The pot and the kettle

The pot calling the kettle black is an established idiom. Known to have Spanish origins, the phrase came into English usage in the 17th century with Thomas Shelton’s translation of Miguel de Cervantes’ novel, where his maverick character, Don Quixote, is getting the rough edge of words from his Man Friday, Sancho Panza. There are other less-used phrases that convey the same sense, like “Do not ascribe to your fellow your own blemish.”

Despite the pot calling the kettle black having racist overtones, it would likely suit India, with its obsession with fair skin and, most of all, its politicians, very well. The pot-kettle comparison seems to perfectly embody the hypocrisy when members of different political parties hurl accusations at each other.

Recently, Dheeraj Sahu, a Rajya Sabha Congress MP, was found with a stash of cash amounting to Rs 351 crore in IT raids conducted across three states. One can only speculate if this MP would be using an abacus to count his money.

Needless to say, senior members of the BJP, including the Prime Minister, wasted no time or minced words in referring to this mind-boggling figure as a money heist. Clearly, all who made the accusation were suffering from a serious lapse in memory. One can only look back to the time when the JDS-Congress government in Karnataka and the Maha Vikas Agadi in Maharashtra were toppled to make way for a BJP or a BJP coalition government in these two states.

Even assuming that the politicians of the JDS, Congress, and Shiv Sena merrily skipped over to the other side, even without the offer of cash incentives and maybe with the threat of the Damocles’ sword-wielding CBI, there was enough press coverage to know that resort politics was the order of the day, just before these governments fell. One would like to know from which ‘heist” the cash to transfer these MLAs from one five-star hotel or resort to another and the air fares to pay for their travel came? Did the people who now question the present Karnataka government for the free bus fares for women ask these questions of their elected representatives then? How can an MLA whom you voted for because he belonged to a certain party defect to another and have the gumption to ask you to vote for him when he is now representing the opposing party in the by-polls? Is that also not some kind of “heist” of your vote?

Even more ironic is how all Covid protocols came into force only after the Madhya Pradesh government was toppled in March 2020 with the defection of Jyotiraditya Scindia and 22 of his supporters from the Congress. It is left to the public to ask whether the Covid management would have been better had the Union government not given this change of guard in MP greater importance. Isn’t the loss of health and lives a kind of “heist” ?

While nobody is offering any excuses for Dheeraj Sahu, at least one is getting to see the cash stash. How come nobody is allowed to use RTI to inquire about the hush-hush electoral bonds or even the accounting of the PMCARES Fund? Under the newly amended criminal laws, it looks as if even enquiring about these accounts will land you a jail term with the label of anti-national. Isn’t the stifling of voices a “heist” of a constitutional right? It feels like a schizophrenic state when you are asking yourself, “Am I a nationalist or anti-national?”

The sad thing is that this double standard seems to have entered Parliament too. One set of MPs can be suspended or expelled from Parliament, while another lot can sit pretty, even after using the most unparliamentary language. The recent incursion into Parliament by miscreants seems to be occupying reams of newspaper space and also video coverage. Balance this with the coverage of other important issues raised in Parliament, and the Fourth Estate seems to be found wanting, again a “heist” of the people’s trust and dependence on them for authentic information.

With all these pot-kettle exchanges, one must hark back to the St. James’ version of the Bible, which says it so well:

“And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, let me pull out the mote out of thine eye, and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to
cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.”

(The author is an independent writer)