India’s democracy is strong under Modi, and Australia benefits

I wouldn’t set myself up as an expert on cricket and I think it’s a mistake when cricket experts pontificate on politics, especially in the extreme terms that Gideon Haigh deploys against Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Here in Australia we wouldn’t name a stadium after a living politician and there’s (understandably) little hero worship in our politics.

I wish Modi’s party included more Muslims at senior levels (just as once the Liberals here needed to include more Catholics). And the communal violence that rocked Gujarat at the beginning of Modi’s chief ministership was appalling, but lack of anticipation and police inefficiency are a more plausible explanation than orchestrated sectarian malevolence from the top.

But if Modi really is one of “the world’s great authoritarians”, as Haigh asserts, how is it that India remains almost riotously democratic, and with his party out of office in nearly half the Indian states and territories? The three hallmarks of a vigorous democracy are a free and diverse media, an independent and impartial judiciary, and free and fair elections. On all counts India passes with flying colours.

Sure, Modi and his party are currently politically dominant in Delhi – just as the Congress was for the first few decades after independence – but this is more a function of the dynastic element in Congress than any authoritarian bent in the current government.

I suspect that Modi’s real crime in the eyes of his modish Western critics is that he’s a seriously spiritual man and has ended India’s traditional non-alignment by joining the Quad.

But for Modi, Australia would not have recently concluded a trade deal giving 90 per cent of our exports tariff-free access. Surely that entitles the leader of the world’s emerging democratic superpower to a more considered political appraisal than he’s yet had from our best cricket writer.

Tony Abbott, former prime minister

Voice details

We can at least be thankful that the longer the debate about the proposed voice to parliament goes, the more transparent it’s advocates become.

Referendum working group member Marcia Langton openly submits (“Leaders’ final pitch for maximum voice”, 9/3) that it will link directly to the executive government and not just the parliament. She argues “every Australian has the right to litigate a government decision”, so what’s the problem? (A reasonable response may be to question the need for change if the opportunity already exists).

In a further display of openness, government leader in the Senate Penny Wong, in response to a question from One Nation senator Pauline Hanson on Wednesday, reinforced that the government supported the Uluru statement and its three tenets: truth-telling, treaty and voice. Fin­ally there is no doubt as to the endgame.

Kim Keogh, East Fremantle, WA

The party of Barnaby Joyce (“Powerful voice for rights for some but not others”, 8/3) has always had a sense of entitlement to pastoral and mining land at the expense of Indigenous rights. Yes, it is 2023, but let’s look at history.

Ralph Hunt openly opposed land rights for the Yolngu of the Gove Peninsula in 1971. Tim Fischer wished to apply “bucket loads of extinguishment” to native title in 1998.

At the 1997 Reconciliation Convention John Howard acknowledged “the blemishes (of this country’s) past history”. That comment and Joyce’s “well-resourced guilt campaigns” are redolent of the history wars. Yes, the voice is a racial clause, but let’s not be hypocritical. Public policy has long favoured one group, those who have arrived since 1788. The voice offers an overdue correction.

Craig Brown, Eaglehawk Neck, Tas

The No voters were accused of scaremongering when they suggested that the will of parliament, representing all citizens, could be overruled by a judicial decision in favour of a stance taken by the voice, representing approximately 3 per cent of citizens. Eminent retired judges were trotted out to proclaim the improbability of such an outcome.

Now we have the truth, with Marcia Langton declaring “advice of the voice must be litigable”. Langton has no evidence that the No voters are asking for decisions of the executive to be immune from “legal scrutiny of the courts” and that they believe in “one law for them and another for us”. I believe the No voters will continue to accept that the High Court should rule on whether parliament’s decisions are compliant with our Constitution.

However, the No voters do not accept that our Constitution should be changed to create additional rights for citizens of any particular race.

What hypocrisy to claim additional rights for your own race while accusing those who oppose race-based rights of engaging in “subconscious racism”. Reconciliation requires treating each other as equals.

John Allsop, Mont Albert, Vic