Aakar Patel's New Book Stirs Things Up

A publisher called me a few months into the #MeToo case I was fighting against a former union minister and asked: Do you think #MeToo will stay strong or ‘fizzle out’? The publishing house was trying to decide whether or not to commission a book about the movement. Every anniversary, obituaries are written about #MeToo. I am asked whether I'm disappointed that the 'wave has ebbed'. Sure #MeToo had its share of let-downs. Indeed, things haven’t changed overnight. Yes, the movement was largely upper caste. Sex workers, trafficked women, incarcerated women, trans voices and other minorities were also excluded. Many powerful people were reinstated. The pushback has been devastating, as we knew it would be.

But those years, when the tidal wave of our voices swept the world, transforming lived trauma into a never-seen-before viral campaign that used scores of different hashtags from Italy's #quellavoltache to Latin America’s #BalanceTonPorc, will always be cited as a key modern-day marker in the centuries-old battle for women's rights. I'm sure the next avatar, whenever it comes, will be more inclusive and impactful.

As the October anniversary of the Indian edition of #MeToo approaches, I'm going to point everyone who asks me whether I'm disappointed to an answer in The Anarchist Cookbook, Aakar Patel's just-out book, described as a 'toolkit to protest and peaceful resistance'.

"The thing is that progress disappoints in the short term but surprises in the long run," Patel writes. "The markers and signals of progress are not always visible or apparent. Change is happening all the time. If we look at it in the widest frame, it is a positive change." The book briefly features the #MeToo movement and your columnist.

Patel, the chair of Amnesty International India and someone who has written a book a year since 2020, argues that elite citizens who control the public narrative are also those that interact least with government and the Indian reality. He believes we engage with politics the way we do with Bollywood. "The appeal of the politician is similar to, and perhaps the same as, the appeal of the film star," he says. "The depth of engagement from the audience is also the same. No delivery in the real world is expected of either; the performance on screen is all there is."

The Anarchist Cookbook is easier reading than Patel's two previous books that examined the nature and impact of Hindu majoritarianism. Sharp, on point illustrations by anonymous political satirist PenPencilDraw further enhance its appeal and accessibility. The heart of the book—its how-to section—has fun chapter titles such as ‘Are you ready to stir things up?” and ‘Make it to MasterChef level’. A quiz tests whether you’re ready to ‘activate your inner activist’. The author says it’s a cookbook because it gives you the ingredients and the recipe to “bake your own campaign for change”. It’s a well thought out response to privileged Indians who say: “But what can I do?”

Patel's first answer to the above question is, quite simply, participate in your democracy beyond the electoral process. He urges you to stand up for human rights, your rights and a progressive society.

Our fundamental rights—Articles 14 to 32 in the Constitution—appear on paper to be potent, the author argues, but in reality we don’t actually possess them. "The Constitution resembles a Potemkin village," he says, reemphasising that India’s most influential citizens are also its most disengaged and explaining why he and a slew of international organisations that monitor democracies and human rights believe the country has entered a “period of authoritarianism”.

He tells you the most powerful weapon of activism (awareness of an issue and its facts); where to hone your persuasion techniques (family groups), where to volunteer and how to start a campaign. The book straddles personal experience, theory, law, and real-life examples. It has an inspiring section on successful modern-day movements and one not-so-successful battle which could have been won had we shown a little more interest. India’s grassroots ASHA health workers needed all the help they could get when they went on a strike in 2020 to demand better working conditions. Patel says if more of us had supported their fight and acknowledged their contribution in the pandemic, the government would have been forced to concede their demands. “We failed them collectively,” he says.

He reminds us that, even today, Gandhi’s non-violent protest is the “template” for civic protests across the world. Some of the examples he cites in the book are from countries more open to their citizenry protesting and, here, Patel adds a statutory warning: “Do not try this at home!”

For Patel, social media is the modern-day soapbox, a place where you can attract likeminded people and build communities. Patel warns that activists can be targeted for the values they uphold. In this he has a wealth of personal experience, from legal cases against him to Twitter suspending his account and the state refusing to let him fly out of the country.

“I do what I do because I cannot do otherwise and cannot look away,” he says. “But I also understand that there will be others who choose to have a lower profile about such things or try and keep their activism anonymous.” The approach you use depends entirely on you, but Patel urges you to use your privilege to stand up for real progress for all Indians. What are you waiting for? Start baking.

Priya Ramani is a Bengaluru-based journalist and is on the editorial board of Article-14.com.

The views expressed here are those of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views of BQ Prime or its editorial team.