored and edited more than a dozen books, one of which was entitled, ‘Modi Government: New surge of communalism’ in 2014. He wrote the fortnightly column ‘Left Hand Drive’ for Hindustan Times. For twenty years, he edited his party’s fortnightly newspaper ‘Peoples Democracy’.
At a personal level, he never recovered from the shock of the loss of his 34-year-old son in 2021, to COVID-19. His own body was donated as per his wish to AIIMS for teaching and research. Tributes poured in from friends and opponents. While Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi called him “protector of the idea of India”, Prime Minister Narendra Modi appreciated his “ability to connect across the political spectrum.” Chairperson of the Congress Parliamentary Party Sonia Gandhi recalled her friendship with Yechury, which began in 2004 at a time when the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance was formed. “He was uncompromising in his commitment to the values of our country’s Constitution embodied so very forcefully in its Preamble. He was fierce in his determination to protect India’s diversity and was a powerful champion of secularism,” Gandhi said. She credited him for contributing enormously to the emergence of the INDIA group in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Yechury won friends across party lines. In his condolence message, Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar said that the career of Sitaram Yechury, spanning five decades, was marked by significant contributions toward strengthening Indian democracy. RSS’ Akhil Bharatiya Prachar Pramukh Sunil Ambekar condoled Yechury’s death and said he was a “committed and sensitive political leader”– this from an organisation he opposed throughout his life.
Dr Jim Penman author of ‘Biohistory: Decline and Fall of the West’, published in 2015 by Cambridge Scholars, has argued that the rise of demagogues may be an early sign of the end of democracy. We are seeing this phenomenon with the rise of ex-President Donald Trump in the USA, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in Hungary and President Vladimir Putin in Russia.
They all use the façade of elections to convert democracy to authoritarian regimes, whereby cabinets and parliaments are almost made redundant. The theory in ‘Biohistory’ proposes that society reflects the prevailing temperament of the people. When people respect the Constitution and rule of law, democracy flourishes. When they follow any leader who makes attractive but false promises, democracy decays. This process can be seen in the fall of the Roman Republic. By the first century BC, the disciplined, patriotic Romans of early times had become a fickle mob ready to follow strongmen such as Julius Caesar.
With the elections for democracy in the USA round the corner, Trump insults women, proposes to seize the Middle Eastern oil fields and wants to build a vast wall between USA and Mexico, with the Mexicans somehow paying for it and yet he is by far the front-runner for the Republican nomination. The violence of words in a democratic setup has become deafening across the political spectrum in recent times. The discourse has reached such a low level that some days back a Shiv Sena legislator offered a reward of Rs 11 lakh in return for the Leader of the Opposition’s tongue. Biohistory predicts that the ‘anti-politician’ will have increasingly greater appeal. The only way to stop this from happening is to reverse the current trend for the general population and to return to the more disciplined temperament of the past.
We need people and ideals which are trustworthy for our society to work towards the promise delineated in the Preamble of our Constitution especially towards a more just, equitable and inclusive society. Today the values imbibed from teachers, love for democracy and parliamentarians, who protect the secular-federal polity of India like Yechury, are need of the hour.
(Dr Sushila Sawant
Mendes is an Author &
Professor in History,
Independent Researcher)