The public who consume untruths are mostly ignorant. They acquire information on a catastrophe and causes for that from media.
People in public life, political persons in particular, are not expected to speak the truth all the time. Even the great king Yudhisthira had to tell a lie, though a guarded one, to his Guru Dronacharya during the battle of Kurukshetra resulting in death of the Guru. Yudhisthira was hesitant but compared to him the present day political leaders suffer less scruples. They do not hesitate to lie as and when they feel it is necessary. Well known political science professor John Mearsheimer categorised two types of lies used by leaders—strategic and selfish. Strategic lies are necessary to protect the nation they lead. Selfish lies help them carry on with their personal agenda of leadership. The lie that Yudhisthira told Guru Dronacharya falls in the selfish category—it helped him to eventually win the battle. Most leaders resort to lies primarily for selfish reason, Yudhisthira is not the only one. One glaring recent example is Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau lying loudly on certain murder committed in his country in order to pass on the blame to New Delhi.
Clearly Trudeau wants to catch at that straw and save his sinking political fortune.
Come back from Canada to Kolkata, a reservoir of distorted messages. The quantum and frequency of the lies pedlled in the state of West Bengal at present is an interesting case to study. Political discourse in the state is a varied combination of lies, concealment and spinning—all falling in the selfish category mentioned above. Some of these have origin in lack of knowledge like the recent one on GlobalFoundries’ (GF) creation of the GF Kolkata Power Center in Kolkata. State’s chief minister Mamata Banerjee, as also state BJP president and a minister of state in the Modi cabinet Sukanta Majumdar read this as setting up of semiconductor plant in the state. Sukanta praised Narendra Modi for bringing in “industry” in West Bengal. Mamata issued long X-Handle message claiming signs of success of her leadership in this. Both spun a tale based on wrong presumption.
In fact the GlobalFoundries acquired TagoreTech’s facility in Kolkata and had announced the same on 1st July 2024, more than 100 days before Mr Modi met Mr Biden. Tagore Technology’s co-founder and chief operating officer, Amitava Das joined GF with the team due to this acquisition. The press note after the Indo-US meeting had merely praised GlobalFoundries’ (GF) creation of the GF Kolkata Power Center in Kolkata, after acquisition of TagoreTech’s Power Gallium Nitride (GaN) portfolio. There was no mention nor was any talk on setting up any manufacturing facility in the state of West Bengal. Both BJP’s Sukanta and state chief minister Mamata Banerjee were spinning tales based on incomplete information. This particular lie originated in ignorance. Both the political persons attempted to take credit from their equally ignorant support base in the state they cater to. Even media in the state parroted this.
Around the same time West Bengal suffered flood havoc due to excessive rains in the upper reaches of the rivers Damodar and its tributaries. Even the few dams under the Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) could not store the excess waters and had to release water as per laid down system after duly informing the relevant departments in the states of West Bengal and Jharkhand. The West Bengal state administration had winked at the need for maintaining river flows in the downstream of these rivers. It even had to release water from the Kangshavati dam, on the river flowing through its jurisdiction. In political one-upmanship a leader is not expected to acknowledge the failure of administration under her charge. The logical outcome is outpouring of series of selfish lies—blaming DVC was an option the state leadership resorted to. In case of Kangshavati dam under the state administration, silence was maintained since it could not find any scapegoat, barring the rain god.
The public who consume the untruths are mostly ignorant. They acquire information on a catastrophe and causes for that from media. The necessary tool to spread disinformation is media. Not long ago, the most infamous, but successful, propagandist Joseph Goebbels had demonstrated how by misinforming, people could be easily controlled. The DVC bashing for West Bengal flood thus had to be fed through media. Pliant media, dependent hopelessly on advertisement support, readily played ball. Only some YouTubers shouted hoarse against the same but ordinary people do not consume information from YouTube. West Bengal government could thus ensure that large number of flood affected people start hating DVC, which incidentally is India’s first ever such project where states of West Bengal and Bihar had joined the Centre. By bitterly finding fault with DVC West Bengal political leadership prima facie shook off the failure of its flood control network to the river authority.
The success of peddling lies depends on a culture of dishonesty where people follow whatever is fed unquestioningly. One reason for such meek acceptance is fear of authority. Authority exercises power and as Orwell mentioned in 1984 that “Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing”. Those who peddle lies also master the art of reshaping human mind. Their selfish interest in salvaging their weakening political positions force them to distort facts. Both Trudeau and Mamata had been resorting to lies in desperate attempt to salvage their sinking political positions. Both are telling lies, as Professor Mearsheimer had mentioned, from selfish motives which will not benefit anyone, even those political persons. Their lies will certainly get exposed in this age of social media. Trinamool’s DVC bashing or celebration of GF acquisition did not last, nor will Trudeau’s attack on New Delhi. But desperate leaders adopt desperate untruths for survival and will continue to do so.
* Sugato Hazra is founder of Poliminds Consult, a content agency for aspiring and practising politicians.