Gen Z, who generally move at a glacial pace from one room to the other, are suddenly toppling governments and ministries across the subcontinent. What comes as a rude shock to non-Gen Zs is that Gen Z even had it in them. The widespread stereotype was that this generation had little in it beyond a fervent passion for K-pop, online games and Instagram. How did a generation dismissed as politically unserious suddenly become the face of political mobilisation?
Young people are, by instinct, anti-establishment—whether at the family or within larger institutions. Any setting that does not allow them to sleep late and rise late is, by definition, antithetical to their worldview. Against this backdrop, the protests at Jantar Mantar, especially between July 18 and 25, deserve to be studied. More remarkable than the protests themselves was the resolve to return after the lathi charges, tear gas and police brutality.
Some of this has been explained away as mob psychology - the courage that a collective provides, but which is individually absent. Yet that explanation feels inadequate. India has seen protests before, but not this kind of sustained resolve from so young a cohort. Somewhere along the way, it became a new normal that ministers in the Modi government simply do not resign. The last resignation under sustained public pressure was M.J. Akbar, and that now feels like a previous lifetime. Even that resignation was not for non-performance but for accountability all the same.
Cynics dismiss the protests as performative, designed for the 'gram. That may well be true for some. But even if social media amplified the movement, it does not diminish the courage required to walk into what had become a literal war zone. Pellet guns, nail-bearing lathis and an overwhelming police force are hardly props for a photoshoot. The same police personnel who, before and after the violence, were eating food brought for these very students, were also mercilessly lashing out at them. Facepalm Millennials🤦🏿.
Now the question remains: what will Gen Z do after they assume power?
Five or ten years from now, when this generation occupies positions of power, we shall discover what it truly stands for. It is easy to be idealistic when one has no power. It is easy to be socialist when one is a penniless student. Can those ideals survive when you are running a start-up on the verge of going public? Can they survive when you are a minister balancing party donors and the faceless voter sleeping on the sidewalks?
The movie Article 15 contains a seminal line: "Power ka alag hi jaat hai." Few dialogues define politics better. We often elect someone from the marginalised to represent us. The moment they attain power, however, they cease to be marginalised. Worse, they often cease to identify with the marginalised. The privileges of power have a seductive way of replacing the memory of powerlessness.
This is not unique to one generation. Every generation enters politics believing it will be different from the one before it. Recent examples, such as the Aam Aadmi Party, remind us how profoundly power can alter political behaviour. Even the leaders of this protest could not resist providing interviews to the same channels that ignored and despised them. However much you deride and belittle the channels, even they believe that legitimacy comes only from appearing on TV that mom sees at home. Such is the allure of power.
Will Gen Z may well have won Round One. For that, it deserves recognition. But Round Two - the exercise of power - is always the harder contest. Until then, the verdict on Gen Z must remain reserved.
