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Rohini Balakrishnan Ramanathan

Getting the message across

Dear Mr Prime Minister,

Sorry I could not meet you when you graced our shores on this side of the Atlantic, but have been sort of following your movements. Not as a spy, but as someone who has a great deal of respect for you as leader of the largest non-monolithic gargantuan of a country in the entire world. Simply not an easy job in the best of circumstances, and Lord knows that in governance rarely the best of circumstances exist.

Of course, we all know that the harder the job, the harder one needs to try to make sure one comes out smelling like a rose. Lord knows you try, but there are forces out there that even in the guise of friends and well-wishers have, instead of easing the challenges for you, made them more challenging. Let's take, for example, the public relations fiasco of your appearance before a gathering of about 2,500 Indians, I am told, on September 9 in New York. I could not be there, though one of my own friends involved with that event as an organiser invited me to the reception.

I didn't really have to be there to express my feelings about how two things that you, Mr Prime Minster, did "turned me off". First, your accepting the invitation knowing fully well there was going to be a prominent contingency of religious "leaders" side-by-side with you. I don't know who your PR meisters are, but knowing fully well what kind of perception there is of your government (dubbed a Hindu body), it was not a very smart thing to let you be surrounded by yards and yards of saffron. Sir, perception counts! These days especially, it counts for a lot.

What a pity that Hinduism itself, that wellspring of some of the greatest metaphysical ideas the world has ever known, has been reduced to a mere religion just so that it can compete with others that came into being specifically as religions. It's like the sun wanting to compete with a bunch of neon lights. I am not sure if those who have caused this reduction understand this. When will they understand that a religion (for lack of a better term) that does not have a founder in the conventional sense of the term, and was never begun as a religion, should not be cut to size to fit modern tastes and tides? Will they ever?

Way back when I met you at a friend's humble kutiya (hut) in a small private gathering in their basement in Queens, New York, I expressed my admiration for you, said how much I'd love for you to become prime minister of India one day. You were like a bhikhari (mendicant) at that time, no office, no seat in Parliament, nothing. Spilling your characteristic muted laugh, you said that this probably was never going to happen. Yes, things did look that grim for you back then. Later I was truly happy to see someone I consider a decent man become India's prime minister. You see, I don't take too kindly to smart-alecky flashy folks who believe in birthrights.

Way back as a child I had seen you on the streets of Delhi when you were just starting out as a Jan Sanghi. My late paternal uncle (he died young at age 60) who was somewhat involved with the party accompanied you door to door, introducing you to the voters, the common folk, most of whom were still in the thrall of the good old Congress party. You always came across as a sincere man without the fancy and flourish of some other politicians I have seen in action.

Returning to the shindig on Saturday, September 9, on Staten Island, the other thing that I felt contributed to the fiasco was your speaking in Hindi. Please, Mr Prime Minster, don't get me wrong, I love that language, particularly when you speak it. But I strongly feel it's language that is keeping many Indians from feeling like they belong to a single nationality. And it doesn't look like any time in the near future Hindi will be India's lingua franca.

So that sanguine day on Staten Island the English language would have done just fine. All those present would have understood you. Funnily enough, my own friend who invited me cannot understand Hindi. It's possible she was anyway too busy distributing chole and kachoris to the crowd to be paying attention to what you said.

Speaking at the United Nations in eloquent Hindi is one thing, a matter of immense pride for many Indians. But still, Hindi not being the common language among Indians, who are definitely more at home with English, if that day on Staten Island you had addressed the gathering in English you would have succeeded in conveying your message to a lot more people. I am sure you will agree that a leader's words need to be heard and understood by as many people as possible.

Let me see if a clothing analogy will work here. There is a reason why we women spend so much on clothes. Because each occasion calls for a different look and feel! Similarly words and language are a sort of garb. You are a poet, you know what I'm talking about. Very often we wear our words like we wear our clothes -- with care and for the sake of being noticed for hopefully their positive appeal.

Both fashions and words make various statements (I'm smart, look at me; I have taste, admire me; etc), deliver a certain message, and demand a certain response from the listener/reader, spectator. Just like we choose one kind of attire for one occasion, and another for another, I believe that the language we choose must also fit the occasion. We all know how President Kennedy charmed the locals with his use of German when in Germany, and used his wife while in Mexico for her facility with the Spanish language.

A leader needs everything s/he has got to woo the people, and every gesture s/he makes is carefully weighed by those whose opinions count. Sir, the public relations opportunity on Staten Island unfortunately ended up being a PR debacle.

I understand the Indian mind quite well. For us, substance matters, form seems of very little value, if any. In fact we are even suspect of form quite often. This is a terrible mistake. Civilization is a lot about tools. PR is just a tool, quite powerful if employed correctly.

I read somewhere that your PR folks had trouble projecting the image of you as a robust leader because of your present ill health (minor, I'm sure). A true PR professional is one who can beat all odds and still accomplish the desired result, just like a true leader is one who can beat all odds and yet come out smelling like a rose.

It's very interesting that in a country where men, women, children, all are told how to behave in a certain way to project a certain image, great leaders have not been told what this would be. No, I take it back, because they in fact have been, by great minds like Chanakya, Thiruvalluvar, and others, but the true spirit behind these highly intelligent seers' message seems not to have been imbibed by all.

Indian culture says elders know best. Those of us who are not there yet would like to believe this. So please do not let us down.

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