Power Without Principle: How India Is Undermining Itself
Power Without Principle: How India Is Undermining Itself
When a Bangladeshi cricketer is
legally bought in an open Indian Premier League auction, only to be later
forced out because the prime minister throws a political tantrum, and when
Indian players theatrically refuse to shake hands with Pakistani players on
international grounds, the problem is no longer sport. The problem is that
India is being run by a leadership with the emotional maturity of a child and
the power of a state.
These are not misunderstandings.
These are not protocol issues. These are the consequences of a nation bending
to the impulses of a man driven by resentment, hatred, and the need to
constantly divide.
The Board of Control for Cricket
in India exposed itself completely in the Bangladesh player episode. The player
entered the IPL auction legally. A franchise bid for him legally. Contracts
were signed legally. And then, under political pressure, the BCCI forced the
team to abandon him. Not because of rules. Not because of the law. But because
the government could not tolerate the presence of a Bangladeshi player without
triggering manufactured outrage. This was not an administration. This was a submission.
The BCCI behaved like a
frightened servant, not a governing body. It humiliated a player. It humiliated
Bangladesh. And it humiliated India. All to appease a prime minister whose
politics cannot function without an enemy to hate.
The refusal of Indian players to
shake hands with Pakistani players belongs to the same category of childish
behavior. This was not courage. It was not patriotism. It was playground spite
dressed up as nationalism. International sport runs on discipline and protocol.
Only insecure regimes turn handshakes into headlines.
Cricket in India has now been
reduced to a stage for political theatrics.
Blocking Bangladeshi
participation after a legal auction and encouraging public snubs of Pakistani
players serve no strategic purpose. They do not weaken Pakistan. They do not
strengthen India. They do not improve security. They only normalize humiliation
as state behavior. When athletes are turned into props for political ego, the
nation they represent looks unstable, not powerful.
This pattern becomes impossible
to ignore when it aligns perfectly with election cycles.
Whenever governance failures
become too obvious, economic stress, unemployment, collapsing institutions, terrorism
accusations against Pakistan suddenly dominate public discourse. This timing is
never accidental. Fear is the last refuge of governments that have run out of
ideas. When roads crumble, jobs vanish, and inequality explodes, distraction
becomes policy.
Accusing Pakistan of terrorism
may satisfy a captive domestic audience conditioned on outrage, but
internationally, it sounds empty when paired with tantrums instead of evidence.
Repeating an accusation does not make it true. Shouting does not make it
credible. The world notices when allegations peak exactly when votes are
needed. The Bangladesh episode only compounds the embarrassment.
When Bangladesh hesitates to send
its team to India after watching one of its players publicly discarded, the
response is not reassurance or diplomacy but pressure and threat. The
involvement of the International Cricket Council, whose leadership is
politically entangled with India’s ruling establishment, confirms what many
already believe: institutions meant to be neutral have been captured and
weaponized. This is not leadership. It is bullying disguised as governance. The
root of this behavior lies at the top.
India today is governed by an
ideology that replaces policy with prejudice and reason with rage. Under Narendra
Modi, the state increasingly behaves like a resentful adolescent reactive,
vindictive, and incapable of restraint. Division is not a side effect of this
leadership. It is its fuel. Religion is used not to unite, but to provoke. Not
to govern, but to control.
This is the exact opposite of
what once made India strong.
Mahatma Gandhi understood that a
nation fractured by exclusion and hierarchy could never be sovereign in spirit.
His struggle against untouchability was not symbolic; it was a strategy. He
weakened imperial power by exposing its moral emptiness. Today, India’s
leadership embraces that emptiness. Moral clarity has been replaced by
cynicism.
Untouchability has returned in
modern forms, shaping economic opportunity, political loyalty, and social
worth. Science is pushed aside. Education is diluted. Myth replaces evidence. A
nation governed by emotion over reason cannot compete globally, no matter how
loudly it chants nationalism. Power in India is now transactional.
Public wealth is funneled to a
select few. Institutions are hollowed out. Bureaucrats comply out of fear.
Opposition leaders remain silent because vulnerability is universal. When
arrests become instruments of intimidation rather than justice, democracy becomes
a decorative shell.
Internationally, this weakness is
obvious. Compromised leadership invites pressure. Sovereignty becomes
conditional. Respect evaporates. What makes this collapse even more damning is
that it is not inevitable.
The Bharatiya Janata Party does
not govern with an absolute majority. This government survives because two men
choose to keep it alive. N. Chandrababu Naidu and Nitish Kumar have the numbers
to end this government tomorrow. They refuse to do so. Their silence is not
stability. It is self-interest.
By choosing personal gain over
constitutional responsibility, they enable the continued erosion of India’s
institutions. This is what a system for sale looks like: where democratic power
exists but is deliberately unused because loyalty has been purchased.
Strong nations are not run on
tantrums. They do not bully neighbors through sport. They do not turn
handshakes into propaganda. They do not allow institutions to collapse to
protect one man’s ego. India is doing all of this.
By surrendering governance to
rage, cricket to politics, and institutions to fear, India is trading long-term
strength for short-term applause. Power without principle does not survive. It
decays. And the world is watching.
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