Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

  

One of the giant floats featured in India's Republic Day parade on Monday promotes the Swacch Bharat Abhiyan ("Clean India Mission"). This initiative to clean India was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 15, 2014.

Modi is from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the political wing of Hindu Nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh group. His victory, though decisive, was divisive. The BJP won a majority of seats in the 2014 elections but received only 31 percent of the vote.

The cleanliness campaign was an attempt to bridge this divisiveness by finding a national agenda that went beyond religion and political posturing.

The idea of a clean India was inspirational because developed countries are associated with cleanliness and both Modi and his party want to project an image of India as a socioeconomic power house. Further, a dirty India sullies other achievements like the sending of a satellite to Mars. The BJP has always had an uncomfortable relationship with modern India's founding father, Mahatma Gandhi, but this campaign used his emphasis on cleanliness to garner more credibility for their campaign.

In some ways the campaign was reminiscent of a pyramid scheme. The prime minister nominated people who were supposed to do some cleaning-up. They would then nominate others, and so slowly the whole of India would be involved. The benefit to Modi wasn't financial but political; anyone seeing a participant in the scheme, especially a celebrity, would inevitably link their actions to Modi, building up his reputation.

This got the common man on board, embarrassed his political enemies while ensured Modi got positive press. In his 2014 Independence Day speech from the ramparts of the Red Fort, Modi nominated film stars as well as opposition Congress Party Member of Parliament Shashi Tharoor.

But the invitation to Tharoor stumped the Congress Party. To all it seemed that Modi was being magnanimous and was reaching out in an endeavor to promote a cleaner India. The Congress Party was between the veritable devil and the deep blue sea. If, on the one hand, Tharoor were to accept the invitation it would seem that they were supporting the prime minister who, till recently, had vilified them and to whom they had lamely responded. If they didn't, they would come across as being churlish, childish and not concerned for the country. It was a win-win for the BJP. What Tharoor finally did was to accept the invitation, organize a real clean-up of an area in his constituency and send a plan for a larger clean-up along with request for funds from the prime minister. Modi has not replied to Tharoor's request.

The clean-ups organized until then were nothing but photo-ops with brooms being held by politicians and the rich as props. Modi, too, took up a broom to clean a part of a road. Tharoor by his real actions showed that half-hearted actions go nowhere. Could this be the reason why Modi on November 8 used a spade and pick-axe to clean up a section of Varanasi?

But the problems with the campaign go beyond it being used for political ends by master Machiavellian Modi. India is hemmed by a civic sensibility that is based on caste and a feudal mindset. The pecking order of the caste ensured that there was always someone below to clean-up. There was no responsibility or accountability of those dirtying and no concern for those cleaning up. Thus till date municipal sweepers and those involved in organized waste-picking come from lower castes, it is not an occupation that would draw candidates from higher castes.

That is the reason why municipal workers work without protection, use tools that expose them to hazards and are not trained. 

The current campaign format is a post party clean-up initiative. Preventing India from getting dirty needs accountability and responsibility. Somebody dirties the place and a different group of people look after the cleaning. A clean-up is a remedial measure and is a "feel good" venture that is hard to sustain. 

As a political tool the campaign is a brilliant concept. But it won't get the rubbish off India's streets without real reform.

The author is the author of 1,400 Bananas, 76 Towns & 1 Million People. opinion@globaltimes.com.cn