Cuteathetic new party wannabes

I've discovered a new genre of public behaviour that's all the rage: cute-pathetic a.k.a. cuteathetic. Longer than the lines of people leaving India to return to Bangladesh because they can't provide relevant documents to avoid the new Bengal government's policy to 'detect, delete, deport' illegal immigrants, is the line of low and mid-level TMC workers knocking on BJP's door. It's only a matter of time when their higher-ups, too, will be sidling up to the newest bossmen and bosswomen in town.

We've seen it before after the 2011 Bengal elections - an exodus of CPI(M) cadres scurrying into every TMC nook and cranny, and overnight turning a new double-leaf. Suddenly 'Inqilab Zindabad!' turned into 'Joy Bangla!' Which is now being effortlessly rendered into 'Jai Sri Ram!' by the very same characters. If proof of loyalty and criterion for entry is to ensure that there's no non-vegetarian food outlet in a 2 km radius near a temple that had no such problems before, these applicants will be shoving cauliflowers into meatshops and cite it in their CVs.

We've also seen it on a national scale, in a less Keystone Cops sped-up comedy show pace, of Congress workers jumping ship and clambering on to a BJP cruiser. But the latest mass morphing from Didi to Dada bhakts is breathtaking, and not in a pranayama way.


One particularly cuteathetic display has been made by TMC MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar. After resigning from all party positions this week - she cited corruption and verbal abuse from a colleague - she left a mysterious comment on BJP worker Keya Ghosh's Facebook post that had listed TMC workers, including Ghosh Dastidar, quitting party posts: 'Kaemon achho go?'

In plain English, 'Kaemon achho go?' translates to 'How are you, dear?' But with the addition of 'go' (no relation to cow), the level of affectation and melodrama couched in that monosyllabic, open-vowelled Sanskritised Bengali word breached radioactive 'neka' levels last reached by Aishwarya Rai saying 'eesh' in Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Devdas. It's as clear as Clint Eastwood is not gay that Ghosh Dastidar wants Ghosh (no relation, and with whom she has never exchanged pleasantries) as her BFF entry into BJP.

When a politician plans to cross the floor - from red to blue, left to right, socialist to national socialist - he or she doesn't merely swap jerseys. The person burns the old one in public, dances on the ashes, and then for good measure blames it for all that plagues the world, his or her own potential redundancy included. The born-again new-party zealot knows that to survive, he or she must outdo existing 'cis' workers and leaders in their own rituals and shows of fealty.

If party regulars chant 'Jai Sri Ram!' the neo-bhakt will bellow 'Jai Sri Ram!' and add 'Ram naam satya hai!' to boot. If Missionaries of Charity were to win the next assembly elections, the same lot would be shouting 'Mother, Mary, Manush!' The job in hand is to prove that the V-turn is no appropriation, but resolution to a long game that must - 'please! please!' - end in true homecoming.

The switcher becomes the loudest cheerleader, most aggressive defender, most enthusiastic executor of party do's and don'ts so as to gain entry for the sheer purpose of 'survival'. Unlike actors and singers the earlier dispensation had roped in, the vast majority of cadres don't have a clue about anything else than 'cadre-ing' (read: make a living off what the ruling party wants them to do). The sheer horror of spending the rest of their days without extracting whatever being on the side of power allows one to extract will lead them to do things you wouldn't want your ex-boss to do in your most twisted daydreams.

To make it sound remotely respectable - by calling it, say, 'political arbitrage'- would be cuteathetic by itself. The craven desperation of the suddenly power-starved, wannabe-born-again ruling party worker is a terrible thing to behold. Although, harbouring a dash of saccharine 'nekami' myself, I can't help but feel a bit sorry for this cuteathetic lot. That is, until I slap myself hard, or the new bosses let these flying roaches in - whichever happens first.