Zuleika Dobson at Cambridge

After all the undergraduates at Oxford killed themselves for love of her, Zuleika Dobson- Max Beerbohm tells us- set off for Cambridge.
What happened to her there?
English Literature supplies no clue but Bengali Poetry does-

Chilo onek rajar bari - chok milano, hajar gari

ebong jole shonali agonon,

hNasher dol dolay pakha, tobu tomar shonge thaka,

chomotkar Zuleikha Dobson.

Ishankone omonojoge - megher tNuti dhoreche roge,

dumre pore probola shalbon,

chNad utheche ontoreekhkhe, monosthapon kori bhikhkhe,

tomar jonno, Zuleikha Dobson.

I have previously mentioned that Zulieka married Rajni Palme Dutt and eventually settled down to be an instructor in Econometrics at the L.S.E. 

What I didn't explain was how that came about. You see on her first arrival at Cambridge, she fell among Bengalis all of whom, for they are a most obliging and gentlemanly race, did in fact fall madly in love with her and vow to kill themselves to testify to their passion.

Sadly, when it came to writing out their suicide notes (for which Zuleika was a stickler) the regrettable Anglo-Bengali predilection for uchchvaas go the better of them and so their suicide notes turned into immense dissertations which, in the fullness of time, earned them Professorships at Jadavpur and Yale and every where in between.

It is in this context, that the Hungrealist poet, Shakti's poem, quoted above, should be read.

Zulieka's long vigil at Cambridge, though taking its toll on her looks, nevertheless much burnished her intellectual equipment and constituted her an excellent helpmate for her ideologically inclined husband in his many and voluminous works.

A theory of Hinduism

Suppose India were an isotropic plane of the Christaller (Central Place Theory) type. In fact it isn't but a lot of the rain fed agricultural areas are actually quite easily inter-connected for purposes of migration and let this be the topos of the Median Hindu.
Furthermore, this area is also suitable for cattle rearing but not particularly good for horse breeding. Pastoralists create one type of pecuniary asset (indeed, the word pecuniary derives from the Latin word for cow) and can quickly achieve linguistic hegemony of a particular type if they solve the coordination problem for Commerce by providing focal points (which Mauss misunderstood as potlatches). In this scenario, instead of a white shoe law firm, you have a 'kavi' intermediate your transactions and he gets to pretend his poetry is super-duper and there is a Textual availability cascade which later on gets mistaken for a Prophetic Religion by shitheads.
No doubt, the elite (Margi) form of the Religion, which the Literature holds as normative, may actually derive from privileged locations- e.g. a riverine 'Hydraulic' elite society, or a Maritime Center or a Caravan hub or some sacred Mountain or Forest- and no doubt the actual vyayahara (customary) laws obtaining at any point (desh) of the (economically) isotropic portion of India are going to show marked variations- still, the dynamics of that vyavahara are going to obey the same laws in the long run because
1) arbitrage type inter-migration dampens hysteresis effects- i.e. path dependence vanishes after a couple of iterations (rather like epigenetic effects)
2) changes in relative wealth distribution would give rise to Invasion/Exodus type events militating to the same end.

Now let us identify the primary driver for Social Geography (i.e. hierarchy) in this idealized rain-fed Agricultural plain. Can it be 'Accumulation'?
No because stuff that can be accumulated is also stuff that can
1) be stolen or taxed or become the object of seditious or fraticidal contestation
2) lose its utility as a store of value because either trade collapses, and hence comparative advantage based industry is extinguished, in which case both Credit and Fungibility dries up- or else the asset is simply eaten by rats or ends up taking the form of like those ugly mo'fo Easter Island Statues or is expended on White Elephant Courtiers and Public Intellectuals and Amartya Sen getting appointed Chancellor of some Nalanda University which will never come into existence coz like, dude, which ultracrepidarian Careerist gobshite (as opposed to genuine Scholar) wants to go live in Bihar?

Indeed, the moment you speak of Accumulation, you open the Pandora's box of Chrematistics- i.e. you are confronted with all the Mental torments involved in the question 'how do I get to keep what I have?'- in other words, how do I trade stuff which depreciates over time for other stuff which is guaranteed to appreciate or keep its value? The problem here is that, even if we have perfect information regarding all agents and all Social Change is uncoerced and Muth rational and so on- still, we don't know the future fitness landscape so we can't predict which asset vendors will be able to fulfill their contract with us.
No doubt, nowadays, we have a branch of Theology called Mathematical Economics which is supposed to exorcise this ghastly specter, whose stark reality no one doesn't secretly recognize, to wit the fact that the real rate of return on every portfolio is negative because the future fitness landscape is unknown.
Currently there is a sort of panic that only the very rich are getting richer and, certainly, it is true that those with the greatest elasticity of response w.r.t. signals relevant to Portfolio Choice get to keep something of value rather than suffering total impoverishment servicing White Elephant assets, still, the fact remains that the first guy to get totally ruined and, stochastically, to hit on the right sort of asset to hold might end up with descendants at the top of the tree in the future fitness landscape.

Thus, instead of speaking of 'Accumulation' which is linear but imaginary (and thus gives rise only to Paranoid theories of History) we need to speak of 'Security' which itself relates to notions of Habitus-as-Conatus and takes us directly from Secular to Sacred discourse without the need for postulating either a Conspiracy theory of Religion (Priests were crooked Shamans in league with 'Stationary Bandit' Princes) or some Racist nonsense about Noble Aryans or Spiritual Semites or Pure Blooded Red Indians (no, I don't mean Ranajit Guha) or the mermen of Atlantis or the mages of Shangri La or whatever.

Of course, the above is way too simplistic. Essentially, I'm assuming an isotropic topos such that ergodicity prevails and Econ type (well, Mechanism Design type) Analysis can yield something useful. However, since Religions are about 'costly signals'- i.e. irrational shibboleths which impose a high barrier to entry- as well as 'cheap talk', of a Preference Falsification type- and since, moreover, India exhibits numerous privileged and non isotropic sacred topoi and associated Availability Cascades, 'epigenetic' type effects, i.e. path dependence, might well be more than transitory. Indeed, given a sufficient number of privileged topoi we can predict that there must be long periods of non ergodicity such that either
1) Marxian stagnation obtains - 'unchanging India' where Hinduism is not a Religion but 'a way of life' normative only to the curator (who, of course, would be the ideal comprador for a foreign Ruler) of a Social Jurassic Park
or
2) Tardean mimetics (stuff like Srinivas 'Sanskritization') or its reverse (Barrister Gandhi deciding he's actually a village dolt of a Bhangi- coz them guys are just too cool for school and all the hot chicks dig them)- but this cashes out as the same thing as (1).

I suppose one might also mention
3) Girardian mimetic rivalry such that a scapegoat is constantly being sacrificed, some random sample of the poorest and least offensive are callously put to death in the name of defeating 'Imperialism' or 'Capitalism' or 'Casteism' or whatever.

However, just because you can have a longue duree like the above doesn't change the dynamics of the system which predicts that endogenous saltations will arise only during brief spells of ergodicity- i.e. the longue duree captures nothing about the essence of the system and has no utility or instrumental value for Progressive Public Policy. This is another way of saying the more a guy knows about Hindu History the more worthless his advise. Of course, I mean History the academic subject not Hindu Itihaas which was specifically written for 'fools, drunkards, women and working class people' like me (well, I score two out of four on that list and, no, I haven't had gender reassignment surgery, my 'man boobs' just naturally look this way).

Let us now, if only to briefly distract you from the sort of lubricious thoughts which mention of my 'moobs' must inevitably have set in motion in that sewer you call your mind, consider the dilemma of the  agriculturist who has settled in a rain-fed area. He could simply be a subsistence farmer and, in bad monsoon years, depend on roots and nuts and small game from uncleared forest land. However, unless he is well entrenched in a 'Zomia' uninviting to other more enterprising agriculturists, he faces the danger of being displaced from more fertile land by Iron age farmers who grow a sufficient surplus so as to not merely have superior technology but also to arm and maintain a warrior cohort . In other words, to be Secure, you need to always aim for a surplus, which means you need specialised Artisans like Blacksmiths and Carpenters and leather tanners and rope makers and so forth, but also a dedicated Warrior cadre.
True, this poses the risk of being enslaved- of being turned into a helot caste- by the very warrior cohort you hire. Thus you need to hedge against 'Agent Principal hazard'. Indeed, hedging against Mechanism Design type risks, in my view,  of the essence in any theory hoping to connect Secular and Sacred or Kantian Morality and Hegelian Sittlichkeit or Vyavahara and Dharma or my man boobs and Marilyn Monroe. What? If she were still alive, they'd probably be as low hanging and hairy nippled as mine. Anyway, could we please stop talking about my moobs? Like, dude, u r making me seriously uncomfortable.

It is tempting to take a sort of sanctimonious 'Manuvadi' line here and say that Hinduism is the solution to Mechanism Design hazard. For example, after the Godhra riots, Prime Minister Vajpayee (a scholarly Brahmin) pointedly ponitficated, during a Press Conference, that Modi (a 'Shudra' from a 'Service caste'- his ancestors were oil pressers) should observe 'Raj Dharma' - i..e. the Religious duty of the King to render Justice to all irrespective of their caste or creed- and Modi, grinning and chuckling, cut his Chief down to size by saying 'Wohi to kar rahe hain Sahib!' - 'that's what we are doing, Sir!'- using the Muslim term 'Sahib' (which derives from the word for the Companions of the Prophet s.a.w) and thus dismissing the comprador Priesthood as worthless windbags whereas true 'Raj'- Rulership as arising indigenously- is always the work-in-progress solution to the multiple Agent-Principle type hazard problems facing the productive classes.

Anyway, as a Brahmin myself- I no longer call myself a Brahminbandhu, which is all Vajpayee was, because I am now both the only Rishi as well as the only Acharya of 'Sura Veda' such that, like my Sama Vedic udgatr ancestors, people pay not to partake in but put a term to attendance of the, now incessant, Soulful Song of my Symposia- I feel emboldened to say that Modi, true to Ghanchi Dharma, was able to extract some useful oil- jet fuel more like!- out of that oleaginous Vajpayee who offered the Nation only the dubious Vajapeya (elixir) of Appeasing impenitent Aggressors, Aggressively Advertising imaginary achievements and incessantly talking such tripe that Sonia and Rahul appeared the Hindi voice of Sanity, by comparison.

Returning to the topic of this post- viz. seeing Hinduism as an Evolutionarily Stable Strategy- there are a couple of myths that first need to be disposed off

1) Jati/Caste as a sort of Trade Unionism such that 'Service castes' (i.e. tanners, carpenters, oil-pressers etc) gain countervailing power by recourse to 'boycott'. Westerners like this idea. Sir Mark Tully's defence of the Caste System is based on it. But is it true? Fuck no. Indian production functions aint convex. There are just too many 're-switching' type possibilities. True, there is Preference Falsification the other way. But, for the Median Hindu, or the isotropic median Indian topos, reswitching rules.

2) Supposed Social Conservatism and/or Weberian characteristics of the Trading Castes.  To my mind, this artefact arises from rational Portfolio Diversification in favor of Credentialized Education/Religion which can be entered into from different motives (Like how becoming a Minister of Religion, in England, was more often a strategy to arrest downward mobility rather than enabling upward mobility, as in America at the same period.)

In India, at times of Grain surplus, it makes sense to get your kids some Bhramin/Shraman/Whatever Credential both as a matter of 'just in case' as well as of 'WTF, let's roll the dice on this'.
 This is the true driver of what appears as 'Sanskritization', or 'Gandhization' or 'Nehruvian consensus' or our contemporary Technocratic 'Great Moderation'.  But, a hedge is a hedge is a hedge. It can't drive dynamics except in so far as it fails in which case it definitely can't drive dynamics.
Now, I'm not denying that something like Tiebout model manorial rents exist and extracting them can look like Social Conservatism or 'Liberalism' or whatever. However,  contested rent extraction too can't drive dynamics except in a 'no escape' strip of fertility- which India aint.

What, then, is my theory of caste? Um...turns out I don't have an actual theory- just a Verstehen and a caste based one at that.
For which, as I needn't tell you, I personally blame David Cameron.
That boy aint right.

Bilgrami's Gandhi-2

It is a commonplace in our understanding of the western moral tradition to think of Kant's moral philosophy as the full and philosophical flowering of a core of Christian thought.
Our? Bilgrami, you are an Indian Muslim. It is not a commonplace for your people to believe any such shite. Nor is it commonplace for any German Christian to do so. Radhakrishnan did not make so vulgar an error in his engagement with Lutheranism even as a student. Why are you writing such ignorant shit? Does your colour (which actually is pretty white) or your status as a Muslim (non believing, it seems) give you a laissez passer to tell stupid, illiterate, lies?
No. But you are a Professor of a shit subject and that's all the excuse you need you worthless fuckwit.

 But Gandhi fractures that historical understanding. By stressing the deep incompatibility between categorical imperatives and universalizable maxims on the one hand, and Christian humility on the other, he makes two moral doctrines and methods out of what the tradition represents as a single historically consolidated one.
I see-only acting according to a maxim that can become a universal law means you have to be a self righteous dick and get up everybody's nose with your holier than thou sermons. Why? Who would agree that 'be a self righteous dick' is a universal law? Imagine the following- Gandhi turns up and starts telling you what a worthless cunt you are coz you wear trousers rather than a diaper. You promptly tell him he's an even slacker twatted ho coz he didn't personally sow the cotton from which his diaper is woven, He's going 'yeah, but like your're wearing trousers dude! Diapers trump trousers.' 'Ordinarily they would,' you reply suavely,' but these aren't trousers at all. What they are is the collected faeces of low caste bhangis which have been cunningly moulded to look like trousers. I personally, as a form of satyagraha, gathered all the shit by hand out of the anuses of Untouchables and as a gesture of humility and a blow in the face of British Imperialism fashioned them into the appearance of trousers. Ha, Ha- I win.'
Is that the sort of world anybody- more especially a self righteously dick- want to live in?
Surely, Bilgrami is wrong. Kant's categorical imperative entails'don't be a holier than thou Gandhian dick or Taliban dick or Amartya Sen type dick.' Why? Imagine a world where everybody is a dick of that sort. The Taliban dicks kill each other because the true Taliban kills anyone who might not be a true Taliban- i.e. everybody.
And discarding one of them as lending itself ultimately to violence, he fashions a remarkable political philosophy and national movement out of the other.
Shite cobbled together from Ruskin and Chesterton and Carlyle aint a Political Philosophy. It is shite. Why are you not saying Gandhi fashioned Khilafat and hence Al Qaida and the Taliban etc? Gandhi got money off the Khilafat guys for his shite Ashrams and Congress work.
He also got money and prestige off the I.N.C by promising to deliver Swaraj within 18 months.  He didn't.
Both Khilafat and the Swaraj movement existed before Gandhi. He just made money out of them and gained a temporary obligatory passage point status. But, he made himself irrelevant by his antics. He was a stupid fuckwit.
I want to stress how original Gandhi is here as a philosopher and theoretician. The point is not that the idea of the 'exemplary' is missing in the intellectual history of morals before Gandhi. 
Are you fucking mad or just stupid? What does 'insaan-e-kaamil' mean? What about 'Purushuttama'? Hang on, here's one you definitely do know- how's about Thomas a Kempis' Tshirt slogan- 'What would J.C do?'
The notion that the moral axis of the World does not coerce or criticize but that a sort of Boscovich 'field'- as in the Vimalakriti- emanates from him has been a constant feature of the 'intellectual history of morals' for at least two thousand years. Indeed, Occasionalism gains ethical salience precisely because this type of 'field' theory is hugely fecund.
What is missing, and what he first brings to our attention, is how much theoretical possibility there is in that idea. It can be wielded to make the psychology surrounding our morals a more tolerant one. 
Gandhi spoke his mind. He generally thought other people were selfish swine who didn't really understand stuff like their own Religion, Economics, Politics, Law, Education, Medicine, etc. He was swift to condemn behavior he thought immoral and to mete out punishments.
Now it is true that Spiritual Religion- whether Buddhist or Hindu or Sufi or Christian- teaches techniques to conquer cognitive dissonance and to control visceral reactions. Thus the sage should be able to serenely contemplate the most atrocious of spectacles without losing his equanimity.
Gandhi makes no special contribution. Furthermore, he simply wasn't a Philosopher.
If exemplars replace principles, then it cannot any longer be the business of morals to put us in the position of moralizing against others in forms of behaviour (criticism) that have in them the potential to generate other psychological attitudes (resentment, hostility) which underlie inter-personal violence. Opposition to moralizing is not what is original in Gandhi either. There are many in the tradition Gandhi is opposing who recoiled from it; but if my interpretation is right, his distinction between principle and exemplar and the use he puts it to, provides a theoretical basis for that recoil, which otherwise would simply be the expression of a distaste. That distaste is a distaste for something that is itself entailed by a moral theory deeply entrenched in a tradition, and Gandhi is confronting that theory with a wholesale alternative. 
When was Gandhi not 'moralizing' and criticising? He says again and again that anyone who does not do exactly what he says is evil and corrupt and likes eating nice food and wearing cool clothes and probably having sex and stuff.  True, he was 'passive aggressive' and backed down pretty quick unless it paid him to put on a gesture political drama to suggest otherwise.  Still, he was a major holier than thou shithead of the worst Gujarati type. Which is why Narendrabhai loves him so much.
Bilgrami doesn't say what 'Tradition' Gandhi was opposing. Was it Hindu? No- Bilgrami can't make that claim because he knows he is ignorant of Hinduism. If not Hindu, then what was it? It couldn't be Western because Gandhi denounced Western education.
Perhaps Bilgrami means 'Universal tendency' not 'Tradition'. In that case he is making an extraordinary claim- viz. Gandhi was the first and last man to achieve some very elevated moral stature.
But Gandhi was also a worthless fuckwit who alienated Jinnah and Ambedkar and did lasting damage to India in every conceivable way.
Moreover, his worshipers tell stupid lies about him like 'Gandhi got Freedom for India' or 'Gandhi healed Hindu Muslim disunity.'
So even if Bilgrami's claim is true, it is not interesting
This conception of moral judgement puzzles me, even while I find it of great interest. It has puzzled me for a long time. Before I became a teenager (when I began to find it insufferably uncool) I would sometimes go on long walks with my father in the early mornings. One day, walking on a path alongside a beach we came across a wallet with some rupees sticking visibly out of it. With a certain amount of drama, my father said: “Akeel, why should we not take that?” Flustered at first, I then said something like, “Gee (actually I am sure I didn’t say ‘gee’), I think we should take it.”  My father looked most irritated, and asked, “Why?” And I am pretty sure I remember saying words more or less amounting to the classic response: “Because if we don’t take it then I suppose someone else will.” My father, looking as if he were going to mount to great heights of denunciation, suddenly changed his 
expression, and he said magnificently, but without logic (or so it seemed to me then): “If we don’t take it, nobody else will.” As a boy of twelve, I thought this was a non sequitur designed to end 
the conversation. In fact I had no idea what he meant, and was too nervous to ask him to explain himself. Only much later, in fact only while thinking about how to fit together the various elements in Gandhi's thought, did I see in his remark, the claims for a moral ideal of exemplary action. But notice how puzzling the idea is. 
Not puzzling at all you fuckwit.  BTW you did too say 'Gee' or rather its homophone 'Ji'.
In any case, there is no great aporia here. Simply a story of any Ashraf or Caste Hindu taking a stroll on the beach with his Dad.
If you don't take the money you are somebody- i.e. a khandani Bilgrami Ashraf who will go on to occupy Chairs of Philosophy without blushing- this does not mean nobody takes the money but that a 'nobody' takes it.
Of if you feel this smacks of 'Casteism', look at it Game Theoretically. Your discounted reputational gain as the man who didn't take a wallet in the sight of another fully offsets the monetary loss.
Here is a wallet, abandoned, and we should not take it. This would set an example to others, though no one is around to witness it. 
No it wouldn't. Not unless you believe in something totally fucked liked Rupert Sheldrake's morphic resonace or shite. Fuck me, you probably do!
The romance in this morality is radiant. Somehow goodness, good acts, enter the world and affect everyone else. To ask how exactly they do that is to be vulgar, to spoil the romance. Goodness is a sort of mysterious contagion.
No. It's doing good things. Like tracking down the owner of the wallet. Or, if that is too difficult, just fucking obeying the law- which says hand it in to the nearest Police Station.

Gandhi was not a good exemplar. There were thousands of Gandhians but they produced nothing lasting. By contrast, take the case of Abdul Sattar Edhi. He came to Karachi a penniless refugee and penniless he remains to this day. Yet thanks to his personal example, nothing more- no long speeches or dramatic political gestures- his foundation is probably the largest voluntary Ambulance and Hospital service in the world.
Gandhi would have loved to have such a legacy. He probably genuinely believed something good would come out of his Khadi work and Basic Education scheme. Both were a massive waste of resources.
The Gandhi cap became a symbol of corruption- and, latterly, criminality and rape.
Perhaps, Bilgrami, in his own way is veering round to this view in his essay. He finally comes out and says Truth has to be about, at least partly, facts about the world. It can't simply be empty posturing. Perhaps, Gandhi wasn't really concerned with Truth at all. Perhaps he was a 'bullshitter' jumping on any bandwagon as an occasion to spout his self-serving holier than thou shite. True, Gandhi was afraid of violence because he himself and his own followers would die first, and this meant that he needed to spread hate by criticizing others without that hate spilling into violence because his side would get their heads kicked in. It was a tightrope that Gandhi had to walk. Fortunately it was a tightrope to nowhere and affected nothing. People who write shite may have their own reasons to pretend otherwise. Still, it is perhaps a good thing that they write shite on a topic which we have prior knowledge about. In this way, we are able to properly judge shite-writers as worthless shitheads whose oeuvre we do well to avoid.

Bilgrami's Gandhi- 1

Prof. Akeel Bilgrami, a nice guy- not obviously a witless careerist- has some extraordinarily foolish things to say about Gandhi. So what? So does Prof. Sorabji- an all round good egg. Surely, writing foolish things about Gandhi is what Indian origin Philosophers are supposed to do?

My contention- and, sure, I admit it is a scandalous one- is, NO, nice guys needn't write shite even if it's about Gandhi.  Omitting to publish one's quota of shite every other year won't directly result in Modi becoming P.M.

Writing non-shite, at least for an Ivy League Prof who has the ear of Rahul's elite buddies,  could however, at the margin, have helped the 'Secular' forces (by definition, anti-Modi) put up a better show in the recent elections. If nothing else, it might have given Modi an excuse to cull some of the more repellent senile shitheads in his own party- like the 84 year old Home Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Babulal Gaur Yadav, who reckons rapes are okay provided the rapist is a Yadav but a bad thing if the reverse is the case.

In what follows, I'll be quoting Bilgrami's Essay on Gandhi from his Columbia Uni. Webpage. My remarks are in bold.

Bilgrami's Thesis
1) Gandhi held a consistent but highly unusual philosophical position. 
'Universalizability suggests merely that if someone in particular holds a moral value, then he must think that it applies to all others (in relevantly similar situations).'
Bilgrami is wrong. A moral value can militate for a 'mixed strategy'- i.e. one with a stochastic component- which can't be simply dominated. Thus a man who abhors gambling may still permit a contentious zero-sum issue to be decided by a coin toss. Yuddhishtra was a moral man. If some people in his kingdom MUST be slaves why should he and his kin themselves become slaves by virtue of a coin toss? It's a perfectly plausible Rawlsian, or 'overlapping consensus' solution IFF Econ 101 in the original position tells you that some necessary Public Good only becomes available if some people are slaves. Otherwise the species goes extinct.
As a matter of fact, in the Mahabharata, the Just King, to overcome his vishada or harmatia, has to learn both Game theory (in the Nala episode) as well as the wisdom of the low-caste butcher (the Vyadha Gita) which shows that perfect felicity in this world and the next is attained by ignoring Kings and Priests and just taking your own elderly parents as your Gods. Notice, the Vyadha's ethic is universalizable; yet entails no obligation to go around making a nuisance of yourself lecturing all and sundry on their moral shortcomings and ignorance of the Chandogya's highest truth which is known equally to the carter and Krishna Devakiputra neither of whom go in for pi-jaw.
2) Philosophers aren't stupid and Gandhi was a philosopher
 Yet despite the fact that it is much weaker than universality in this sense, it still generates the critical power that Gandhi finds disquieting. If moral judgements are universalizable,  one cannot make a judgement that something is morally worthy and then shrug off the fact that others similarly situated might not  think so. They (unlike those who might differ with one on the flavour of ice cream) must be deemed wrong not to think so.
Why? All we can say about them is that they have a different Vyavahara/Jati dharma/Verstehen than we do. Since Gandhi claimed to have read the Gita- indeed, he claimed to understand it better than anyone else- why should we assume he hadn't read its dual, the Vyadha Gita? Furthermore, Gandhi learned a little Jainism from his greatest supporter's brother-in-law. Where is the scandal for Anekantavada in what Bilgrami is saying? Indeed, there is no scandal for European thought here either.  No doubt there is some narrow textual availability cascade in the Academy that pretends otherwise- but it is fuckwitted merely and has had zero impact on anyone whether Western of Eastern or whatever.
3) Gandhi was a hermeneut of traditions he was entirely ignorant of.
Gandhi repudiates this entire tradition. His integrating thought is that violence owes to something as seemingly remote from it as this assumed theoretical connection between values and criticism.
Gandhi was blissfully unaware of any such tradition. People would tell him about it and he'd basically tell them to fuck off in a polite way while underlining his firm conviction that everybody else was a moral worm or eunuch and he alone was worthy of worship. Why did Gandhi do that? The answer is because that's what guys who run expensive Ashrams with other people's money do if they want to be successful and get to sleep naked with young girls.
Take the Maharishi, instead of saying 'ply chakri and Universal Peace will reign' he said 'Do Yogic Levitation and then Universal Peace will reign'. Still, Mia Farrow wouldn't sleep with him. The Beatles wrote 'Sexy Sadie' to commemorate this terrible crime which the Materialistic West inflicted on the Spiritual East.
4) Shite gobshites write can cause violence even without the instrumentality of a sociopath
Take the wrong view of moral value and judgement, and you will inevitably encourage violence in society. There is no other way to understand his insistence that the satyagrahi has not eschewed violence until he has removed criticism from his lips and heart and mind.
Urm...not just satyagrahis, every one who knew him well,  was constantly tempted to criticise Gandhi for sleeping with naked chicks and making his wife cook mutton chops for Maulana Azad and fucking up the Independence Movement, the Khadi Movement, the Basic Education scheme and anything else he stuck his oar into. Telling his wife she was guilty of 'himsa' (violence) if she didn't cook mutton chops (coz Azad really liked them and was a total fuck-wit of Gandhian proportions who had dreamed of becoming the Imam ul Hind and buggering with all them smart Aligarh M.U. types) was par for the course.  
Gandhi, himself, of course, criticised everybody and anybody unless they got stroppy and made him stop. That's just standard operating procedure for charismatic fuckwits running a Credentialized Ponzi scheme is all.
5) My name is Bilgrami and I'm an Indian Muslim and can't reason for shit. Watch Slumdog why don't you?
But there is an interpretative challenge hidden here. If the idea of a  moral value or judgement has no implication that one find those who disagree with one's moral judgements, to be wrong, then that
suggests that one's moral choices and moral values are rather like one's choice of a flavour of ice cream, rather like one's judgements of taste. In other words, the worry is that these Gandhian ideas
suggest that one need not find one's moral choices and the values they reflect relevant to others at all, that one's moral thinking is closed off from others. But Gandhi was avowedly a humanist, and repeatedly said things reminiscent of humanist slogans along the order of 'Nothing human is alien to me'. Far from encouraging self-enclosed moral subjects, he thought it the essence of a moral
attitude that it take in all within its concern and its relevance.
A guy running a Ponzi scheme has an interest in broadening the base of his pyramid to cover not just all sentient beings but imaginary ones too.
Now, it is true that there is a Jain Gandhism- originating with Dr. Pranjivan Mehta and Raichandhbhai and very effectively developed in vernacular languages like Gujerati and Hindi (see for e.g. H.H. Amar Muni Upadhyay of Veerayatan fame) but it is based on a monadology which is 'self-enclosed' and which rejects the notion that one substance (dhravya) can, for woe or weal, operate directly on another. However, this is a dynamic conception- i.e. a field theory- and features fuzzy logic and other such high I.Q stuff- so forget I mentioned it okay? 
How, then, to reconcile the rejection of universalizability and of a value's potential for being wielded in criticism of others with this yearning for the significance of one's choices to others? That is among the hardest questions in understanding the philosophy behind his politics, and there are some very original and striking remarks in his writing which hint at a reconciliation.
Name one. Go on. I dare ya.
So far, I have presented the challenge of providing such reconciliation as a philosophically motivated task.
Why? Gandhi was a stupid guy. He passed the University entrance exam, but realised he'd gotten as far as he could and, sensibly, never pretended otherwise- at least to himself.
But it is more than that. It is part of the 'integrity' that I am pursuing in my interpretation of Gandhi that it also had a practical urgency in the political and cultural circumstances in which he found himself.
We know very well that it was close to this man's heart to improve India in two ways which, on the face of it, were pointing in somewhat opposite directions. On the one hand there was the violence of religious intolerance, found most vividly in the relations between Hindus and Muslims. This especially wounded him. Religious intolerance is the attitude that the other must not  remain other, he must become like one in belief and in way of life. It is an inclusionary, homogenizing attitude, usually pursued with  physical and psychological violence toward the other.
Right! Jinnah was constantly trying to get Hindus to convert to Islam wasn't he? Liaqat actually did convert one person- his second wife, but she was Xtian to start of with and, come to think of it, she converted voluntarily. Under Muslim Law, Liaqat could have kept an Xtian wife. 
Who else? Savarkar was constantly badgering everyone to like get with the program and worship a cow already. Same was true of Bal, Pal and Lal.
Are you fucking kidding me? The whole point about Ashraf Muslims like Bilgrami is they didn't want their Kayastha clerks or Bania agents to convert to Islam and then start inviting themselves around on the excuse of Eid or whatever.  If nothing else, it would damage their efficiency.
Similarly, no Iyer has ever tried to convert a Muslim. Them guys are way smarter than us Smarthas.  The last Tamil Avadhani was a Muslim. As for Sanskrit- don't even start.
As a particularly vicious Hindutva nutjob myself, suppose I have a chance to slip A.R. Rehman a mind-altering drug and then to 'shuddify' him- i.e. reconvert him to Hinduism. Would I do it? Fuck no! The Tamil film (music) industry was a sewer of drugs and drink and dishonourable conduct to women. God bless the Pir who- WITH NO INTENTION TO CONVERT- helped the family when the father was dying in hospital. Thank God, the young genius took shelter in Islam! That way he could refuse drink or drugs on the grounds of Religion. Had he remained a Hindu, those bastards would have forced him because- don't you know?- Hinduism is very evil and the best way to escape its to get drunk and rape some girls belonging to a lower caste.
Modi has been in power for 12 years in Gujerat. Show me the Muslims he has converted even from his own 'Ghanchi' caste (for example those in Godhra). 

Ethnic monopoly and/or cleansing is a different kettle of fish. Partition wasn't about converting people- it was about coveting their possessions and perquisites of office and then conducting a cull. Still, it is noteworthy, Pakistan banned the exodus of 'bhangis'- i.e. the guys who did the dirty jobs- while, Paul Brass tells us, the Jat Sikhs deliberately cleansed their own Muslim 'service castes' so as to create space for Mazhabi Sikhs. (I don't personally believe this story- but a 'Secularist' like Bilgrami is bound to pay lip service to it.)
On the other hand, for all his traditionalism about caste, there was something offensive to Gandhi within Hinduism itself.
Yes. It was the notion that he himself wasn't educated enough in it to claim a scholarly or clerical title.
The social psychology of the Hindu caste system consists of an exclusionary attitude.
Unlike the non-Hindu caste system.
For each caste, there was a lower caste which constituted the other and which was to be excluded from one's way of life, again by the most brutal physical and psychological violence.
Is this true? Let us look at Dr. Ambedkar's biography.  Parsis beat him and throw him out of their lodge. Muslims deny him water. A low caste Hindu 'banjara' won't carry him to his destination- even though he's just a child and well educated and affluent.
By contrast, his teacher is a Brahmin who delights in him and gives him his own surname- which is why Gandhi thought him to be some over-educated Westernised Brahmin who didn't really understand the 'Harijans' and thus was heating his brain for no reason- and, later on, his second wife- a Medical Doctor whom he married to care for him because he was diabetic- was also a Brahmin. She was ostracized and accused of having poisoned him after his death by his own son.  Yet, right from the start, the educated Mahar (thanks to the British Indian Army) was a significant threat to the Maharashtrian Brahmin. 
Yet it is from that equally martial community that he received most support. Hegdewar and Gowalkar loved him. He himself appreciated the R.S.S for its anti-caste attitude. That's why, later on, people like Barrister Khobragade had no compunction in allying with the BJP or Shiv Sena even though it wounded the hearts of LSE fuckwits like me.
Why? What was the reason?
The Chitpavan, who were getting demoralized and sinking as a community, knew that the Mahars were a heroic people like themselves.  
Dr. Moonjee volunteered to serve during the Boer War, as did Gandhi, so as to learn Military tactics. Any future Indian Army which neglected the Mahars' martial prowess- their sheer courage and intelligence and long tradition of uprightness and pietistic 'Bhakti' religion- would be bound to fail.  The great qualities of this 'caste' are visible to all- then and now. But, I can multiply instances.  Look at the Balmik caste, the Jatavs, or (for Tamils) the Valluvars who technically are 'Pariahs'. Can you imagine Tamil without Tiruvalluvar? Hinduism without Valmiki? A.K Ramanujan tried but he also told us his grandmother enjoyed being taken from behind by underemployed fishermen, but only with the fell purpose of using her vagina dentata (I'm not making this up) to bite off their low caste dicks.

Army discipline requires that the 'high born' show 100 per cent obedience to the orders of his 'low born' superior. Nothing else will do.  This is the basis of the R.S.S ethos and the real reason people like me used to hate them. Don't get me wrong. I love the Indian Army- but only coz their officers looked so smart and their lovely wives and daughters spoke such beautiful English.
Now, because my 'posh' English accent (hey! I went to St. Columba's!) is starting to fray,  and I can't understand Rahul Baba's English (he did spend a little time at St.Columba's but then Harvard got hold of him) and have to settle for Modi's Hindi- what? I'm a fucking Madrasi!- all bets are off. Let the Indian Army promote according to Merit. Let English die in India. But fucking fix it so children don't get raped!
Sorry, for that outburst. I'm truly shit, I am. Senile fucking debility, mate. 
Anyroad...
Returning to Bilgrami's thesis, there may well be 'alterity' here. But it is an alterity which cries out for an, I will not say Levinasian, but 'Mussar' response such that 'the spiritual needs of the other are my material needs'. If Acharya Kosambi, a Brahmin, and Babasaheb Ambedkar, a Mahar, both embrace Buddhism- where is the problem for the 'Caste' Hindu?
Are we so fucking stupid that we prefer to be ruled over by Mlecchas just so as to preserve our 'Smarta Vicharams' and plague afflicted 'Agraharams'? 
Bilgrami, as a deracinated emigre, may believe Gandhi's return to India marked something genuinely new. It didn't. If Khilafat was a success- was it because of Gandhi? As for Hindu 'Anushilan' or 'Jugantar' type radicalism- Gandhi was no where in the picture.
As a prematurely senile but active man, no doubt, he provided a cover for those- like Birla- who needed to retreat from Revolutionary politics. He was the provider of a 'Good Conduct' certificate which kept you out of the clutches of blackmailers and police-spies while also granting you a sort of post-obit on the resources of the dying Raj.
When I think sometimes about caste in India --without a doubt the most resilient form of exclusionary social inegalitarianism in the history of the world-- it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that even
the most alarming aspects of religious intolerance is preferable to it. To say, "You must be my brother", however wrong, is better than saying, "You will never be my brother." In religious intolerance there is at least a small core that is highly attractive.
Bilgrami Sahib, you must know the expression 'sag bash birader-e-khurd na bash' (better a dog than an younger brother). Is that not what has happened in the Indian subcontinent? 'You must be my brother' means- 'you must be my younger brother and let me shit in your mouth.'
You may find this 'small core' in Religious intolerance highly attractive. Why? Believe me, the stuff they are serving you isn't goulash- it's shit. I found out the hard way.
The intolerant person cares enough about the truth as he sees it, to want to share it with others.
Why, Bilgrami Sahib, why? What you describe is a strategy that is easily dominated if the other has an equal endowment of knowledge and/or reasoning power. Even if he doesn't, still, the optimal strategy is to only grant the privilege of being witnesses to your truth to those who immediately die for it- i.e. martyrs or shaheeds.  
Of course, that he should want to use force and violence in order to make the other share in it, spoils
what is attractive about this core. No need to do so. Just pretend that the truth is esoteric or requires some long praxis of unquestioning obedience. If you are speaking of 'cognitive dissonance reduction'- just pretend to be a bien pensant humanist till some over-educated shithead from somewhere else turns up to sit at your feet. It was Gandhi's humanistic  mission to retain the core for it showed that one's conception of the truth was not self-enclosed, that it spoke with a relevance to all others, even others who differed from one. How to prevent this relevance to others from degenerating into criticism of others who differed from one and eventually violence towards them, is just the reconciliation we are seeking.
O...kay. You're about to say something real interesting, right? After all, you're one smart dude and, more to the point, belong to the Bilgrami khandan.
In the philosophical tradition Gandhi is opposing, others are potential objects of criticism in the sense that one's particular choices, one's acts of moral conscience, generate moral principles or imperatives, which others can potentially disobey. For him, conscience and its deliverances, though relevant to others, are not the wellspring of principles. Morals is only about conscience, not at all about principles.
There is an amusing story about two Oxford Philosophers, which makes this distinction vivid. In a seminar, the formidable J. L Austin having become exasperated with Richard Hare's huffing on about how moral choices reveal principles, decided to set him up with a question. "Hare", he asked, "if a student came to you after an examination and offered you five pounds in return for the mark alpha, what would you say?" Predictably, Hare replied, "I would tell him that I do not take bribes, on principle!" Austin's acid response was, "Really? I think I would myself say, 'No Thanks.' " Austin was being merely deflationary in denying that an act of conscience had to have a principle underlying it. Gandhi erects the denial into a radical alternative to a (western) tradition of moral thinking. An honoured slogan of that tradition says, "When one chooses for oneself, one chooses for everyone". The first half of the slogan describes a particular person's act of conscience. The second half of the slogan transforms the act of conscience to a universalized principle, an imperative that others must follow or be criticized. Gandhi embraces the slogan too, but he understands the second half of it differently. He too wants one's acts of conscience to have a universal relevance, so he too thinks one chooses for everyone, but he does not see that as meaning that one generates a principle or imperative for everyone. What other interpretation can be given to the words "One chooses for everyone" in the slogan, except the principled one?
WTF! That's your apercu culled from decades and decades of elitist Anglo education? Austin was clearly wrong. He said 'No thanks'- which means the other guy has to offer him more money or a beating or a buggering or whatever. The point about deontics is that it solves a co-ordination problem. It is Eusocial. Austin should have punched the student. A punch has illocutionary force. A.J Ayer once argued Mike Tyson out of raping some hot chick. How? Flattery and nimble footwork. Language is strategic or not at all. 
Gandhi was too making a privileged claim re. his Conscience. It was the voice of God. Marie Stokes heard the Voice of God in 'a dark yew wood' and it is to her we have all harkened. Flaubert spoke of Art as being the Soul's condom in this brothel of a World; Bilgrami spouting Gandhian shite too is a prophylactic but not for the Soul, no, rather for a burnt out Careerism which now must take recourse to the dirtiest sort of Senile, Syphilitic, gesture politics.

Why all internal reasons are actually external prejudices

Bernard Williams' doctrine that all reasons for a person doing something must be internal to that person- i.e. involve a motivation within himself rather than arise out of some Social Convention- appears easy to dispose off- at least on the assumption that human beings evolved by Natural Selection. This is because, assuming it is costly to have motivations which are subject to some calculus such that they inhibit or permit an action; it follows that for any given action, the Evolutionary Stable Strategy will militate for some proportion of actors not possessing an 'internal reason' but proceeding by mimicry, including lagged mimetic effects- i.e. for an external reason- to complete the same action. Indeed, Amotz Zahavi's work on warning calls and predator 'mobbing' shows how 'external reasons' can improve predator-prey outcomes and hence are trans-species Eusocial.
The same point would be true for artificial agents- e;g. those used in a simulation- provided it is costly to acquire information and apply reason to it and there is heterogeneity in terms of either information access or processing capacity amongst agents.
True, one could simply change the way one defines 'internal reasons' or 'motivations' such that we now speak of a desire to mimic or a desire to be lead or a desire to roll the dice and so forth. However, since these desires or motivations are encoded in Language, then- by Wittgenstein's argument against Private Languages- clearly these are 'external reasons' merely. The one doing the action may not even be aware of it, let alone have an internal reason for doing it. Certainly, it would also be a case of quod nescis quo modo fiat, non facis.
 However, since Public Language has different granularity than either 'Mind stuff' or whatever Cognitive process determines action, and furthermore, since we know in advance that any given set of terms available to Public Language for use as explanans is either incomplete or misleading or both- it follows that no external reasons exist save by way of prejudice.
The literature on this subject, in so far as it relates to counter-factuals, misses the point that for agents who have evolved by Natural Selection, Uncertainty always exists as to which World we live in- this one or a counter-factual. Indeed, the Evolutionarily Stable Strategy- assuming it is costly to find out the answer- is to always remain in a state of 'buzzing blooming' confusion in this regard, at least for some proportion of the population. Philosophy has no Archimedian point here. On the contrary, opening its jaws to digest Game Theory it  becomes merely the Ouroburos of the latter's shed skin.

No doubt, those familiar with the literature may think I'm missing the point. Perhaps, Williams is referring to ideal agents with infinite and instantaneous computing power? The problem here is such agents would have a type of Theory of Mind which would disintermediate Language and the essentially linguistic distinction between 'internal' and 'external'. Indeed, it is far from clear that the word 'reason' would retain any utility.

Alternatively, we may posit some special barrier to perfect Theory of Mind. But, in that case, Language would be entirely strategic because arising wholly from that barrier and the reason for it. Here again the distinction Williams makes becomes wholly hypocritical and empty of Philosophic content.

What about William's criticism of 'external reasons?'

The answer, of course, is that the agent believes he's hit on a 'cheap talk' ploy in a particular sort of game. To turn it into a 'costly signal' he may pretend to be undergoing some terrible inward struggle productive of the costive truth in question. Indeed, there's a Kavka's toxin type twist to this such that he has an incentive to convince himself that this is what is genuinely happening.
A bit like Bilgrami's Gandhi.

Rich People belong to a different Species.

I recall drunkenly watching the 1992 cult movie, Society, where, it turns out, the Rich really are, as Fitzgerald said, different from the rest of us not because they have more money but because they turn into pullulating, pustulating, disgustingly pink giant amoebae at high toned incestuous orgies- before proceeding to eat us.

Alex Tabarrok has a lucid- therefore obviously ludicrous- post at Marginal Revolution which compares Piketty's pataphyique model with the standard Solow witted shite we were all forced to learn at School.

Tabarrok is commenting on Krusell & Smith who highlight Piketty's definition of Y (Income) as net of Depreciation- i.e. Income is what you can spend such that future Income doesn't fall- so if stuff you need to maintain your standard of living needs repair, then your Income is what's left over after you've done the repairs. Now, some 'Capital' (i.e. man-made stuff needed to sustain your standard of living) is 'Social' or 'Communal' or relates to Education, Training and Psychological Motivation and Boulding 'Psychic Capital'.  If this depreciates by wear and tear or whatever and you don't (either collectively or by yourself) repair it, then- in some sense- though your consumption may have gone up, still you have 'dis-saved'- you have less Wealth.
Similarly, suppose the value of your house has gone up because rents in your area have gone up. You still spend the same and earn the same in dollars. Still, according to the National Income Statistics, you now get an 'imputed rent' from owner occupation. This could be considered an increase in your yearly Savings, which is why your 'Wealth' increases over time and why, hopefully, you will be eventually reconciled to that selfish little shit of a son of yours who, disgusted by your parsimonious refusal to buy him a burger for his birthday, stormed out of the house when you insisted, by way of judicious reparation, on telling him for the umpteenth time the tragic tale of your brutal date-rape at the hands of his mother that time she took you to see Sir Partha Dasgupta lecture on Optimal Depletion and everybody else was so engrossed in the lecture that they failed to come to your aid... and...sorry this stuff is still just too painful. How would you like it if someone stuck their titty in your mouth just when you'd raised your hand to say "I'm sorry Sir Partha, that equation is wrong?'

Anyway, turning to less horrific topics, this is Tabarrok's mistake- ...' Piketty’s model ... defines output and savings in a non-standard way (net of depreciation) but when written in the standard way Piketty’s saving assumption is that I=dK + s(Y-dK). What this means is that people look around and they see a bunch of potholes and before consuming or doing anything else they fill the potholes, that’s dK. (If you have driven around the United States recently you may already be questioning Piketty’s assumption.) After the potholes have been filled people save in addition a constant proportion of the remaining output, s(Y-dk), where s is now the Piketty savings rate.'
I haven't read Piketty- indeed, my Literacy Worker is no longer allowed to read Econ type books out to me coz of my incontinence issues- still, surely, that smelly Malinvaudian snail-eater wouldn't have committed to homogenous agents just to get in with the Anglos? At worst, he might have 'Schutzian ideal types'. However, a more radical possibility is opened up by my own comment, given below, which now proudly besmirches Marginal Revolution's meretricious web-site.

Windwheel June 2, 2014 at 11:08 am

One way of saving Piketty’s conclusion within the above framework would be to permit depreciation to sometimes be negative savings for one class of agents which, by some bizarre convention re. imputed rents, counts as positive savings for another class of agents. Then what you actually have is two different populations with something like a speciation event occurring- i.e. there is now no  driver for ‘canalisation’.

 Perhaps it’s the visceral feeling that the Rich really are now a different Species- like in the classic 1992 film ‘Society’- which explains Piketty’s appeal. 

For my part, I thought Growth theory had died an unlamented death in the Sixties. To be clear, heterogenous Accounting Identities can always be made to line up if you are Paranoid enough.

P.S- You will be pleased to hear my subsequent comments have been barred.

Akeel Bilgrami on Modi

Prof Akeel Bilgrami writes-
'In the Europe of the 1930s and 1940s, the term “fascist” came to be associated with two defining features. First, the finding of an external enemy within a nation (in the case of Germany, the Jews, the gypsies) and despising and subjugating them. Second, what Mussolini offered as an explicit definition of fascism: the fusion of the interests of corporations and the state. I ask the reader to look at Modi’s record with Muslims and his avowed economic programme and decide for herself where the lack of intelligence really lies. '
Is Bilgrami correct?
Let us look at the facts. The word Fascist, in the 1920's, as popularized by Mussolini had nothing at all to do with Jews. It did however have everything to do with
1) Defeating the Communists and other Leftists who
a) had opposed Italy's participation in the War
b) aimed at Bolshevik style Revolution. Mussolini was a  former Socialist who supported the War and had the backing of the Army for this reason.
2) Stressing the role of the Military and seeking for a revival of Imperial glory. This was to be done by making Business Corporations and Trade Unions and other elements of Civil Society- including the Education system and, after the signing of the Lateran treaty, even the Church- subordinate to the interests of an expansionist State. Mussolini's 'Corporatism' meant subordinating, not fusing, the interests of the Capitalists to the greater glory of the Nation.

Which other European countries could be described as Fascist?
1) Hungary. Bela Kun had led a Communist Revolution. With help from the armies of neighboring countries like Romania and Czechoslavakia, Admiral Horthy launched a 'White Terror' and became Regent.  Kun and many of his comrades were Jewish but Horthy wasn't Anti Semitic because Jews had traditionally been loyal to the dynasty.
2) Germany also faced the problem of Red Insurrection which was put down by 'Freikorps'- disbanded soldiers. The size of the Army had been drastically cut by the Peace Treaty. Hence, the German Army wanted a 'force multiplier' in the shape of a Mass Movement. They were also keen on projecting the 'stab in the back theory' so as to absolve themselves of War guilt. Hitler was a paid agent of the Army when he joined the Nazi party. Luddendorf was beside him during the Munich Putsch. But, the mentally unstable Luddendorf refused to go to jail to pose as a martyr and so Hitler gained salience.  Hitler's path to power was paved by Generals like Schliecher (whom Hitler killed) and Blomberg (whom he hounded out of the Army in disgrace) and all this happened when Hindenburg was President. Hitler had no particular love for the Corporates. They and the German Army however agreed to subordinate themselves to the State- which, thanks to them, Hitler came to embody.
3) Spain. The Left came to power and went a little crazy. General Franco, with help from Mussolini and Hitler, invaded from Morocco having first declared the Virgin Mary to be the Captain General of his Army. But Franco wasn't serving Corporate interests. Primo de Rivera's idiotic Falangism hurt Corporates. Unlike the First World War, the Second War was a period of stagnation for Spain. It was only after ditching the ideologues that Spain, from the Fifites onward, took a Technocratic direction under American tutelage. Franco wasn't particularly anti-Semitic.
4) The Romanian Iron Guard- vicious anti semites but they thought they were serving the Archangel Michael, not the Corporations. They considered Capitalism sinful.
5) Pilsudski's 'Sanation' in Poland featured massive State action. Hiter's Germany did see Privatization but Corporations had to serve the interests of the State. Had German Capital been in the same parlous state as Poland's, Hitler and Blomberg and so on would have gone the Pilsudski route. Indeed, to a certain extent, they did.

One can multiply instances but one conclusion is inescapable. Inter-war Fascism was a product of-
1) Fear of Communist Revolution and/or invasion or subversion by the Soviets. The Military had a disproportionate say and they considered Capital to be a junior partner.  Some military men, but also some Business men like Henry Ford, came to believe in the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion'- i.e. a paranoid fantasy in which the Jews controlled both the Kremlin and Walll Street and were aiming to destroy Spiritual 'Christianity' or 'Aryan Values' by 'Materialist' ideologies like 'Capitalism' and 'Communism'.

2) Anger at or anxieties arising out of the Peace treaties. Defeated powers looked to get back territory by Armed Might; Victorious powers sought to keep their gains by the same means.

Some 'Fascist' countries had an 'internal enemy', some did not. What they shared in common was Militaristic rule and a willingness to abandon International Treaties and the League of Nations in pursuit of their National Interest. When people thought of Hitler or Franco or Mussolini, they didn't think- 'oh that fellow is in the pocket of Big Business and his only other passion is killing some specific minority'. 
Instead, what people thought was 'that nutjob is willing to start a World War to expand his territory. He will ruin his own country- including its Businessmen- but he doesn't care.'
Suppose Hitler was a puppet of Big Business. Then, there would have been no War. Just pay the German industrialists to rein in Hitler. After all, money is what those guys care about, right? France and England had plenty of money to buy peace. They didn't use their money in that way because it couldn't be used in that way. Big Business wasn't in charge in Germany. Hitler was- but only because people like General Blomberg had come to see that he would push through the Army's maximal program better than they could do so themselves because
a) he was simply more ruthless
b) he could pose as the Charlie Chaplin like 'Little Corporal' whom the English assumed would be anti-War because he'd experienced its horrors himself.

Now let us look at Modi. Is he in the pockets of Big Business? No. Adani is a junior partner in the development of Gujarat. Jindal, the former Congress M.P, wasn't anybody's junior partner. Manmohan scarcely wanted Coalgate. Yet it happened. The country got no benefit whatsoever. 
Some people can make money even in a failed State. However, the Business Sector as a whole goes down the toilet.
It is undeniable that Corporates, as a class, backed Modi this time round. What was the alternative? If the Economy continues to stagnate- which it would have done because Congress didn't even have a P.M candidate- then many of them either go bankrupt or have to severely retrench. If Growth gets back on track- which it will under Modi simply because he isn't a senile idiot- most of them will be able to raise money and get back to profitability. It is an Existential question. 

What about Bilgrami's second assertion- viz. Modi has risen to power by attacking an 'external enemy within the Nation'? Surely the secret of his electoral win is that he himself was attacked by all other parties as that very 'external enemy'? This split the Muslim vote. Furthermore, there was a 'counter polarization' amongst Hindus because 'Secular' politicians, with great cynicism, were claiming to have given Muslims a special most favored status. 
Still, the fact remains, people have voted for Modi because they believe he's a 'Good Governance' man who will treat everyone equally and not play caste/creed vote-bank politics.  
If Bilgrami were correct, wealthy Muslims would now be fleeing the country. To my certain knowledge, they are not doing this. Instead, we see Muslim N.R.I businessmen ramping up their investment plans and planning to spend more time in India and not just Gujarat or Rajasthan or M.P or the N.C.R either. People are talking of opportunities in U.P and Bihar.

Bilgrami is a nice guy. He writes well. But, if he wants to challenge Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum on their own home turf, he will have to up his game. I suggest he make a deep study of my blog. That will enstoopidify him sufficiently to come into his own.