Former Gujarat MLA Purnesh Modi, who filed a case against Gandhi for tarnishing all Modis at a public rally four years ago, wants Gandhi to repent, ideally from jail and/or by writing ‘I will not insult non-Gandhi surnames’ 10,000 times on the blackboard. Ranjit Savarkar, chairman of Swatantryaveer Savarkar Rashtriya Smarak (variously described in the media as Veer Savarkar’s grand-nephew and grandson), wants the politically incorrect politician to apologise for besmirching the reputation of his grandfather/grand-uncle, or else…
Poor Uddhav Thackeray (no relation of William Makepeace Thackeray) has now been put in a spot for being part of an alliance whose resident motormouth is giving arch rival Eknath Shinde (of the same Maratha clan as the Scindias) much mirch, mirth and ammunition.
An apology from Gandhi would really help Thackeray’s currently sagging Hindutva street cred. He could then suggest it was he who leaned heavily on the Congressman to get an apology out of him. Right now, the Maharashtra chief minister has the upper hand, stating that he wants Gandhi to go to not any jail for his Savarkar statement, but sent to the Cellular Jail in the Andamans. This would mean re-operationalising the since-1979 national memorial as a prison.
Even the Mumbai Press Club has been unapologetically strident and wants Gandhi to apologise for ‘publicly humiliating’ a journalist at a press conference. Gandhi had called the reporter ‘working directly for the BJP,’ which has set off its own set of (job) enquiries. How this demand for an apology goes is being followed with great interest by those who have been on the wrong end of a question-answer session with Kangana Ranaut or Jose Mourinho. They hope some kind of precedent will be set.
But mincing the most chilling words in Hindi film history – ‘Mera naam hai Crime Master Gogo. Aankhen nikal ke gotiyan khelta hoon’ (My name is Crime Master Gogo. I take out eyes and play marbles with them) from Andaaz Apna Apna – Gandhi said last weekend, ‘My name is Gandhi. Gandhis doesn’t apologise to anyone.’ That is not technically correct. Gopalkrishna Gandhi, former West Bengal governor had, in his capacity as a columnist, apologised to me once. I’ve forgotten whether it was for sending me an unsolicited article or for not being able to write one I had solicited.
But forget the Gandhi and Gandhis for now. The apology itself holds so much potential that to not use it liberally, even lavishly, is to withhold its true capabilities. Coming from the opposite end of the spectrum of Rahul Gandhi, I have not hesitated to apologise at the drop of a hat, whether warranted or not. If there’s a crash in the next room, I apologise for any breakage. I even pre-empt remorse by saying sorry before causing any upset.For one, it saves a lot of trouble – ‘I am sorry’ sounding far better than ‘This is not what it looks like’. For another, incessant sorry-dropping actually lowers the value of the apology, the same way the huge influx of silver from South America caused serious inflation in 16th century Spain.
This is essentially – oh, that overused, jaded verb – weaponising the apology. While the market still dictates that a sorry is to be taken at face value, the sorry-splurger holds it as a counterfeit, thereby creating an unlimited personal currency boom. Like airline stewardesses and TV anchors stripping the smile of any real value, the lavish apologiser, too, knows ‘sorry’ for what it is: a lubricant.
I had promised myself that I would not drag in that – oh yes, overused and jaded again – line from Eric Segal’s 1970 novel, Love Story: ‘Love means never having to say you’re sorry.’ But Rahul Gandhi’s may well be a love story after all. An unrequited one.
No? Too forced? Too convoluted? Oh well then. Sorry.