Narendra Modi himself is the epitome of all trolling; a man proud of his anti-intellectualism, and a votary of action over thought. File pic

A depressing marker of our time is the viciousness of public discourse. It is nothing like Nyaya-Vaisesika students debating before their gurus or Socrates’ followers taking apart one another’s dialectics. The ancients relied on facts and logical argumentation. How silly. In our post-truth era, the politik has no use for facts, and even less for logic. US President-elect Donald Trump won due to fake news, shouting over his opponents, and surrounding his supporters with a soundproof, reality-proof firewall (also, he faced a terrible opponent with loads of money, but a lack of endgame). In India, much of social media’s post-truth cacophony is generated by the supporters of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. For them, it is not enough that the messiah has won; they are on an endless war against doubt, scepticism and dissent.