The Daily Times
February 17, 2005
Their extraterritorial loyalty
by J Sri Raman
Ashok Singhal put it succinctly in January, in Kathmandu, at a ceremony to honour King Gyanendra as the world’s only Hindu monarch. Ordained the VHP oracle: “It is the duty of 900 million Hindus the world over to protect the Hindu samrat (king) ... God has created him to protect Hindu dharma”
Historians warn us against the ‘what-ifs’ of history. Fussy academic concerns, however, need not stop a newsman’s frivolous and speculative query. What if the Bharatiya Janata Party had headed the government in New Delhi on February 1? What, indeed, if the last general election had gone the BJP’s way and the party had held untrammelled power on the day the King of Nepal placed a partial democracy under suspension?
Of course, in its official reaction to the dramatic development, the BJP has been critical of King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev’s action. He had dismissed the quasi-representative government of appointed prime minister, Sher Bahadur Deuba, declaring a state of emergency and taking over all state powers. Said the BJP: “The events in Nepal have seriously affected the cause of legitimate democracy. India has been consistently supporting the development of a political system that truly reflects people’s aspirations. King Gyanendra’s actions have caused a serious setback to this process.”
No strong denunciation, but a disapproving statement all the same, though it suggests that the suspension of the process is temporary. The statement cleverly avoids comment on the ground — “Maoist terrorism” — the King has cited for his action.
But the BJP, whether as part of a coalition in power or an opposition front, cannot fully and freely represent the far right on such issues. The far right has far less circumscribed fronts — like the Rashtriya Swaymsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) — to speak up on such occasions. They did so repeatedly and in ringing tones whenever the Atal Bihari Vajpayee regime had to resort to the device of double-speak.
They did so, for example, on Ayodhya when the allies would not let the regime proceed beyond paying tributes to the “nationalist movement”. They did so, too, on Gujarat, when Vajpayee had to condemn the carnage even while vindicating it as a reaction to Godhra. Demolition of the edifice of secularism, they swore, would follow that of the “disputed structure” of the Babri Masjid. They hailed the Gujarat pogrom and held it up as a model for the rest of the country.
They are playing the same role now on Nepal. No pretence of commitment to principles of democracy dilutes their defence of the King and his action. The stated ground of their defence is the same as his — “Maoist terrorism” — but the true reason is not too remote from their case on Ayodhya and Gujarat. The counter-terrorist argument camouflages, pretty thinly, a cross-border extension of communal fascism.
The always quotable Praveen Togadia of the VHP, who had glorified the police-aided Gujarat pogrom as a great ‘Hindu’ upsurge, said “There was anarchy in the Hindu kingdom before the King’s takeover”. He warned that, “if India remained a mute spectator to the unfolding events in Nepal, China might take advantage of the situation”. VHP president Ashok Singhal, who had proclaimed he was “proud of Gujarat”, said that “increased extremist terror targeting innocent people had prompted the palace to dismiss the Deuba government”.
RSS spokesman Ram Madhav sneered: “I do not understand all this criticism from India. We want democracy to flourish around the world, but what about Goa?” He was referring to the raging controversy over the dismissal of a BJP government in the tourism-centred state, despite a doubtful vote of confidence it won in the assembly under a partisan speaker. Madhav also pointed to the constitutional provision under which the King had acted, though the RSS rejected a similar defence of Indira Gandhi’s infamous emergency in 1975.
The real reason for this special pleading was no secret. Ashok Singhal put it succinctly on January 22, 2004, in Kathmandu, capital of Nepal, at a ceremony to honour King Gyanendra as the world’s only Hindu monarch. Ordained the VHP oracle: “It is the duty of 900 million Hindus the world over to protect the Hindu samrat (king) ... God has created him to protect Hindu dharma.” Singhal also proposed to organise a world Hindu meet in New York under the King’s leadership. The proposed event “would project Hindus as a global power... with the Nepalese king leading the way”. Similar sentiments have emanated from the Shankaracharya of Kanchipuram, now facing criminal charges relating to a murder. He denies the police allegation that he was planning to flee to Nepal, but his relations as the ‘rajguru’ or the palace priest in Kathmandu with Gyanendra (and his brother and predecessor King Birendra) have been as close as with the VHP and the rest of the far-right parivar (family). The Shankaracharya, on a visit to Nepal, proclaimed its monarch as “the king of all Hindus” and counselled the Nepalese people to support him against “Maoist insurgents”.
To the parivar, the King of Nepal may be the “king of all Hindus”. To sections of the far-right ‘family’, however, the Hindu kingdom must also be part of a ‘Hindu’ India. In January 2001, BJP leader KR Malkani kicked up a controversy with his ‘revelation’ that King Triubhuvan of Nepal had offered his country’s accession to India in the early fifties. Malkani added: “We should have accepted (the offer).” The BJP, of course, distanced itself from his “unfortunate” remarks without taking any other action against him.
Long ago, RSS ideologue Guru Golwalker, in his famous ‘Bunch of Thoughts’, listed India’s Muslims, Christians and Communists as the country’s main enemies for their “extraterritorial loyalty”. To far-right political philosophers, loyalty to the king of another country does not fall in the same category.
The writer is a journalist and peace activist based in Chennai, India
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