India’s Left, Right support Putin

The Left and the Right in India are split down the middle on the issue of Ukraine. Many Modi bhaktas support the Russia invasion of Ukraine. Interestingly, many Modi haters agree with them but obviously for two opposite reasons.

Support for Russian President Vladimir Putin among a section of the Left is a function of their ideological hatred towards the West. This was also the reason that many of them also supported Saddam Hussain; in their scheme of things, he was seen fighting American imperialism, and anyone who does that is a hero. Now, in their imagination, Putin is a hero who is fighting the Left’s old enemy, the abomination called American imperialism.

As for the Ukrainians they are mere pawns who should either surrender to Putin or be prepared for slaughter.

Support for Putin among those on the Right stems from their aspiration for India to be a superpower. Putin inspires their imagination of someone who is powerful enough to thumb his nose at the world.

Just as with the Left, Ukraine doesn’t matter to them. It just exists so that a superpower can display its might to the other superpower. The bhaktas are not bothered by the reality of geopolitics. They fail to recognize the fact that our 50-year-old India Russia Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation, 1971, friendship treaty with Russia is of little consequence in comparison with the new China-Russia partnership. They also remain blissfully ignorant of the fact that the challenges India faces from China and Pakistan may now multiply.

There is an ideological convergence between the Left and the Right. By the way, it has become increasingly obvious over the past decade.

The extreme Left claims to champion the cause of workers and the poor, but it uses them as mere pawns to fight their ideological battles. Similarly, the extreme Right doesn’t tire of elucidating their vision of Hindutva; in their imagination, Hindutva will bring new glory to Hinduism. In reality, however, Hindutva just transforms Hinduism into a uniform and homogeneous lump of clay lump of clay, a poor copy of Christianity and Islam, although Hindutva stands against both. This is a mockery of Hindu philosophy that appeals to a broad very spectrum, Hinduism is able to accommodate the atheist as well as a wide diversity of beliefs and practices, cherishing karma while also recognizing destiny, celebrating the diverse pathways for individual salvation. This is a mockery of Hinduism that cherishes the diverse pathways for individual salvation.

To both these supporters of Putin, as mentioned earlier, the wishes of Ukrainian people have no worth or relevance.

As Orwell wrote in Animal Farm, “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” Putin is surely more equal than others.

While sections of the Left and Right in India are converging to endorse Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, the opposite may be happening in the West. Yuval Harari, one of the most well-known authors and historians today, notes that one of the fall-outs of Putin’s war in Ukraine might be to end, or at least put on the back burner, the culture war that has dominated the political discourse in the West over the past decade. By choosing to launch this war against Ukraine, Putin, maybe quite unintentionally, is helping to heal some of the deep political divisions that had been polarizing opinion in much of the Western nations, and uniting the West against him.