While zeitgeist-defining speeches or exhortations are few and far between in the post-millennium world, politicians every once in a while manage to invoke a chuckle or a round of applause with some well-timed rhetoric. A recent incident at the UN General Assembly involving the Permanent Representatives of India and Pakistan made headlines as the duo took on each other in a war of words. TS Tirumurti, representing India shot back at the Pak spokesperson, who raked up the Kashmir issue, and said, “Pakistan has become Pavlovian, whenever India is mentioned.” Tirumurti’s response was on Pakistan bringing up its grievances on the disputed territory, no matter what subject is under discussion. In this case, it was regarding India holding a Permanent Council seat at the UN.

The term Pavlovian is inspired by Russian scientist Ivan Pavlov, who observed an irrational reaction to a psychological trigger in dogs. Pavlov saw that dogs who associated the idea of food with the sound of a bell tended to salivate whenever they heard a bell, irrespective of whether there was any feeding involved. While Tirumurti’s response proved to be a bouncer for many, it was one of the better examples of a civilised put-down or a rebuttal that is indecipherable for ordinary opponents. The father of political put-downs arguably came from Congress MP Shashi Tharoor in 2018, when he released a new book on Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Tharoor, an enfant terrible of vocabulary, described his book as ‘more than just a 400-page exercise in floccinaucinihilipilification.’ With that one word, one of the longest in the English dictionary with 29 letters (just ahead of antidisestablishmentarianism, at 28 letters) Tharoor threw Twitter into a tizzy, with netizens scurrying for cover, seeking to find what Tharoor’s latest googly meant. The MP later clarified it can be defined as the act of estimating something as worthless.

In a similar vein, RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das in August last year dropped a phrase during a banking summit that sent the financial wizards into a tailspin. Borrowing a leaf from the French philosopher and novelist Voltaire, Das said, ‘I am not saying we maintain a Panglossian countenance and smile away every difficulty.’ Panglossian is defined as a way of life characterised by extreme optimism. The word is a tip of the hat to Professor Pangloss, a character in a satire written by Voltaire in 1759.

These bursts of verbal razzmatazz might seem amusing. But many of us in this generation are experiencing a bankruptcy when it comes to the expression of thoughts and ideas by those entrusted with running the nation. Post-British Raj, Indians found a ray of hope in the words of the then prime minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, whose Tryst with Destiny speech helped lay the foundation for a modern independent nation. A decade and a half later, Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, set out on a national unification drive with Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan, a battle cry invoking strengths of the soldier and the farmer.

Closer home in Tamil Nadu, stalwarts of the Dravidian political movement stood by the axiom – Udal Mannukku, Uyir Thamizhukku (I dedicate my body to the soil, my life to Tamil). Rousing sloganeering and pithy speeches aside, politicians must not forget they are ultimately answerable to the public, and that their catchphrases are only as good as their ability to follow through on their promises. Seventy-three years after independence, citizens in India weigh the words of its politicians with a pinch of salt – and a dash of scepticism. And while it is true that every nation gets the government it deserves, it might do some good, if those in power weighed their words with sincerity. Maybe, that holds the key for a government to get the people and nation it deserves.