by Ram Puniyani
Putting on masks with changing times are the
compulsions of electoral politics for many parties, more so with a party like
Bhartiya Janta Party. BJP so far has been doing this with great amount of ease,
but lately its dilemmas are increasing in intensity due to its track record in
the political arena during last two decades. One such attempt to change gears
or put on a new mask was attempted by L.K. Advani in the recently held BJP
executive in Delhi (Sept 2012). Mr. Advani in the speech which was circulated
had written about "re-projecting the party's
commitment to secularism" in his valedictory function speech. While
speaking he stumbled as he was face to face with something which BJP does not
like in the real sense, secularism, and so he skipped this S word in his spoken
speech.
To begin with recent
things, it is from last few months that Neetish Kumar has been saying that NDA
should have a leader with a secular image. His hint was to oppose the claims of
Mr. Narendra Modi, who is a strong candidate for the post of PM, for BJP and
thereby of NDA. Neetish Kumar with his own electoral compulsions has been
avoiding Mr. Modi, not touching him even with a barge pole. Since Kumar and
other allies are very crucial for BJP to come to power, BJP has been in two minds
about projecting Modi as the PM candidate. As such also BJP had a complex calculation
while dealing with the issue of secularism and Indian state.
BJP is the at one level
the political wing of RSS, in which RSS trained swyamsevaks are in the lead
with some non-RSS background leaders also scattered here and there. Still the
primary control of BJP is with the RSS trained swayamsevaks. In turn BJP’s
political directions are controlled by the patriarch, RSS, which takes most of
the crucial decisions about BJP policies. It is not too far back that Nitin
Gadkari was imposed on BJP as the President, and then making exception to the
rule he was ‘re-elected’ as the President mainly due to the dictates of RSS. Earlier
also there are examples galore about the RSS determining the direction of BJP
in the main. It’s also true that within the given parameters, BJP does have
some autonomy also, but that relates to mundane affairs not in the major policy
making.
The major brunt of
campaigning for BJP is also done by the RSS volunteers, who are the major
bulwark of BJP political electoral machine.
All the top leaders of BJP, from Vajpayee, Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi,
Narendra Modi, Arun Jaitly and Nitin Gadkari are the swayamsevaks trained in
the RSS shakhas. For them, RSS has the primacy over any other thing and this
gets reflected times and over again. Once Vajpayee, when he was Prime Minister,
was speaking in the gathering of NRIs in Staten Island in US. He exhibited his
primary loyalty to RSS by saying that he may be the Prime Minister, but more
than that he is the swayamsevak of RSS, a right, which nobody can snatch from
him. When Advani in an effort to make an image changeover from the Babri mosque
demolisher to the potential PM candidate, went on to praise Jinnah and his 11th
August 1947 Speech in Pakistan, RSS immediately put the reins of control and
Advani was immediately marginalized from BJP leadership, a ground he has been
trying to regain by various means, to no avail. Similarly when the previous avatar
of BJP, Bhartiya Jansangh had dissolved itself to merge in the Janata Party, in
the aftermath of dreaded emergency, its leadership broke the Janata party and
re-emerged as Bhartiya Janata Party. The issue was that the socialists in Janata
party had demanded that the Jana Sangh faction cannot have duel membership of Janata
party as well as RSS. This faction rather than severing relation with RSS
promptly broke the Janata party and came out.
RSS is primarily
committed to the agenda of Hindu Rashtra, Hindu nation, a concept parallel to the
concept of Islamic nation, which had become the base of Pakistan. Now the
paradox for BJP is that it has to come to power through an electoral process, in
a country with diversity in religion and culture. It does want to impose Hindu
nation but that is not possible without capturing power in the centre. For
capturing power they have to adopt the norms of electoral politics and play the
‘vote bank ‘politics as other parties do. The aim has been first to polarise
the Hindu votes and then to appeal to votes of other sections of society. Polarization
of section of Hindu votes has been achieved by BJP through Babri demolition,
Post demolition riots and Gujarat carnage. Having achieved this, for winning
over the dalits and other weaker sections the strategy is to co-opt them
through mechanisms of social engineering through programs like “Samajik
Samrasta (collaboration between castes) and Hindutvisation of Adivasis through
programs like Ghar vapasi (returning home) for Adivasis, telling them they are
Hindus who had to flee to the forests due to the intimidation of Muslim kings,
so they must return to Hindu fold. In the same effort for winning over
Adivasis, the tribal areas witnessed anti Christian violence.
As for as Muslim, the
biggest religious minority is concerned they have given mixed signals. Having
given the signal to section of Hindus, the challenge has been to win over the
Muslims’ votes as well, as all Hindus will not vote for BJP at any time. So the
first effort was to project Vajpayee as the leader, as Vajpayee was a most
suitable mask. It was very part of his persona, to the extent of people went on
to say that he is the ‘right man in the wrong party’. To oppose Congress Advani
coined the word pseudo secularism for the policies of Congress. Surely Congress
is no secular angel, as it has compromised with communal forces and in the game
of vote bank politics, has played the role of ‘opportunist communal’ party.
This is in contrast to BJP which is party programmed for Communalism. After
Vajpayee period BJP has been trying to put on a secular mask. But the job is
not easy and they have to play the role close to that of a trapeze artist. Not
to lose polarised vote bank of Hindus and at the same time to win over Muslims
votes.
It is in this direction
that Bangaru Laxaman once said that Muslims are the ‘blood of our blood and
flesh of our flesh’. Advani tried this by offering secular Jinnah comments and
now this gem from him is again an attempt in that direction. Same Advani in part
of his speech, which he did not read, said, “We should, with full conviction,
reassure our brethren belonging to the minority communities that we brook no
discrimination or injustice in dealing with different sections of our diverse
society.” Who will believe that except the novice!
Whether such a new mask will cut
any ice with the Muslim community, who by now has realized that irrespective of
its utterances BJP is anti minority to the core, and makes secular noises just
for effect. Even their formulation of secularism ‘justice to all and
appeasement of none’, gives a clear message that Muslims cannot expect any
affirmative action, which a battered community needs for its upliftment.
Today while the communal parties
have polarized the communities along religious lines, what is needed is a principled
politics along secular lines. Those tied to the apron strings of the organization
with the ideology which wants to bring in Hindu Nation cannot be secular. Their
masks are a mechanism to put wool in people’s eyes. We need to recall the Hindu
values of father of the nation, Gandhi. Despite holding Hinduism as his religion
he never indulged in the politics of Hindu religious identity. BJP indulges in
issues like Babri mosque, holy cow, Ram Setu, Amarnath Yatra, etc. something
which is the basic hallmark of Advani and company. It is the use of religion’s
identity for political goals. Gandhi followed religion as morality and BJP is
using ‘religions’ identity for political goals’, this is what communalism is,
and this is what the hallmark of BJP is.
