www.openthemagazine.com 50 20 JULY /2020 OPEN VOLUME 12 ISSUE 28 20 JULY 2020 CONTENTS 20 JULY 2020 5 6 8 14 16 18 20 LOCOMOTIF INDRAPRASTHA MUMBAI NOTEBOOK SOFT POWER THE RACHEL PAPERS WHISPERER OPEN ESSAY Modi’s call By Virendra Kapoor By Anil Dharker A ganglord saga The outsiders By Jayanta Ghosal Will Trump’s base hold? By S Prasannarajan By Makarand R Paranjape By Rachel Dwyer By James Astill 24 RIDING OUT THE STORM How Modi met the Chinese challenge without ceding political and strategic ground By PR Ramesh and Siddharth Singh 36 PRISONERS OF THE PRINCE Look who’s killing the Congress By PR Ramesh 44 THE FUTURE OF LEARNING 54 Education in India is finally catching up with the digital revolution in the wake of Covid-19 A LUNGFUL OF LIFE By V Shoba and Ullekh NP A portrait of oxygen as breathing becomes harder for the world By Madhavankutty Pillai 58 61 64 65 66 THE MEANING OF A MAN SHORT AND SHOCKING FATHER AND SON HOLLYWOOD REPORTER NOT PEOPLE LIKE US The onscreen unravelling of Animation films with a social A searing look at generational Sarah Oh on the new season English Channel traditional masculinity conscience have become online hits conflict and conservatism of Killing Eve By Rajeev Masand By Kaveree Bamzai By Divya Unny By Sharanya Manivannan By Noel de Souza Cover photograph PIB 20 JULY 2020 www.openthemagazine.com 3 OPEN MAIL [email protected] EDITOR S Prasannarajan LETTER OF THE WEEK OPEN MANAGING EDITOR PR Ramesh C EXECUTIVE EDITOR Ullekh NP Democracy in India has not only survived for over sev- EDITOR-AT-LARGE Siddharth Singh DEPUTY EDITORS Madhavankutty Pillai en decades now but it has also emerged as the country’s 13 JULY 2020 / 50 www.openthemagazine.com (Mumbai Bureau Chief), strongest feature (‘In Praise of the Indian Voter’ by Rahul Pandita, Amita Shah, V Shoba (Bangalore), Nandini Nair Shashi Tharoor, July 6th, 2020). Democracy has evolved CREATIVE DIRECTOR Rohit Chawla in India, as evident in the several peaceful and 27 12 ISSUE VOLUME ART DIRECTOR Jyoti K Singh SENIOR EDITORS Sudeep Paul, seamless power transfers election after election over Lhendup Gyatso Bhutia (Mumbai), the years, one of the three key parameters political Moinak Mitra, Nikita Doval AssOCIATE EDITORS Vijay K Soni (Web), scientists look at for judging the strength and depth of Shahina KK democracies. Indian voters have also evolved over that ASSISTANT EDITOR Vipul Vivek CHIEF OF GRAPHICS Saurabh Singh period. They have shown maturity and pragmatism in 13 JULY 2020 13 JULY SENIOR DESIGNERS Anup Banerjee, choosing governments, bringing to and throwing out Veer Pal Singh of power based on their differing needs at the state and PHOTO EDITOR Raul Irani DEPUTY PHOTO EDITOR Ashish Sharma national elections even when polls are held at the same time. That surely is a sign of intelligent and strategic emerged out of the lifeless NATIONAL HEAD-EVENTS AND INITIATIVES Arpita Sachin Ahuja voting where voters have shown that electoral literacy pillar that the Congress AVP (ADVERTISING) Rashmi Lata Swarup goes far beyond educational literacy. Indian voters have was to kill the demon of GENERAL MANAGERS (ADVERTISING) time and again surprised pundits and upset scientific paternalist policies that Uma Srinivasan (South) predictions. A theory of the Indian voter remains were holding back the NATIONAL HEAD-DISTRIBUTION AND SALES elusive. The India Shining campaign was assumed economy. Like Prahlad, the Ajay Gupta REGIONAL HEADS-CIRCULATION to be a votewinner for the BJP in TV newsrooms but young country’s economy D Charles (South), Melvin George (West), Basab Ghosh (East) the voter quitely disagreed. Similarly, when the first was saved. He was a great HEAD-PRODUCTION Maneesh Tyagi Modi Government went to polls, some commentators achiever, much like our SENIOR MANAGER (PRE-PRESS) assumed that the party had touched its peak and could freedom fighters. It was Sharad Tailang MANAGER-MARKETING only go down from there. Certainly not, said the Indian for our economic freedom Priya Singh voter. Cash and caste are not enough to predict them. that he fought at the risk of CHIEF DESIGNER-MARKETING Bholey Bhardwaj Champak Bhattacharjee ruining his political career. PN Sreelekha CFO & HEAD-IT Anil Bisht CHIEF EXECUTIVE & PUBLISHER Neeraja Chawla CORPORATE CLASS All rights reserved throughout the BHARAT RATNA made him pragmatic in Corporates the world over world. Reproduction in any manner is prohibited. PVNarasimha Rao was politics instead of veering are the same (‘The New Editor: S Prasannarajan. Printed and a godsend for India (‘The to extremes; the fifth Working Class’, July 6th, published by Neeraja Chawla on behalf of the owner, Open Media Network Pvt Debt to Narasimha Rao’ refers to his achievements 2020). When they need Ltd. Printed at Thomson Press India Ltd, 18-35 Milestone, Delhi Mathura Road, by TP Sreenivasan, July in all the three aspects of labour, they overindulge Faridabad-121007, (Haryana). Published at 4, DDA Commercial 13th, 2020). He was a true life—knowledge, devotion them. Once their need is met, Complex, Panchsheel Park, ‘ratna’, which loosely and deed (jnana, bhakti and they hardly care. The double New Delhi-110017. Ph: (011) 48500500; Fax: (011) 48500599 translates as ‘DIAMOND’: karma, respectively); the whammy for the working To subscribe, WhatsApp ‘openmag’ to ‘D’ for his developmental sixth to his commitment class is that politicians too 9999800012 or log on to www.openthemagazine.com commitment, ‘I’ for to Gandhian principles side with corporates. We or call our Toll Free Number 1800 102 7510 innovation smarts, ‘A’ without going overboard; need governments that or email at: for assertiveness, ‘M’ and finally, the last one think of workers. Especially [email protected] For alliances, email for moderation, ‘O’ for for how liberalisation this crisis caused by a global [email protected] For advertising, email omni-proficient, ‘N’ for has liberated the masses pandemic demands a fairer [email protected] non-violence and ‘D’ for the from impoverishment. balance between the two For any other queries/observations, email [email protected] darling that he was of the As teachers, we request classes. On the one hand, poor. The first two features the Government to award everybody talks about high Disclaimer led him to opening up India him the Bharat Ratna unemployment. On the ‘Open Avenues’ are advertiser-driven marketing initiatives and Open assumes no responsibility to the world and saving it posthumously. other, business is down as for content and the consequences of using products or services advertised in the magazine from falling into a financial PV Padmavathi and Madhu workspaces are shut. We abyss; the third was why need to adopt more humane Volume 12 Issue 28 he could resist political PV Narasimha Rao is an apt management practices in For the week 14-20 July 2020 Total No. of pages 68 interference in his plans choice for the Bharat Ratna. these times. for the nation; the fourth Like the god Narasimha, he MR Jayanthy 4 20 JULY 2020 LOCOMOTIF By S PRASANNARAJAN Modi’s Call EADERSHIP NEEDS A backdrop to make it, For Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while he has been sometime in the future, a story worth retelling. That battling on one front, another opened along our border with is why, when the stories of tyrants and redeemers are China in the Galwan Valley. In the first battle, against the retold, history becomes a cautionary tale. Everything, coronavirus, he was one of the first leaders who understood the in varying degrees of cruelty, began as a project in enormity of the crisis. The lockdowns saved us from the initial Lfreedom, whether it was war or revolution. Those who won spurt, and it was a lesson in useful fear. India listened to him, the wars, not necessarily all of them, weren’t model managers followed the instructions, and in enforced isolation, realised the of freedom. And those who led the revolutions, mostly all of vulnerability of being human. The story would have been worse them, turned the original slogan of freedom into a prescription had Modi behaved like Donald Trump or Boris Johnson. As India for terror. Still, we return to their stories to tell the present in climbed up the worst-hit list subsequently, what was revealed in more clarifying words. Stories alone remain, as reminders of frightening starkness was not a political leadership in denial but boundaries set—and defied—by dreamers and warriors. one of our shameful inheritances: a healthcare system incapable The 21st century, still young, carries the burden of the last. of coping with the size and inequalities of India. The much-cited Its larger dramas borrow from the script of the last. Its arbiters— Kerala example in effectively containing the pandemic has to be whether wayward liberals or national populists or autocrats credited to the state’s heightened sense of healthcare. who have bestowed on themselves an eternal mandate— The other challenge that tested Modi’s leadership came occasionally return to the rule books of the last. They have been from the world’s most tolerated rogue republic (‘Dream and denied the kind of backdrops that made some past portraits Dictatorship’, July 6th). India still suffers from a China complex, of leadership compelling even now. There are transformative a reflection of national diffidence and insufficient faith in the stories still. The morning of September 11th in 2001 changed possibilities of democracy. The look-at-China wonderment an American president from a privileged stereotype into an is perpetuated by a section of our academic and political class original action hero. In 2008, long before race was a frenzied dazzled by a gilded autocracy. The country that wanted to be the dispute in the street and in the public square, an African sole author of the so-called Asian Century was in a permanent American, a freshman Senator, became the reconciler president mode of disruption-and-diffusion in its relationship with India, on the strength of his stump poetry of change.