Whether anyone likes it or not, the fact of the matter is that India has started having a bit of an image problem which if not addressed—not through controlled media or self-serving propaganda, but organically—will become a huge stumbling block in India’s rise. Admittedly the image of any country is a stereotype, a sort of dumbed-down snapshot of the country. For instance, notwithstanding all the reports of rising “white nationalism” in the US, it isn’t as though rednecks are running amok all over the country. Similarly, it isn’t quite as though the cow vigilantes and lynch mobs are running riot all over India. Nevertheless, the stereotypes colour perceptions, and plays a role in the formulation of policies and attitudes of other leaders and peoples of countries. This, in turn, impacts on business and investment decisions.

Until the economic reforms of the 1990s, India’s image was that of a sanctimonious if also hypocritical country that punched far below its weight, defended all the lost causes of the world, never quite seemed to fulfil the potential it was supposed to possess, and which was known more for being the land of spirituality and snake charmers than for anything else. But it was also feted as the largest democracy—a remarkable achievement by any and every standard.

Post the economic reforms, India was rediscovered and the narrative on India changed completely. It was suddenly being seen as an exciting economy which no global company could afford to ignore. India became known more for its geeks and techies rather than its gurus and thaumaturgy. The West discovered virtues in Indians’ culture, work ethics, industriousness, entrepreneurial skills, family values and what have you that even we didn’t know about. India was held up as a shining political and cultural example of a mind-bogglingly pluralistic country in which virtually no Muslim was attracted to al-Qaeda or any other international jihadist group. Indian soft power—yoga, movies, music, cuisine—was the toast of the town.

But over the last few years, this positive image has started fraying. Some of this has to do with the media which is often hostile to and prejudiced against the Modi government. Blaming it all on bad press would, however, tantamount to the worst sort of denial of how much the acts of omission and commission by the government, administration and members or supporters of the ruling combined are responsible for tarnishing India’s image. Truth be told, the ruling dispensation is suffering from what has been beautifully summed up in this couplet of the Pakistani Punjabi poet Munir Niazi: Kuch shehr de log vi zaalim san, kuch sannu maran da shauq vi si (the people of the city were unsparing, but I too had a death-wish).

It is undeniable that a lot of the image issues have a lot to do with many bad things that have happened under the watch of the government, and which simply cannot and should not be brushed under the carpet. Perhaps if the government had reacted with alacrity and even-handedness to incidents of lynching, rioting, hate speeches, etc., these wouldn’t have got magnified to the extent they did. But the inaction, indifference, insensitivity and, worst of all, alleged involvement of people linked to the ruling worked to cement the stereotype that had been created about them.

Compounding the image problem is the adherence to failed and discredited voodoo economics, doubling down on pushing medieval social mores down the throats of people, antediluvian approaches to modern problems. Most of all, it was compounded by outrageous, outlandish and rather embarrassing gaffes and statements by motor-mouths within the government and outside it.

The trouble is that instead of recognising where the problem is coming from, there is a natural tendency to slip into a denial mode. Much as it would rile many people, the denial of the Hindu extremists is quite similar to the sort of “religion of peace” excuse/denial offered by Islamofascists and their apologists. While Muslim extremists project their history as one of great enlightenment and even say “to be Muslim is to be tolerant”, their mirror images on the Hindu side never tire of saying that a Hindu can never be a bigot, that intolerance is the anti-thesis of Hinduism, and to be Hindu is to be tolerant.

Well, guess what? All anyone needs to do is follow social media where, using the relative anonymity of the medium, the worst sort of hate and prejudice is spouted by all sides.

We need to recognise that the version of Hinduism that is today being flogged by its stormtroopers and flagbearers is an Abrahamised version and a grotesque distortion of the faith. Until this denial ends, India will continue to slide down the slippery slope of fanaticism. Hinduism is a faith that puts individual freedoms at the very centre of its philosophy, so much so that every individual has the liberty to choose their own God or not believe in God at all. And yet, today, a sort of uniformity and regimentation is sought to be imposed on what people should eat, what they should wear, how they should practise their religion, etc.

The problem isn’t so much with the ideological framework of the ruling dispensation. After all, the Bharatiya Janata Party and its affiliates are not unique in espousing to such a framework that is hinged on the centrality of religion and culture and seeks to revive the glory of a past era. Around the world, there are many examples of similar movements and political expressions. The image problems that India is suffering haven’t got as much to do with ideology as they have to do with the clumsiness, crassness and coarseness with which the ideology is being spread.

For instance, it is completely counter-productive to justify minority bashing as an opposition to Islamism, Islamic supremacism and separatism, and minority appeasement. The latter doesn’t get you a bad image even though it might open you to motivated allegations of Islamophobia; the former, however, does put you on the same pedestal as the Islamists.

Another example of the clumsiness of the ruling dispensation is the way they have gone about some of the things that are not just part of their ideology but also mandated by laws passed not by them but by their “secular” foes. Cow slaughter or anti-conversion laws were not passed by the BJP but by the Congress. And yet, the flak for the same has come on BJP. The reason is partly the prejudice of the media. But it is also because of the fact that instead of using the law and order machinery to implement the laws that already existed on the statute books, the BJP allowed vigilantes to run amok, thereby undermining not just the law but also the state.

Unleashing mobs or building pressure to press for certain demands is understandable if you are in the Opposition, not when you are in government. With a majority in both the Centre as well as in Uttar Pradesh, what prevented the BJP to use its legal, legislative and constitutional powers to solve the Ayodhya issue rather than fire its guns from the shoulder of the Supreme Court? It is quite likely that there will be an uproar if the BJP was to by-pass the court, but this is far better than getting lakhs of people shouting provocative and hate-filled slogans on the streets of Delhi, disrupting social harmony and societal balance.

Before we outrage over the negative image of India in the rest of the world, we would do well to ask whether in this day and age—when news and images travel at lightning speed, and fake news travels even faster—will a law passed by Parliament give India a bad image, or the sight of hate-sloganeering crowds? Will legal action against cow slaughter earn India a bad name, or a mob lynching? Does rioting over a fictional historical drama earn India a good image? Does threatening to chop the nose of an actress and no action against the man giving the “supari” improve India’s image? One could go on giving examples of things that have sullied India’s image.

That Brand India has been tarnished is undeniable. Without corrective action, this will continue to happen. Raving and ranting about it, blaming sinister plots and conjuring up conspiracy theories will not help burnish India’s image. This will only happen if we get out of the denial mode, and recognise the fact that unless we get off the slippery slope of extremism, we will end up no better than our enemy on our western border.