Subterranean Politics of Generosity

The “gesture of generosity” has undeniably been visible in the public sphere when the novel coronavirus crisis is causing devastation to people. The act of generosity may be judged as an activity that has an inherent quality of being innocent; innocence on the grounds that it is not motivated by the politics of achieving personal or party interests. Thus, any efforts made by either an individual or organisations to support the most adversely affected people, particularly the migrant labourers at this moment, are considered to be conspicuously voluntary, and thus, beyond the sphere of narrow political inclinations. Arguably, it is the moral force that is constitutive of the “virtue” of generosity. It is the element of virtuosity that can possibly assign a distinct moral advantage of innocence to the act of generosity.

Such a manifest “gesture of generosity,” however, has led to political debate, if not controversy, involving some of the spokespersons of the Government of Maharashtra. Doubts were cast about the innocence of such an act.