Source : INDIA TODAY NEWS
Across the country, a familiar political spectacle is unfolding.
Public representatives are suddenly rediscovering modesty. Official convoys are being shortened. Ceremonial excess is being trimmed. Carefully publicised images of ministers travelling with fewer vehicles—or occasionally choosing ordinary modes of transport—are being presented as evidence of democratic simplicity.
The headlines approve. Television channels replay the visuals. Social media celebrates the symbolism.
It is, of course, a welcome change. But it also raises an uncomfortable question: if such restraint is possible now, what made extravagance necessary all these years?
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We witnessed similar theatre during the Covid-19 pandemic. At a time when citizens were asked to endure restrictions, uncertainty and sacrifice for the collective good, occasional displays of official austerity were amplified as moral examples.
A politician choosing an ordinary ride for a day became front-page proof of “leadership by example”.
Yet the deeper question persists:
Why is democratic simplicity treated as spectacle instead of being accepted as a way of life?
Why did public roads have to be cleared for endless cavalcades?
Why were traffic signals suspended, commuters delayed, and ordinary life disrupted so elected representatives could move uninterrupted in fleets of official privilege?
George Orwell observed that “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” Few lines capture democratic theatre more precisely.
Our political class often behaves as though electoral victory confers not responsibility, but royalty.
History offers a different standard.
When communal violence ravaged Noakhali in 1946, Mahatma Gandhi walked through its villages with minimal protection despite repeated official offers of special arrangements. His faith was simple: a leader’s greatest protection is the trust of the people.
Across the ideological spectrum, there were others who lived similarly. Leaders like Puchalapalli Sundarayya travelled by bicycle while serving in Parliament. Public office, for them, was a duty—not a licence for spectacle.
That ethic has largely disappeared.
Today’s politicians excel at proximity before elections. They shake hands, embrace children, and walk among crowds. But once power is secured, distance returns—physical, political and psychological.
The transformation is not accidental; it is enabled by public complicity.
Bertrand Russell wrote that “Power reveals more than it corrupts.” It reveals what society permits.
We elevate public representatives into feudal symbols. We line up to garland them, cheer their processions, and treat access to them as a privilege rather than a democratic entitlement.
Language itself changes. Familiarity gives way to deference; equality becomes ceremony.
And hierarchy does not stop with politicians. It reproduces itself in offices, institutions and homes.
A minor official expects submission from subordinates. Domestic workers may enter our homes, but are rarely invited to sit.
Bureaucratic privilege mirrors political privilege because both reflect the same social conditioning: our comfort with inequality.
This is why systemic corruption survives so easily.
Citizens complain about bribery, yet often prefer paying once to “get things done” rather than insisting institutions function lawfully. Officials demand compliance because they know compliance will come.
The problem is not merely political leadership. It is civic culture.
As William Shakespeare wrote in Julius Caesar: “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.”
So when convoys shrink, let us welcome the gesture—but not mistake symbolism for reform.
True democratic simplicity will arrive not when leaders occasionally perform modesty for cameras, but when citizens stop mistaking authority for nobility.
Until then, the shrinking convoy remains what it has often been: a passing spectacle.
And if four fingers point back at us when we raise one in accusation, perhaps that is exactly as it should be.
(Views expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author)
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SOURCE :- TIMES OF INDIA
