Four days after he was officially “outed” by a Canadian minister as the prime mover in this whole unpleasant business of alleged Indian involvement in the killing of a Canadian citizen on the Canadian soil, the Indian government has rather belatedly spoken up in defence of Union home minister Amit Shah.
The Ministry of External Affairs has expectedly termed the Canadian charge as “absurd and baseless.” Our official view is that the Justin Trudeau regime is indulging in India-bashing because of its domestic political agenda. Perhaps there is substance to the Indian understanding of Canadian domestic politics. Yet, it needs to be asked why a responsible Canadian ministerial official would allow himself to “finger” Shah, that too before a parliamentary committee. If Indian officials are correctly reading Trudeau’s political and electoral calculus, then his petty domestic imperatives have already been served by the grand diplomatic hoo-ha between New Delhi and Ottawa. Naming the third most powerful political figure [ as per the latest India Today list] still does not add up. Why this extreme, precipitous step?
Could it be that the Canadian intelligence establishment has been taken in by the reputation cooked up for Amit Shah by the Indian media? Even before he moved to Delhi in 2014, a friendly Gujarati press had hailed him as the mastermind behind Chief Minister Narendra Modi’s signature political moves, within and outside the BJP. His “take-no-prisoner” approach against political rivals and allies got easily shoe-horned into the “law and order” sector. The whole Sohrabuddin/Kausar Bi caper revealed Amit Shah as an activist, hands-on home minister. Along with chief minister Modi, home minister Amit Shah was serenaded for ridding Gujarat of all those difficult “underworld figures” who had supposedly prospered over the years because of “appeasement” politics. In the post-9/11 “global war on terrorism”, there was subtle appreciation for all those police and political officials who were prepared to employ unorthodox methods against the presumed “jihadis.”
All these “facts” probably figured in the profile of Amit Shah that the Canadians had compiled, as a matter of routine, of an up and coming Indian politician. The profile had to be necessarily updated and nuanced when he moved to Delhi in 2014 to work as Modi’s empowered consigliere. A fawning media ramped up his reputation as a new Chanakaya in the BJP as the ruling party rewrote the rules of political engagement with domestic rivals. “Naya Bharat” was not to be constrained by the old, conventional political morality of the Vajpayee era.
The Canadians must have surely revised Amit Shah’s profile when Prime Minister Modi allotted him the corner office in North Block in 2019. A servile media showered him with encomiums when he “did away” with Article 370. Amit Shah’s reputation as a man who did not care for any norms or conventions or traditions was now cast in stone. Journalists vied with each other to manufacture his image as a man who not only had the complete confidence of his boss but who believes that “power” must be used to consolidate and entrench oneself. Strategy and tactics came naturally to him; he was always in his zone. The media was in thrall of Shah; even our judges and generals and bureaucrats fell for this exaggerated image of a consummate power player. The Canadians, and most probably their big brothers in Washington too, could not be impervious to this concocted portrait.
Perhaps Canadian diplomats stationed in New Delhi also heard from serving and retired Indian police officers praising Amit Shah as the boss who was unafraid of the consequences, however unpleasant, if a course of action was deemed to be in the “national interest.” Senior police officers came away impressed with his determined eagerness to move beyond conventional “dos and don’ts” of the lawful exercise of authority. He was definitely not a man who would allow himself to be dissuaded from going after an “enemy” by some ‘Western’ notions of accountability and statesmanship. Here was a man of certainties and convictions, a man who knew what he believed and what he was doing. Policemen, bureaucrats, foreign service-wallahs, and generals found him a refreshing contrast to all his predecessors who allowed themselves to be hobbled by bureaucratic rules and by considerations of political fair-play. This admiration must have wafted into the ears of Delhi-based Canadian diplomats.
The Canadian intelligence establishment can be excused for locating in Amit Shah’s political DNA an appetite for risk and recklessness. Does this mean he would be so reckless as to get involved in “encounters” on Canadian soil? Notwithstanding Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s campaign-time hyperbole that “ye naya Bharat dushman ko ghar me ghoos kar marta hai”[ the new India goes after its enemies in their homes], Indian constitutional arrangements stand in the way, as does our collective aversion to any kind of “rogue” exercise of power at home or abroad. All spy agencies across the world know the limits of New Delhi’s coercive power outside of India.
So far, the Canadians have not produced a smoking gun to back their allegations against Amit Shah, which have inadvertently enhanced his reputation as a man not to be easily trifled with. Until and unless they do so, the mystery of why the intelligence and political bosses in Ottawa pointed a finger at him will remain.
Whatever the truth of the matter, this very public diplomatic spat should serve as a reminder to everyone that Deng Xiaoping’s axiom, “Hide your strength, bide your time,” applies to New Delhi too. As an aspiring power, India will need to appreciate that over-reach is not without its consequences.
