“Socrates was a wise, Greek philosopher who walked around giving advice to people. They poisoned him.” We do hate people and politicians who philosophise and the bile raised by Rahul Gandhi’s speech at the Confederation of Indian Industries in New Delhi last week, re-emphasises the point.
The Gujarat chief minister Mr Narendra Modi, it seems, does not like honeybees. Otherwise, why would he feel so insulted by the Congress Vice President’s analogy that India is less like an elephant and more like a beehive? Indeed, Mr Modi seems to have felt, judging by newspaper reports on Sunday, that the comment was an insult to the nation and made by someone who is ‘ignorant of the culture and traditions of the country’ (sic).
With neither newspapers nor TV channels bothering to ask him to elaborate, one can only speculate over what he could possibly have meant. Perhaps he thought that any comparison of the country with what essentially are “pests” and “insects” could only be ‘insulting’ and, therefore, dismissed with contempt?
His reaction provides a fascinating insight into the mind of the person who wants so hard to occupy the chair of the Prime Minister.
Other reactions have been more nuanced. A stinging satire points out that the poor bees, like poor Indians, work very hard but only to see the fruits of their toil taken away by others. But that only reinforced the imagery of India as a beehive, and not an elephant.
Indeed people are entitled to see the beehive in different ways. Ramchandra Guha focuses on the queen bee and makes the point that beehives collapse when the queen bees collapse. Not entirely true. Queen bees are routinely replaced and new hives routinely ‘elect’ new queen bees. The extraordinary thing is that it is always a ‘queen’, never a ‘king’--something that can make some people wonder and see a form of gender empowerment while others dismiss it as of no consequence.
The beehive has fascinated thinkers and writers for centuries. Indeed, when we were in school, it was not uncommon to be asked to write an essay on ‘bees’. They were said to be extraordinarily disciplined, energetic and loyal to the hive. There were lessons to be learnt from them.
As recently as in 2010, a book written by an Associate Professor in Columbia School of Business, Michael O’Malley, on the wisdom of bees caused a sensation in academic circles. A beekeeper also of long standing, O’Malley pointed out that beehives have survived for over a million years and provide an excellent example of sustained productivity and efficiency. They have survived because the bees work both individually and collectively; they have survived because the bees know that their survival depends on the hives and on each other; they have also survived because they learnt to reward merit, divide labour and take risks.
The beehive is a complicated structure and cannot be made everywhere. The bees generally prefer the cavities in trees but they need to ensure it would have the capacity to hold 25 to 40 litres of honey. There are scout bees, whose job is to scout for the best places to make a hive. There are assessors who then check out, debate and decide on the best possible place. The hive is then made painstakingly by the collective effort of the bees.
There is division of labour and while some bees forage for pollen, others stay back to repair the hives and to protect it. Once the hives become too big, the bees split and make a separate hive. The roles are clearly defined and there is constant training of the young by the more seasoned bees on the best ways of collecting pollen.
Reviewing O’Malley’s book in the Harvard Business Review, a Biology Professor from Cornell, Thomas Seeley, wrote, “ One of the popular misconceptions about honey bees is that their lives are ruled by a queen… (in fact) honey bees stake everything on a process that includes collective fact-finding, vigorous debate and consensus building. It is a democratic process that humans might do well to emulate.”
The book triggered a spate of reviews with academics and business leaders acknowledging the shared interest and mutual respect that bees have for each other; and the diverse solutions that they constantly come up with. They make their choices quickly and execute them competently. What is more, the honeybees work for their future, a stable future.
The Congress Vice President can certainly be accused of over-simplifying things. Or, critics might say that the bees do the same monotonous work at the cost of their individuality, that the hives are examples of dictatorial structures in which a section seemingly does nothing.
But what is so insulting about the analogy ? Will Mr Modi please throw some light ?
It is also a reflection on us and the media that we have spent so much time and energy discussing the “beehive” analogy and the “Rani ki Jhansi” slip in the speech, which also made the following points :
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- The poor have no time to crib. They are desperately poor and yet are optimistic while those who are much better off are forever complaining.
- The poor are often unemployable because they lack the necessary skills.
- The country must facilitate the movement of people by ways of faster transport, better roads and ports.
- Industry-education interface requires to become stronger
- Education and training must have some relation with actual work.
- Empowerment must be done smoothly, with harmony and it must be inclusive.
- The UPA is committed to the right to work, right to education, the right to food and a right to identity.
- Changes in India, be it the Green Revolution or the IT Revolution, have been exponential and not incremental. And that is why the UPA is trying for radical changes.
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Nothing earth shattering, one agrees. But there is little to be disdainful and dismissive either.
Significantly, Rahul Gandhi also said something that Narendra Modi repeated on Monday at FICCI : that the government alone cannot create jobs; that it can only facilitate the conditions for creating jobs. Both cited endeavours of common people--Indu Behn and Jassu Behn by Modi and Girish, the painter, by Gandhi—to buttress their points.
Just one other point. When Rahul Gandhi spoke of his 36-hour train journey in a general compartment from Gorakhpur to Mumbai " a few years ago", one tried in vain to recall the ‘event’. For any other politician, it would have been difficult to resist the temptation to invite the media and make a spectacle of it, create a buzz and cash in on it. That this man did nothing of the sort, may reflect his political naïveté. But are we not grateful for such small mercies ?
