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The meeting between former Chief Justice of India (CJI), Justice Bhushan Ramkrishna Gavai and self-styled godman Dhirendra Shastri cannot be construed as just an issue of religious belief. We are witnessing a much deeper cultural transformation, wherein individuals who occupy positions of power and influence, and who are from middle and upper classes of communities which had traditionally turned their back on Hinduism, feel a need to relate themselves or even match to the Hindutva influenced aesthetics in order to remain relevant.

The transformation is no mere accident. It suggests that for those with different identities, learning to live within and adapt to the dominant culture is becoming increasingly necessary just to survive. However, this comes with its own cost and consequences. It produces a kind of soft form of violence wherein the identity is not simply negated but subsumed under the dominant aesthetic structure. In the age of viral images and performative acts such instances cannot stay isolated and end up normalising a hierarchy which slowly causes psychological, mental and cultural harm.

Buddhism embraced by Babasaheb was not only a spiritual or a religious conversion but it constituted a political break from the Brahminical system of meaning, power, and ordering. This was a very thoughtful effort to create totally new moral world centered on equality and reason that completely rejects the dominant aesthetics. The paradox emerges when those who represent this counter identity look for affirmation and validation within the system they have denied. Does this suggest that this sense of otherness has begun to lose its direction?

Given the claims made by Gavai – a public figure – about the legacy of Dr Ambedkar and identity of being Buddhist, such an engagement with these spaces holds symbolic meaning. The presence of CJI Gavai in such a scenario cannot simply be seen as an individualistic act.

It represents the shrinking of that important distance which Dr Ambedkar had tried to build between those who were oppressed and those oppressive institutions. Even if there is no explicit shift in ideology, this growing proximity to the dominant system suggests a quiet surrender of autonomy.

This is where the concept of subtle violence becomes central to the discussion. In this case, violence does not mean physical or direct actions but........

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