If words were deeds,
And catch-phrases files,
If sophistry were argument,
And achievement intent,
The strong man with fifty-
Six inch starched frontispiece
Has indeed fulfilled every
Bharti's needs to heart's content.
How the prices of quotidian
Eatables have been smashed,
How bushels of wealth are stashed
In swelling jandhan ledgers,
Cunning marvels of zero treasures,
How hungry pockets have been
Stuffed with moolah from
The Black trough of money bags
Who may now rue making
A rain of their smart earnings
To fuel a feisty-false campaign
Destined for u-turn churnings.
Not to speak of peasants and farms
Whom now the charms of smart-city
Development teach a needed lesson
Of national interest sans
Weak-kneed sentiment or pity.
More: at last, the namby pamby
Congress has been shown
How mightily a so-strong man
Can impress the uppity enemy
Across the border, and make
Fearsome sally for the anti-nationals
Who stain the valley with flags
And banners inimical to good manners.
Lesser neighbours are askance
That they should never have
Been told what a colossus is
Bharat, hitherto so badly undersold.
Even the Dragon, always chuckling
In poker-faced scorn, now
Knows a new slayer is born.
And, poor Obama, what noises
He still might make under press
Of our indigenous “others”
Is crestfallen to see how the new
Global numero uno couldn't care less.
If words were deeds, and
Catch-phrases employers, India
Is now awash with jobs,
Saturated with manufacturing hubs,
Exporting alredy apocalyptic tubs
Of made-in-India marvels,
Raising growth several notches
A day—a miracle that snubs
Foreign investors who will not
Offer to fill our welcoming coffer.
If words were deeds, then allocations
To health and education have
Not been cut but, however you
May rebut with fact and figure,
Enhanced beyond imagination.
If words were deeds, our
Religious and other minorities
Never had it so good: so even
Is now vikas that their nightmares
Need no longer be understood;
So when an employer writes to say
Sorry “non-Muslims only” such
Discrimination need not be seen
As doing dirt on the Constitution.
Or, when a Dalit citizen is kindly
Murdered in the same saffron-ruled
State for sporting a ringtone with
Ambedkar song, this is merely
An instance of sanaatan normalcy—
Stabilising traditions which the
Rationalists have sullied over
Six-long decades with anti-upper
Caste Hindu venom,—a secular plot
To neuter sanaatan dharam.
If words were deeds, such aberrations
Are mere media creations, a fleabite
Here or there which the great leader
Cannot allow to make murky his sight
Of the conquests he must make
Of Indians and celebrities abroad
For super-powerdom sake.
If words were deeds, our democracy
Is everyday so bolstered by one
Unquetionable man's decree;
All minions now in proper place,
All channels full of one insistent face;
This land which knew only scams
And skullduggery till a year ago,
Is now, if words were deeds, leagues
Ahead in the global race—
Propelled by the approving grace
Of godmen and enemy-baiters,
No-nonsense minority haters,
Punters and smart-city waiters.
If words were deeds, India has
Won over the world in a mantra
Of megalo-mix, and there's little
Left to be done. Except never
To let on that words are not deeds,
Slogans are not successes,
Iteration is not truth,
Intimidation is not persuasion,
And insistence is not governance.
And to hammer, hammer, hammer
The read that those alone succeed
Who in relentless sing-song feed
The word that, indeed, they
Alone succeed who say “we
Succeed, succeed, succeed. Succeed.”