Victory of BJP or communalism?

The BJP itself never expected such victory. The Prime Minister himself admitted he was expecting to win in two states and the other two the Congress was expected to win. Though the Congress win in MP was within the realm of doubt everyone thought Rajasthan will fall in the lap of the Congress. However, even Rajasthan went to the fold of BJP with comfortable margin.

There is need for deep reflection. The BJP, it is interesting to note, did not employ communal card and did not speak the language of Hindutva throughout its election campaign in all the four states and only employed the discourse of development. In fact in case of MP it was Digvijay Singh, the then Chief Minster of MP who tried to employ what was construed as 'soft Hindutva'.

Is it genuine change of heart in case of BJP? Can we say the BJP leaders have come out of clutches of RSS-VHP? Will the BJP now fight all elections on the basis of developmental issues? Or is it only temporary tactics on the part of the BJP. If it is genuine change of heart every secularist will welcome it and it will rid India of hate and divisive politics being employed by the BJP. But all available evidences show it is quite unlikely to happen.

The BJP's only obsession is power, even if it is at the cost of unity and integrity of the country and even if it is through shedding blood of innocent people. The BJP when it came into existence in 1980 after the break up of the Janata Party, had declared that it had adopted secularism and Gandhian socialism as its policy and it took pledge not to resort to communal politics anymore.

What was the result? Did BJP really renounce communal politics? It did but only temporarily. On the secular plank it lost the parliamentary elections very badly. It got only two seats in the 1984 Lok Sabha elections. It was shaken to the core. And it did not hesitate for a moment to renounce its secular and socialist plank. The party, which had taken oath never to resort to communalism began to question the very philosophy of communalism and dubbed it as an alien western concept. It also began to denounce Nehruvian secularism as 'pseudo secularism' and amounting to 'minority appeasement'.

So much for the change of heart on the part of BJP. In fact it was only after formation of the BJP in 1980 and its 'renunciation' of communalism that the BJP became most aggressively communal in mid-eighties. It was after this oath for secularism that BJP raised the question of Ram Mandir and changed the whole direction of Indian politics. Now in view of Mandir politics, communalism has been institutionalised. Indian politics was, until then, nothing, if not secular. And now we heave a sigh of relief, if Hindutva issues are not raised by the BJP in its election campaign.

The reason for the BJP not using Hindutva issues in MP, Rajasthan and Chattisgarh elections are obvious. Firstly, when Digvijay Singh raised 'soft Hindutva' issues in MP in anticipation of the BJP raiding the hard Hindutva issues and particularly so as the BJP had nominated Sadhvi Uma Bharti as the chief ministerial candidate, the BJP vowed not to raise Hindutva issues and raise only developmental issues.

Uma Bharti had played crucial role in Mandir politics and had aroused feelings of hatred among Hindus using her sharply communal rhetoric and everyone was expecting that she would fight MP elections employing Hindutva rhetoric aggressively. But in a way Digvijay Singh, himself a shrewd player in election game thwarted this possibility by raising issues of cow slaughter etc. The BJP thus changed its tactics and decided to take Digvijay Singh on another turf.

MP was known for its bad roads and shortage of electricity and drinking water. The BJP realised that these issues will be far more important for people of MP than Hindutva plank. It realised this particularly after Uma Bharti failed to raise Hindu emotions on the question of Bhojshala in Dhar. Digvijay Singh government frustrated her attempts to turn Bhojshala-Kamal Maula Masjid issue as another Rammandir-Babri Masjid issue by throwing open Bhojshala to Hindus on every Tuesday.

Also, people of India are tired of such emotional issues and no longer respond to them as vigorously as they did during eighties and nineties. This is precisely why the BJP is in a bad shape in U.P., the very epicentre of mandir politics and it had to strike alliance with otherwise its arch enemy BSP and that too broke, fragile relationship as it was. The Bhojshala-Kamal Maula Masjid issue also did not evoke any warmth in Hindu hearts in MP and hence BJP shrewdly raised the issue of electricity, roads and water.

Today the BJP is indeed facing a great dilemma i.e. Hindutva versus development issues. After winning Gujarat elections using Gujarat carnage as winning formula and discovering in Narendra Modi a Hindutva icon gave the BJP a new hope. The BJP leaders then made statements that 'we would use Gujarat model to win elections all over India'. However, immediately after that the BJP lost elections to Congress in Himachal Pradesh and Narendra Modi, the Hindutva icon, had to be withdrawn from campaign. Thus the BJP came to conclusion that India is too diverse to apply the Gujarat model in other parts of India. It was forced to change its strategy once again.

The RSS and Vishwa Hindu Parishad want to keep their iron grip over BJP and dictate terms to it. The BJP, unable to come to power of its own due to this bewildering diversity of India, has to depend on coalition politics (also often described as 'coalition dharma by BJP leaders) and moderate its Hindutva rhetoric. But it also has to face pressures from RSS-VHP as their volunteers do great deal of work during elections. It cannot win elections without the support of these volunteers.

The BJP thus uses development discourse from public platform but clandestinely uses Hindutva propaganda to exploit hard Hindutva votes. There is clear evidence that the Hindutva volunteers were doing door to door campaigns swaying voters' sentiments on hard Hindutva issues like construction of Ram temple on one hand, and converting India into Hindu Rashtra, on the other. These RSS-VHP volunteers were distributing Hindutva leaflets along with election cards from door to door.

It is also interesting to note that all the tribal areas which used to vote for the Congress in MP heavily voted for the BJP this time and the RSS leaders claimed that it was because of work done by Vanwasi Ashrams (i.e. forest dwelling religious centres) in tribal areas. The RSS is concentrating on tribal areas and making these tribals proud of their 'Hindu' identity though in fact tribals are not Hindus. They do not worship Hindu gods and goddesses. Thus the RSS has greatly succeeded in Hiduising the tribals and turning them into Hindutva vote-bank.

In Gujarat too in post-Godhra carnage tribals and dalits were used on a large scale to massacre Muslims. Most horrible carnage took place in tribal areas of Baroda and Panchmahal districts. On the other hand, the Congress does hardly any work among tribals. It has taken these tribal votes for granted. In Chattisgarh too, which is primarily a tribal state and the Congress used to win elections in these areas, it lost heavily and BJP was main beneficiary of tribal votes. Jharkhand state is also primarily tribal and BJP won elections there too and formed Government after it separated from Bihar.

The Congress has to do lot of introspection if it wants to come to power in the states as well as at the Centre. It has to win back tribal areas, which is no easy task for it as the RSS is working very hard among tribals to convert them into Hindu vote bank. Secondly it will have to give up its arrogance that it can win elections on its own and there is no need to enter into coalition with other like-minded secular parties. The Congress still lives in the past and wants to bask into past glory. It is not going to help it any more.

Though it had passed a resolution at Simla to enter into coalition with other like-minded parties but in practice it never did and suffered heavily for it both in Gujarat last year and in these three states. In Gujarat too, if it had entered into coalition with parties like the NCP, the BJP would have lost many seats and would not have won elections by two-third majority. Also, if in these three states it had entered into coalition with the BSP, CPI and other smaller parties it would certainly have won elections if one goes by vote percentages.

The Congress should also realise that masses in India are no more mesmerised by the Nehru family. There is need for more dynamic leadership rather than a leader from only Nehru family. Sycophancy would no more help the party. What is needed is vision and ability to alter the terms of politics once again. Nehru attracted Indian masses mainly because of his futuristic vision of India. Indira Gandhi also sustained this vision and continued to exercise great influence on the minds of Indian voters. The Congress will have to think on these suggestions sincerely to win back the Indian electorates.

Asghar Ali Engineer is founder of Centre for Study of Society and Secularism, Mumbai