Electoral pay-off in Karnataka Strenghtens BJP hardliners

Financial Times

Hindu nationalists stand at the crossroads waiting for fresh vision

By Amy Kazmin in New Delhi

Published: May 19 2009 03:00 | Last updated: May 19 2009 03:00

Surveying the political landscape after its decisive parliamentary election defeat, India's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata party could be tempted to see one bright spot: the southern state of Karnataka, where the opposition party clinched 19 of the 28 seats on offer.

The strong performance in the state, the home of Bangalore, India's information technology hub, capped a turbulent period in which rightwing Hindu groups affiliated to the BJP attacked Christian churches and young women visiting bars or wearing western clothes, across the state.

The danger now is that the tensions stoked in Karnataka - and its apparent local electoral pay-off - will strengthen the hand of BJP hardliners in what is likely to be a hard-fought battle for the soul of the party after its second consecutive parliamentary election defeat.

"There are two warring groups within the BJP - each has its own set of takers," said Dipankar Gupta, a sociology professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University. "What will happen depends on which group is able to swing the emotional sentiments within the BJP."

The BJP's roots lie in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, or National Volunteers Organisation, set up in 1925 to unite Hindus in the struggle against British rule, and embraced a vision of India as a fundamentally Hindu society.

It became stronger in the early 1990s when it tapped into simmering resentment among Hindus, especially those displaced in the partition of the Indian subcontinent at independence, with a campaign that culminated in the destruction of a 16thcentury mosque allegedly built over the birthplace of Ram, the Hindu god.

In the late 1990s, the BJP sidelined some of its most cherished, yet contentious, Hindu-oriented policy goals so it could form a governing coalition with more secular alliance partners.

Yet since its 2004 election defeat, the BJP has been torn between conflicting impulses to return to stoking communal and cultural passions, which still find fertile ground among unsettled rural migrants to urban areas, and to craft platforms to target young, mainstream Indian voters, among whom a semi-mythical Hindu past, or old religious antagonisms, have little appeal.

That tension was on display during the current campaign of L. K. Advani, the party's 81-year-old prime ministerial aspirant. The BJP sought to present itself as a party of good governance, security, development and strong leadership, criticising Congress's record, while Mr Advani avoided the emotive Hindu nationalist rhetoric of his past.

Yet that carefull messaging was undone when one of the BJP's parliamentary candidates - Varun Gandhi, the estranged first cousin of Rahul Gandhi, the Congress party's heir apparent - was filmed making highly inflammatory anti-Muslim statements during a rally.

With the RSS expressing firm support for the young firebrand, the BJP refused to jettison him and instead backed his claim that the tapes were doctored. Mr Gandhi won his seat by a wide margin but the controversy hurt the party's image.

M. B. Puranik of the affiliated Vishwa Hindu Pari-shad, or World Hindu Council, said the lessons of the election were already clear. "Appeasing the minorities may not be very helpful to us," he said.

At the crossroads on its future, the BJP faces an imminent leadership contest. Mr Advani has offered to resign as leader but the BJP's rejection of his request has merely deferred a scramble for position. Among the contenders to fill his shoes is Narendra Modi, chief minister of Gujarat, whose role as "star campaigner" seemed to have yielded few dividends at the polls.

Though praised by business leaders for his efficient administration, Mr Modi is linked in the minds of many voters to the 2002 Gujarat riots in which 2,500 people, mainly Muslims, were slaughtered as state police stood by and even helped.

Pratap Bhanu Mehta, president of the Centre for Policy Research, said: "It's about as massive a leadership vacuum as you can imagine."

Gideon Rachman, Page 11 The Short View, Page 15 Unexpected victory, www.ft.com/worldvideo

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009