Ghulam Nabi Azad recently praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for not having forgotten his humble beginnings.As a student of culture, I have some questions to ask of Azad sahib here. Although, before I ask my questions, his averment about Narendra Modi at once calls to my mind the image of a wall that was quickly erected to conceal slum dwellers in Ahmedabad from the then visiting US President Donald Trump.For precisely this reason, I am unable to square Modi’s alleged candour about his humble beginnings with that rather insulting action of hiding away humble people from a visiting VIP’s gaze. I cannot understand why we should have been embarrassed to let them be as they in reality are.So why do we think it is laudable for a person in high office not to “hide” his humble beginnings?There is more than one possible answer to this. It can be that the memory of humble origins helps keep an element of empathy alive in the person who now commands the strings of high power, thus inspiring him to frame policies directed primarily at uplifting millions who continue to be suffering their humbleness.But, it can also be that the great man’s recall of his own humbleness functions as a grim reminder that he must, at all costs, prevent his slide into humbleness again.Of the second possibility first: at least three figures of unchallenged authority in modern history that I can recall presto had beginnings even more humble than Modi might have had, namely, Napoleon, Mussolini, and Stalin (Hitler may have been a shade better placed) and yet, consider where their policies got us. Beginning as a source of great radical hope for the little men of Europe, Napoleon himself became emperor; Mussolini and Hitler used the humble as fodder for wars that destroyed the humble most of all; and Stalin, challenging aristocratic rule, became a law unto himself, destroying any trace of democracy.Also read: Reading Between the Lines of Narendra Modi’s Tearful Farewell to Ghulam Nabi AzadClearly, then, the humble origins of any ruler need not imply that, once in the seat of power, his or her heart would bleed for the humble.Indeed, the popular cultural imaging of any humble person hemmed in by historical disadvantages, within modern capitalist societies, tends to showcase stray individuals who struggled against the odds of the system to make it big. Such examples are often foregrounded with great instruction by corporate media channels to inform us that robust individualism is the true answer to penury, and how the humble must learn not to depend on the bounties of the state-system. In any rightwing middle-class household, such images form the bedrock of advancement in general, propagating the virtues of private initiative over progressive social governance.On the first possibility, I must confess, no example comes to mind of anyone who rose to the political heights that Modi has, from humble beginnings and then set about managing the assets of the realm primarily to raise other humble people to human status.Modi’s career here, of course, will be better evaluated by historians, but, here is what I would like Azad sahib to tell us: is it his view that Modi ji’s memory of his humble origins has produced a governance system in the last seven years that has lifted the humble Indian to the detriment of the fat cats?And if he thinks it has, why should then he also say that whereas he lauds Modi ji for not hiding his origins, he remains opposed to the party that Modi ji belongs to?Senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad speaks in the Rajya Sabha during the Budget Session of Parliament, in New Delhi, Tuesday, February 4, 2020. Photo: PTIThe record would show that he does not think Modi ji has done great things for the humble. Or else why would we hear that constant refrain of how the Modi dispensation has worked blatantly to the welfare of the Adanis, Ambanis and of the corporate class overall? And if that is the truth, in what way, we may ask, has Modi ji’s acknowledgement of his own early modesty of life helped to better the lives of many millions who remain sunk in humbleness of destitute proportions?There are two things one can do with a ladder: climb and help others to climb. Or, climb alone, a step at a time, and kick the ladder once at the top so that others may not be able to climb. Time will tell which of these paradigms fits the Modi case.But, there is now a contrary paradigm too: of people who had anything but humble beginnings, but, once in the seat of power, sought to orient their thinking towards those left behind by nature and government policy.Also read: Some Observations on Prime Minister Modi’s Tears in the Rajya SabhaGandhi and Nehru come to mind immediately, as well a plethora of others who came from endowed backgrounds but immersed themselves in progressive causes, both during the freedom struggle and in independent India. They left their silver spoons behind and descended into the muck in order to clear as much of it as circumstances allowed.Who is to say then that those who left their silver spoons behind and descended – rather than rose – to cater to the humble millions may not have a better case for praise in history than those who rose, and, rather deterred by their memories of their own origins, set about to cater to their own newly-acquired greatness with zeal and self-love, as well as to support structures of wealth and social clout that enable that greatness to be bolstered and made unchallengeable?The most memorable case study of this conjecture of humbleness is that of Dickens’s enactment of Uriah Heep in the beloved novel, David Copperfield. Recall that Uriah Heep never fails to make mention of his humbleness even as he seeks to climb the next ladder to power and prominence.Humble origins, therefore, Azad sahib might consider, do not necessarily, in and of themselves, ensure any wider empathy with the humble. Indeed, more often than not, it works rather the other way to keep humbleness at an arm’s length, as does that other personage in another Dickens novel, Little Dorrit. There, one Mr Podsnap, having grown into great modern wealth from stock-jobbing, extends a great right arm to block anyone who brings news of misery from the world outside.God knows if the farmers may now have much the same feeling – of being blocked out with a great right arm.Finally, more than Azad sahib or this writer, those humble Indians who are now unable to refill their cooking gas cylinders may have the more dependable answer to the conundrum.Badri Raina taught at Delhi University.