Beware of the BJP!

May 1, 2016

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And their hatred of everything Pakistani

No matter how many trumpet how much about the ideal of humanism by arguing that discrimination of humans on the basis of race, religion, etc, is negative; there are always some buyers of negativism and with the coming of the Hindu nationalists in power under the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), this negativism is on the rise in India.

Nationalism was the ‘new religion’ in the eighteenth century; now, it is “the religion” of the day. The problem is that it divides people between “Us” and “Them.” The rejection of fellow humans as the “Other” is a negation of the ideal that humankind is one fraternity; this being one of the three cherished ideals of the French Revolution — the other two being liberty and equality. These are noble ideals because they integrate humanity. And India upheld these noble ideals by becoming a secular state under the leadership of Jawaharlal Nehru but with the annihilation of Congress in the last general elections at the hands of the BJP, secularism stood defeated at the hands of Hinduism. Under the BJP, India has become Hindustan because the Hindu nationalist leaders insist “Garv say kaho ki hum Hindu hain” (Say with pride that we are Hindus), thus raising the question as to what is the status of non-Hindus in today’s Hindustan. Kingshuk Nag’s recent book provides some insights into the nationalist Hindus’ mindset.

The roots of this Hindu nationalism can be traced in the writings of the mid-nineteenth century Bengali writer Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyaya, particularly his novel “Anandamath” which revolves around a rebellion against the medieval Muslim rulers and its song “Vande Mataram” which was adopted as India’s national song after independence in 1947 making many question whether Nehruvian secularism was just skin-deep.

The roots of this Hindu nationalism can be traced in the writings of the mid-nineteenth century Bengali writer Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyaya, particularly his novel “Anandamath” which revolves around a rebellion against the medieval Muslim rulers and its song “Vande Mataram” which was adopted as India’s national song after independence in 1947

Under BJP, “Hindutva’ has become the soul of India. The party makes extensive use of Hindu mythology to mobilise its followers. Whether there is a rally or ‘yatra’, the starting and the culminating points are the birthplaces of Ram, Sita, the capital of Krishna, etc. One of the top BJP leaders LK Advani made it quite clear that for the Hindu nationalists “Shri Ram is not just a religious icon. He is also the symbol of the Indian ethos, culture and unity. He is the personification of our concept of Hindu nationalism.” And when the Hindu nationalists get an opportunity, they try to rewrite history as well. One of the BJP presidents, Rajnath Singh, while serving as the education minister of the UP state not only introduced new chapters in the textbooks on the “leading lights” of Hindu nationalism such as Hedgewar and Deendayal Upadhyaya but also affected changes in the history syllabi to promote their peculiar ideology. The crux of this ideology is that India is inhabited by just one nation, one people and one culture. This concept of monoculture India is abhorred by all those who believe that cultural diversity strengthens social unity.

To give the impression to the world that the BJP was not just a Hindu party, it made Sikandar Bakht, a Muslim resident of the walled city of Delhi and who had a Hindu wife as one of its general secretaries along with LK Advani and Suraj Bhan, when the party was founded in 1980. Despite this non-communal façade, the party very much remained communal because it emphasised upon the “Indianisation” of Muslims which simply meant that the Muslims must adopt the Hindu ways of life and one of its influential leaders, Balaraj Madhok stressed that “India should be a homogeneous nation state. There has to be total assimilation of Muslims into Hindu culture.”

To give the impression to the world that the BJP was not just a Hindu party, it made Sikandar Bakht, a Muslim resident of the walled city of Delhi and who had a Hindu wife as one of its general secretaries along with LK Advani and Suraj Bhan, when the party was founded in 1980

The Hindu nationalists outrightly reject the “Two Nation Theory” which is generally believed to be the basis of the subcontinental Muslim nationhood as well as the creation of Pakistan. One has to just read their history. In one of its resolutions, the Jana Sangh, the parent body from whose womb the BJP was born had stated, “It is an unpleasant fact that nothing has been done to destroy the two nation theory… the situation has been aggravated by efforts of Pakistan to become the self-styled protector of Indian Muslims.” In early fifties, the Jana Sangh pledged itself to the cause of “Akhand Bharat” which meant that India was “one nation, one country and one culture,” and in the mid-fifties it declared that the “Partition of India was a great blunder,” however, after India was drubbed by the Chinese in the 1962 Sino-Indian war, the Hindu nationalists came to their senses but just for a while when Jana Sangh’s leader Deen Dayal Upadhyaya, while repudiating the idea of “Akhand Bharat”, stated that his party had no intention to forcibly merge Pakistan into India rather it would like to form a confederation with Pakistan otherwise the Hindu nationalists have consistently opposed Urdu language and the Aligarh University which they believed was a “poisonous plant” that should have been made “to die its own death.” So bitter is the venom of the Hindu nationalists against Pakistan and its founder Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah that when Advani praised Jinnah on his visit to Pakistan, he was forced to submit resignation and when another BJP stalwart Jaswant Singh commended the leadership of the Quaid in his book, he was expelled from the party.

The self-styled Hindu nationalist leaders who adorn the mantle of self-rightousness are not without blemishes themselves. Even the highest among them have been tainted by charges of corruption and wrongdoings. In the 1970s, one of the provocative slogans of the Hindu nationalists against the Congress Premier Indira Gandhi was “gali gali may shoor hai, Indira Gandhi chor hai;” lately, this slogan has haunted the BJP leaders as well. Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s reputation as prime minister was besmirched by his foster son-in-law, Ranjan Bhattacharya, who lived with the premier and influenced important deals. LK Advani was accused of having taken 35 lac rupees in a 64 crore rupees hawala scam in 1991. Though the court acquitted him six years later, the damage was done. The most embarrassing moment for the BJP was when its party president, Bangaru Laxman, was caught on tape accepting bribes in a defence deal. Another BJP President Nitin Gadkari’s name has been linked to several business scandals. Amit Shah, the right-hand man of Narendra Modi during his stint as the interior minister of Gujrat, was accused in the murder of one Sohrabuddin Sheikh and his wife Kausar Bi. In addition, the reputation of some leaders was tarnished for indulgence in immoral activities. Atal Bihari Vajpayee is a case in point. While living in a bungalow at 30 Rajendra Prasad Road that was allotted by the party, Vajpayee was accused of maintaining an illicit relationship with a former classmate who lived with him till she passed away in 2014. This was revealed by a senior Hindu nationalist leader Balraj Madhok in his memoir “Zindagi ka safar” in these words: “When I was the president of the party, Jagdish Prasad Mathur in charge of the central office who was staying with a central leader at 30 Rajendra Prasad Road complained to me that the leader had turned the house into a den of immoral activities. I had discovered that the senior leadership of the RSS was bent upon making this leader the president of the Jana Sangh. I went to Golwalker and told him what Mathur had said. After hearing me Golwalker was quiet for some time. Then he said, ‘I know about the weaknesses of people. But I have to run an organisation; I have to take everybody together. So like Shiva I have to drink poison every day.’”