People's Democracy

EDITORIAL

BJP’s Political Bankruptcy

IN these columns last week, we had commented on the developments in the run-up to the elections to the president of the Indian Republic. Since then, the battle lines have been drawn as expected. Consequently, the country was looking forward to an informed debate on the relative merits of the candidates in discharging the constitutional role of the president.

However, to the dismay of the whole nation, the scurrilous campaign unleashed by the BJP against the UPA candidate is stooping to such low levels which we thought even the BJP was not capable of. The no holds barred mudslinging and character assassination in the contest for the highest office of the Republic has, indeed, been most demeaning.

The Supreme Court’s squashing of the petition challenging the UPA candidate’s nomination, the inability of the BJP to substantiate the charges that they have levelled, all go to show the scant respect that the BJP has for the highest constitutional office of our Republic. Undermining constitutional authority has always been an important part of the communal agenda advanced by the RSS/BJP. The Indian Constitution enjoins all its consequent authorities to safeguard and strengthen the secular democratic character of the Republic. It is precisely this character that the RSS/BJP want to transform by converting the Republic into a rabidly intolerant fascistic `Hindu Rashtra’.

Therefore, from the flip-flop that they had shown, as commented by us in these columns last week, by first announcing support to the incumbent vice president, then extending support to the Third Front proposal to re-nominate the incumbent president and when this charade was exposed, then to fall back once again to supporting the vice president, the BJP has unleashed such a degenerated campaign. Well, their character is there for all to see.

What is worse, however, is the defence that the BJP is putting up of their candidate. The BJP spokesperson has informed the nation that Shekhawat had joined the police force as a probationary sub-inspector in 1942. She also produced the discharge note of 1948 which highlighted the commendable role of the sub-inspector. Sushma Swaraj seems not to have realised the damage that she is doing to Shekhawat’s candidature. Everyone in the country knows that the Quit India movement was launched in 1942. Millions of freedom fighters were subjected to police brutalities during this movement. What does it mean to serve the police force in this period and leave the service with a discharge note commending the performance soon after our independence? Is Swaraj aware of what she is attributing to Shekhawat as serving the police force and acting against the Indian freedom movement?

It is the same RSS/BJP which ad nauseum hurls false allegations against the Left for their role in the Quit India movement.
One need not go into the details of the already richly documented history of the role of the Left in India's struggle for freedom. It would suffice to note that when the country was celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Quit India Movement, the then president of India, Dr Shankar Dayal Sharma, addressing the midnight session of the parliament said: "After large scale strikes in mills in Kanpur, Jamshedpur and Ahmedabad, a despatch from Delhi dated September 5, 1942, to the Secretary of State, in London, reported about the Communist Party of India: "the behaviour of many of its members proves what has always been clear, namely, that it is composed of anti-British revolutionaries."

On the contrary, the role of the RSS during India's freedom struggle is an open secret. The Bombay Home Department, during the 1942 Quit India Movement, observed, "The Sangh has scrupulously kept itself within the law and in particular has refrained from taking part in the disturbances that broke out in August 1942."

Sushma Swaraj’s defence of Shekhawat, thus, seems to be diabolically endorsing the RSS’s role during the freedom struggle.

Swaraj also reminds the country that upon becoming the chief minister of Rajasthan in 1977, Shekhawat had withdrawn cases against various people for participating in the struggle against the emergency including two against himself! In the post-Babri Masjid demolition period, the Supreme Court upheld the dismissal of the government led by Shekhawat in Rajasthan on the grounds that it worked against the fundamental structure of our Constitution by sending kar sevaks for the demolition.

Hence, the BJP not satisfied with the mudslinging against the UPA candidate is, in fact, contributing to create unseemly controversies for their own candidate and the incumbent vice president of India. Such is the political bankruptcy of the BJP.