Will the Real Patriots Please Stand Up?

Nirupam Hazra1

“…They also serve who only stand and wait” writes John Milton in the sonnet ‘On His Blindness’.
Standing up and waiting, both in recent time, have attained the glory akin to national duty. An
unabashed display of nationalist symbolism has created a halo around the act of standing up. Like the
soldiers who stand day and night at the border to keep our nation safe, an analogy expedient to hyper-
nationalist sentiment, the people of the country also need to stand up for some reasons to show their
love for the nation. Demonetization was the occasion that gave the opportunity to the people to
literally stand up and show their love for the country. It was not only an event to measure your
patriotism; it was also one of the rare tests taken by any democratic state to assess the morality and
honesty of its citizens. The stoic willingness to stand in the long serpentine queues before banks and
ATMs was the litmus-test of the real patriots. The ritual of nation building demands sweat and
sacrifice and sometimes also wants the people to forgo their capacity to think critically. So, when after
the drastic decision of demonetization, people were forced to stand before the nearby ATMs or banks;
they were also made to believe that somewhere, in some undisclosed part of the country, black money
was being auto-detected and self-destructed. The more time the people spent standing in the queue the
greater amount of black money was burnt, the more common people suffered to re-earn their hard-
earned money, the more black money was incinerated. This act of endurance and sacrifice also
ensured that one’s status as a real patriot was firmly established on the pedestal erected on a high
moral ground. All of you may not be brave enough to stand at the border to protect the country, but
you should be patriot enough to stand before banks and ATMs. It is the bounden duty of every true
patriot to take part in the endeavour of nation building. If one died standing in a queue, she or he
would a martyr, just like one who dies on national duty serving the nation. This is what happened to
Kallol Roy Chowdhury from West Bengal and many people around the country during
demonetization; though it was a different matter that demonetization could never be medically
established as the cause of those deaths. However, we were made to believe by the demagogues of
demonetization that what the soldiers were doing at the border, you and I were doing within the
country, they fought against the terrorists and infiltrators and we fought against the tax-evaders and
traitors.

All these were done in the name of the nation. Every great deed entails pain, suffering and
considerable inconvenience that would disturb the comfort of normal life, although every great pain
does not necessarily ensure a great feat. Still, one should not complain and there are plenty of reasons

1
Assistant Professor, Department of Social Work, Bankura University, West Bengal. Email:
hazra.nirupam@gmail.com
that make sure that you must not complain. One must not complain because unlike others who
complain, you were clean and morally upright. People who criticised, refused to stand up were
nothing but potential hoarders of black money. Their intransigence is the greatest evidence of their
complicity. Had one’s earnings been made on hard work, one would have worked harder to re-earn
and save them; one would have smilingly spent the entire day standing in the queue. It was a test of
loyalty and morality to the nation. The simple act of standing up makes one a foot-soldier of nation
building, no less a status than the real soldiers on the duty at the border.

But then came the peripeteia and you suddenly realized that 99% demonetized currency, which you
thought being destroyed by your act of standing, returned to the system that was being cleansed with
your sweat and suffering. You woke up to the reality that no big fish worth your suffering was caught.
So, you look for solace in the fact that you passed the test of national loyalty and individual honesty
and it should be celebrated as a matter of great pride. In Milton’s word, “...who best, Bear his mild
yoke, they serve him best...” the citizens dutifully bore the mild yoke of national duty and literally
stood up to the expectation of the nation. The demigods of nationalism must be pleased.

But what else can you do for your nation or where else can you stand up to show how much you love
your nation? Perhaps, there is no other better place than movie theatres or cinema-halls. Lest you
forget to shower love and show respect to your nation, national anthem was made mandatory by the
court, though temporarily, before the screening of any movie and the viewers were instructed to
spring to their feet to make a spectacle of their love for the nation, a tradition which began in the time
of Indo-China battle in 1960s and was subsequently discontinued. The judiciary suddenly felt that
instilling patriotism or nationalism is a prerogative not limited only to the state. The judiciary had
every right to make a stand-up patriot out of every citizen of the country. The highest court of the
country, for some time, was of the opinion that it was the ‘sacred obligation’ on the part of the citizen
to show respect to national anthem. Playing national anthem in cinema halls and making viewers
stand on their fit was considered one of the best ways to instil “committed patriotism and
nationalism”. But if one’s physical or psychological limitations do not allow her or him to stand up
and show respect to the national anthem, then what? She or he may be beaten into a patriot or her love
for this country would be publicly questioned or she or he may find his or her nationality forcefully
grafted to that of a hostile neighbour. This is what happened with wheelchair-bound Arman Ali in
Guwahati. Be became a ‘Pakistani’ as his physical limitation did not allow him to stand up during
national anthem. However, the process of producing stand-up nationalist did not stop here. For those
who find it difficult to ‘show respect’ due to certain limitations, were expected to follow certain Home
Ministry guidelines. In such cases one was required to maintain “maximum possible attentiveness and
alertness physically” and “persons with mild intellectual disability can be trained to understand and
respect the national anthem.” But finally good sense prevailed and sanity restored. The same
judiciary which made it mandatory to play national anthem in cinema halls and made viewers stand
up for the sake of patriotism and nationalism, amended its way. But there will be no respite. We shall
be called, every now and then, to prove our loyalty to the nation, probably at the cost of our love for
the country.

Nationalism and patriotism are often used interchangeably in day to day exchange, but there are subtle
yet substantial differences between the two. In his essay, Nationalism :Genuine and Spurious, Asish
Nandy enumerates these differences to separately identify these two concepts. Nationalism is more
about your loyalty to the state and its decisions rather than your love for the country. To establish the
loyalty and to make it sufficiently visible, nationalism has its rigid, non-negotiable and well-defined
parameters. Therefore, a nationalist is supposed to show a sincere and often uncritical allegiance to
the state and its various activities to establish his or her nationalist credentials. But it allows to the
citizens very little space for manoeuvring and almost no space for questioning or criticizing. Being an
ideology, nationalism is more concrete in terms of its content and specific in terms of its conduct.
Therefore a nationalist is never supposed to miss a chance to stand up and show his or her allegiance
to the nation-state but a patriot may find a better way to show love to his or her country.

I would like to conclude with Milton’s ‘On His Blindness’. “Doth God exact day-labour, light-
denied?” Milton fondly asked. The answer would be yes if you want to please the demigods of
nationalism, every day you have to give the test to establish your loyalty to your nation and dismiss
others’ who do not believe in the same ritual as yours. Blinded by the ultra-nationalist fervour, we are
denied any space for question and criticism. We are trained to stand up, but not allowed to speak out.
If one is at all allowed to speak, one has to speak in the language of the state, in the voice of the
majority. Hence, I shall conclude rephrasing the lines of Martin Niemöller to describe the dystopia
that awaits us if things go like this:

First they came for the Muslim

and I did not speak out
because I was not a Muslim.
Then they came for the Dalits
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Dalit.
Then they came for the anti-nationalists
and I did not speak out
because I was not an anti-nationalists.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
 References

A ‘Pakistani’ is here: Wheelchair-bound man abused for sitting during national anthem in
Guwahati theatre (2017): The Indian Express, 2 October,
http://indianexpress.com/article/india/arman-ali-disabled-man-called-pakistani-on-not-standing-up-
for-national-anthem-in-guwahati-4871021/

Anand, Utkarsh (2016): National Anthem must be played before movies in theaters, rules
Supreme Court. The Indain Express, 1 December
http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/national-anthem-national-flag-supreme-court-
theater-4402827/

Demonetisation: Government employee dies in ATM queue in West Bengal (2016). The Indian
Express, 3 December
http://indianexpress.com/article/india/demonetisation-government-employee-dies-in-atm-queue-in-
west-bengal-4408498/

G. Ananthakrishnan (2018): National anthem in cinema halls is no longer compulsory: SC

modifies order. The Indian Express, 10 January
http://indianexpress.com/article/india/national-anthem-in-cinema-halls-is-no-longer-compulsory-
supreme-court-modifies-orderv-5018334/

Milton, John (1673). “On His Blindness”, Quiller-Couch, A. (ed)(1931). The Oxford Book of English
Verse 1250 - 1900. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Nandy, Asish (2006): “Nationalism, Genuine and Spurious,” Economic and Political Weekly, Vol.41,
No.32, pp 3000-3005.

Rautray, Samanyawa (2018): National anthem not mandatory in cinema halls: SC. The Economic
Times, 10 January ,

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/national-anthem-controversy-a-brief-
background/articleshow/62426770.cms