New Delhi: A large section of the Indian media routinely seeks to portray every serious political debate as a street fight between the ruling party and the opposition. In the process, the moot issue dissolves into the background. To a largely impressionable audience, significant political discussions appear as slugfests between the political classes, effectively diluting the severity of the concerns that led to such a debate in the first place.Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s speech in the Lok Sabha on February 2, 2022, that touched upon at least three consequential criticisms of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government at the Union government drew similar responses from the big media. It chose to give prominence to the ruling party leaders attacking and ridiculing the Congress leader instead of reporting on the parliament’s Motion of Thanks debate in which Gandhi made his far-reaching remarks. Gandhi, in fact, drew attention to three crucial problems India has been grappling with at the current moment – rising unemployment, strategic failures to corner China and Pakistan, and an unprecedented attack on the country’s institutional framework. These are concerns that every opposition political party and scores of civil society groups have been pin-pointing and on which they have failed to draw a convincing response from the Union government. In that sense, Gandhi’s remarks were not new. Over the last few years, he has been drawing attention to these issues consistently at various platforms, and each time he has done that, the media has sought to deflect the debate towards flippant attacks on him by BJP ministers and leaders. Wednesday was no different as immediately after Gandhi’s speech, the media turned it into a contest between political ranks, aiding and abetting the right-wing handles on social media who began an orchestrated campaign against him by trending the hashtags #pappu and RahulGandhi_Jawab_Do.Also read: If Rahul Gandhi Were Really Irrelevant, the BJP Wouldn’t Need to Attack Him SoThe familiarity of such gimmicks have become so banal that they have lost even their entertainment value, while they seek to cover up failures and misdemeanours of the BJP-led government.What Gandhi, and earlier many other opposition leaders, are attempting to bring to the forefront are issues that demand serious attention. Growing unemployment is the single-most important socio-economic issue in India currently, and is desperately crying for viable solutions. In Uttar Pradesh, which is headed for an assembly election soon, even core BJP voters speak about why the governments should prioritise the need to generate jobs. Currently, UP’s unemployment rate is somewhere around 4.9%, up from around 2% a few years ago. High as it may sound, several economists have also pointed out that even the current figure is a gross underestimation.Gandhi made a few points on the problem of unemployment.In 2021, around three crores people lost their jobs.India is currently facing the highest unemployment rate in over 50 years.Manufacturing sector jobs witnessed a 46% drop since 2014. Unorganised sector which generates the maximum jobs has collapsed because of the Union government’s allegedly flawed moves like demonetisation, erratic GST regime, and lack of support from the government during the pandemic. The Union government, according to Gandhi, has encouraged cronyism and handed over much of the formal sector to two players “Ambani and Adani”, paving a way for monopolisation. Finally, medium and small enterprises (MSMEs), the biggest employer of all sectors, are on the verge of collapse because of the government’s cronyism. In a sharp attack on the government, he questioned why the recent Union budget makes no mention of the problem of growing joblessness, and pointed at the growing inequality levels in India. “Today, the richest 100 people in India have more income than 55 crore Indians. The 10 richest Indians have cornered more than 40% of India’s wealth,” he said, asserting that the ground reality of India’s job situation is in complete contrast to the Prime Minister’s big announcements like “New India”, “Start-Up India” or “Make In India”. Daily-wage workers in Mumbai. Photo: Reuters/FilesAttack on India’s ‘institutional framework’ The Wayanad MP then went on to allege that the BJP-led government has launched a frontal attack on the idea of Indian union of states that has put in place a federal structure with significant checks and balances. He said that the Modi government has consistently turned a blind eye to the demands of various states, and demanded a discussion over the issue in the parliament. “There are two visions of this country. One vision, that it is a Union of States; meaning, it is a negotiation, meaning, it is a conversation; meaning, I go to my brother in Tamil Nadu and say, what do you want and he says, this is what I want and then he asks me, what do you want and I say, this is what I want. It is a partnership. It is not a kingdom,” he said.Alleging that the BJP and its ideological parent RSS believe in a different vision, one that “India can be ruled by a stick from the Centre”, what Gandhi called “a centralising vision, the vision of a king, the idea of a king, which the Congress removed in 1947.” Gandhi charged the Modi government of compromising India’s democratic ideals in its thirst for power. “A particular organisation,” Gandhi said referring to the BJP, “has captured the institutional framework of the country and is attacking the voice of the different states of this country.” He went on to allege how different institutions like the Election Commission of India, judiciary, security agencies are being misused against opposition leaders and critical citizens by the ruling dispensation to impose a monarchy-like framework in India. Attacking the Union government for allegedly using the spyware Pegasus on Indian politicians and citizens, the Congress leader said, “When the Prime Minister personally goes to Israel and authorises the use of Pegasus in India, he is attacking the people of Tamil Nadu, he is attacking the people of Assam, he is attacking the people of Kerala, he is attacking the people of Bengal.”Also read: Transcript: India’s 2017 Pegasus Deal With Israel Involved Top Intel LeadersFailures on the diplomatic frontHe went on to say that India under Modi has made disastrous strategic mistakes, one of which has been to unite Pakistan and China against India. “…the single biggest strategic goal of India’s foreign policy has been to keep Pakistan and China separate. This is fundamental for India and what you have done is, you have brought them together.”As he ended his speech, he said, “…my understanding is that the RSS [Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the BJP’s ideological fountainhead] and the BJP are playing with the foundations of our country and they are weakening the foundations of our country. They are weakening the links between our people. They are weakening the links between our languages.”“The nation is now at risk. The nation is at risk. The nation is at risk from outside. The nation is at risk from inside,” he said. Naturally, no party in power will entirely agree to such a scathing opposition attack. The ruling BJP is also expected to give the opposition a solid response to such criticisms. As a Congress politician himself, Gandhi contrasted the United Progressive Alliance’s rule with that of the National Democratic Alliance’s when he said that the UPA brought around 27 crore people out of the shackles of poverty, while alleging that the Modi government pushed 23 crore people below the poverty line. One can easily see that Gandhi, in bringing livelihood and ideological issues to the forefront, was also attempting to build a political narrative against the BJP. What was expected of the Union government was a solid retort to such accusations. That would have also indicated that a healthy parliamentary framework is still up and alive.However, one only wonders what among Gandhi’s pointers prodded the BJP leaders and their supporters to kickstart a campaign mocking the Congress leader. A minister in Narendra Modi’s cabinet Prahlad Joshi went on to say that “Gandhi has lost his mind…”, and that he is “confused”.As if such a response was not unparliamentary enough, Gandhi’s speech elicited a more fatuous remark from the BJP’s Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sharma. “Those who feed biscuits to dogs in presence of Assam leaders, then offer the same to them should be the last to speak about political decency,” he said on Twitter, referring to Gandhi’s remark. Amidst the din of such undignified responses from the ruling party leaders, only the Union minister of external affairs, S. Jaishankar took the responsibility of responding to the opposition leader’s remarks with seriousness. Jaishankar highlighted incidents and events that showed that China and Pakistan have always had close ties, and that the Modi government cannot be singularly blamed for bringing them closer as Gandhi alleged. Barring him, not even one BJP leader thought it fit to give informed responses to the opposition leader, and directly or indirectly encouraged the witlessly orchestrated campaign against him – an exercise that only ended up emboldening Gandhi’s allegations and arguments.