The politics of the campaigns against the government, however, goes well beyond a simple dichotomy between political representatives and wildlife activists. It is their protean character, incidentally, that explains their response to state officials. Yet even this rather modest realisation of lower middle-class aspirations has failed to dampen, or stunt, lower middle-class opposition to his government. To sum up, what we are seeing here is a division between state officials, assumed to have entered the government through merit, and political representatives, assumed to have entered it through influence. By no means am I saying that Anna Hazare was/is to India what officials crusading against political representatives are/will be to Sri Lanka.

Source: The Nation April 17, 2021 00:56 UTC