People's Democracy

Harkishan Singh Surjeet

AFTER making a series of statements here and there, our prime minister has now come out in his real self. Addressing the BJP national executive’s recent meeting, held on January 4-5, he assured his party colleagues, and through them all organisations of the saffron brigade, that his various statements on the Ayodhya issue were "well thought-out" (sab soch samajh ke kaha). These include not only his Kumarakom "musings" but also his utterances on December 6, 2000, eighth anniversary of the heinous Babri demolition.

It will be recalled that, in his Kumarakom musings, the prime minister had taken the position that the Ayodhya dispute could be resolved through a court verdict or through mutual negotiations. Moreover, he had taken the position that a court case did not preclude the possibility of negotiations; rather the two could be mutually complementary. Shri Vajpayee had even gone to the extent of warning the hawks of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), though without naming the outfit, that they must not try to disturb the status quo at the disputed Ayodhya site. On the face of it, all these positions are unassailable.

REAL WORTH

OF THE MUSINGS

Yet, as we said last week (see People’s Democracy, January 7 issue), the VHP, an important constituent of the Sangh Parivar, was not in the least worried over the prime minister’s words. Leaders of the outfit very soon made it clear that they would go ahead with their plan of temple construction at the Babri site, the programme for which will be declared at the "dharam sansad," to be held on January 19-21. Up till now, their preparations have proceeded according to the plan.

This is not without its own reasons. VHP leaders know the real worth of the prime minister’s statements and are not perturbed a bit by his warnings. We quoted in these columns last week Acharya Giriraj Kishore’s reaction to Shri Vajpayee’s musings. And on Monday, January 8, while speaking at the unveiling of the Ram temple model at VHP camp at Allahabad, Mahanta Ram Charan Das had had the guts to claim that the prime minister would himself take part in the karseva the day the BJP gets an absolute majority at the centre.

On its part, despite his warning to the VHP leaders from Kumarakom, the Vajpayee government has not made any preparations to maintain the status quo at Ayodhya. Nor has any worthwhile steps been taken to bring the two sides of the dispute to the negotiation table. Vinay Katiyar, BJP MP from Faizabad, himself a Bajrang Dal hawk, did give an impression that he was trying to bring the two sides to negotiate. But his move was rejected by leaders of the Babri Masjid Action Committee (BMAC), as an effort to skirt the real issues and present it as a simple land dispute. On its part, the VHP also spurned the move, saying no MP was authorised to hold or organise negotiations.

VHP PLAN CONTINUES

AS ANNOUNCED

On its part, the VHP has come out with an elaborate plan for the period preceding the temple construction. On January 8, the temple’s model was unveiled at the VHP camp at Kumbhnagar, Allahabad, after it was brought there from Jaipur. (According to newspaper reports, a number of prefabricated pillars for the proposed temple have already reached Ayodhya from Rajasthan.) On January 13 and 14, the VHP proposes to hold conventions of its activists residing in 45 foreign countries. Its central organising committee will meet on January 16 and the Pranyasi Mandal members will meet the next day. On January 18 and 19, VHP office bearers, about 2,500 in number, will hold their discussion. The so called "dharam sansad" will take place on January 19 to 21, to be attended by sadhus, sants, mahants and VHP activists. This will be followed by a meeting of the sadhvis on January 22. (Evidently, here too, women are expected only to endorse what the menfolk decide.) Then, a meeting of the office bearers and activists of Bajrang Dal, storm troopers of the VHP, will take place on January 23 and 24. A convention of purohits will be held on January 27 and 28. After a month, the temple’s model will be taken to Ayodhya and kept at Keshavapuram there.

This is indeed a hectic schedule. Behind all this, however, the VHP has one single purpose --- to somehow exploit the religious sentiments of the millions of devout Hindus who will turn up for a holy bath at the confluence of Ganga and Yamuna rivers.

EXPLOITATION OF

RELIGIOUS SENTIMENTS

The choice of the occasion is not fortuitous. The four Kumbh Melas, periodically held every few years, in particular the one at Allahabad, are marked by literally the biggest congregations of devout Hindus. This year, more than 20 million Hindus are expected to come to Allahabad alone for a holy bath. And it is here that the VHP is trying to inject communal venom into the thinking of these basically secular masses, and has roped in a host of sadhus, sants and mahants for the purpose. One cannot possibly witness a more naked attempt at exploiting the religious sentiments of people for communal gains!

On their part, however, the prime minister and the BJP national executive did not give any serious thought to the grandiose plan that has been chalked out and announced by the VHP with much fanfare. After clarifying his position at the national executive meet, Shri Vajpayee presumed that there remains nothing to be said about the VHP programme, and the matter was dropped there. Instead, the prime minister urged the BJP activists to go to the people and explain to them the "achievements" of his government. He asked them to remove the misgivings the people have about his economic policies, in particular his agricultural policies, which are causing a lot of discontent against his government. He then flew away on his foreign jaunt.

This makes the RSS-BJP game absolutely clear. While the BJP workers will try to convince the people about the BJP government’s "achievements" and seek to remove their misgivings, organisations like the VHP and Bajrang Dal will try their level best to turn the prevailing and increasingly deepening discontent into fratricidal channels. The game will continue till the BJP gets a majority on its own, when Shri Vajpayee will himself take part in the karseva.

This is also in line with the Sangh Parivar’s tactic of blowing hot and blowing cold at the same time.

Till now, it is not clear as to what turn the events will take after the "dharam sansad" comes out with an announcement. There is also a possibility that the congregation may not announce a firm date for commencement of the temple construction. According to certain reports, the VHP may keep the issue hanging and, instead, run a campaign in the name of a temple till the imminent assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh are over. The BJP has a big stake in these elections and its defeat in UP (which it is currently ruling with the help of dozens of defectors, many of them with criminal records) will seriously jeopardise its prospects at the national level. Hence the BJP, absolutely not averse to misusing religion for political purposes, may well like to incite the people of the state on communal lines in order to reap electoral dividends.

VIGILANCE CAN’T

BE SLACKENED

Yet, whatever shape the events take in the days to come, one thing is certain: that the secular forces cannot afford to slacken their vigil in the least. The coming months are going to be very, very crucial for the secular fabric of the country, as the communal forces are going to launch their most vigorous offensive since 1991-92. Let the secular forces take the multi-headed monster head on; otherwise they will be risking nothing less than our national unity and our syncretic culture.

This applies, with equal force, to the otherwise secular parties who are, in their lust of power, helping the BJP-RSS combine to maintain and strengthen its hold on state power. The non-BJP, non-Shiv Sena constituents of the NDA have to realise that the BJP is not just another actor in the country’s political-electoral arena; behind it stands the RSS that aims to destroy the very secular and federal foundations of our polity in order to create a rabid Taliban-type theocratic state in the country. Whether on the question of secularism or on the question of economic burdens being imposed on the people, to date their protest has being subdued, at the best. Every time the NDA partners lodged their protest on one or another issue, leaders of the BJP made certain manoeuvres to pacify them. But, all said and done, the BJP has persisted with its style of functioning, doing only what it wants to do, giving the allies nothing but a short shrift.

As for the masses of the country, they have time and again proved that they are a basically secular lot. Not to talk of earlier occasions, when the model of the proposed temple was unveiled at Allahabad, it was, in the words of The Hindustan Time, "a lukewarm affair." In its January 9 edition, the paper reported from Allahabad that the "much-hyped event" turned out to be "a damp squib." The paper then added, "Except for mediapersons, a few VHP members and the security personnel, there was no one to witness the event." Some other papers also reported more or less the same thing. This brings to the fore the basically secular character of Indian masses who will not allow their sense of piety to be exploited for electoral purposes. As the model will be kept at the Kumbh for a month, maybe some people go to see it, but that may be out of curiosity and not an endorsement of the VHP’s communal plan of action. This is the factor that will ultimately foil all the communal attempts of the Sangh Parivar, no matter how hard they try to bring them to fruition.