Time for new strategies

The relationship between the RSSand BJP has a complex history but it is not a relationship between equals. PRABHASH JOSHI reviews a book by A. G. Noorani that looks at the power equations between the two organisations and the dilemma facing the BJP today as a consequence of its attempts at secularisation.

A. G. NOORANI remains one of our most committed and devoted critics of the Sangh Sampradaya (sect). Unlike other believers in secularism, he refuses to accept and compromise with what is described these days as political reality. And again, unlike yet another set of secularists, he is firm in his assessment of the so called "liberal" and "secular" Atal Behari Vajpayee as a true son of the RSS and does not buy the facile argument for cooperating with him and the BJP to secularise the party.

Noorani concludes in "Retrospect and Prospect" in his book The RSS and the BJP: A Division of Labour: "It does suit the RSS to have a BJP Government in power at the Centre. But the clock is ticking away against both. Of what use a BJP regime to the RSS if it does not implement the RSS agenda? If the BJP continues as it is, domesticated and rendered 'respectable', the political arm of the RSS will be atrophied and its agenda forgotten, if not discredited. That leaves infiltration in the administration, saffronisation of education and imposition of cultural hegemony as possible fields of endeavour.

"But if the BJP listens to the RSS on these matters, it loses allies and alienates public opinion. If it does not, it loses the RSS support. Whom is it prepared now to deceive and ditch, the RSS or the nation whom it keeps assuring that it has no 'hidden agenda' apart from that of the NDA? The BJP is confronted with a dilemma of its own creation."

Does the BJP indeed have a dilemma? To have a dilemma, you have to be your own man or, in the case of the BJP, your own party. Only someone with options can afford a dilemma. As it clearly emerges from Noorani's book, the BJP is not a political party as other democratic, political parties are. It is not free to choose its way, ideology and strategy. It will never be left to emerge as an independent political party. The RSS will never allow that.

The BJP is a creation of the RSS and does not enjoy an equal relationship with the mother organisation. It has been created to spread and establish Hindutva in the political field and to make the Indian State serve the purpose of Hindutva by participating in elections and capturing political power. If the BJP shows any genuine desire to give up Hindutva, the RSS will certainly finish it. The RSS, by creating the BJP, has not given up politics.

As Noorani has quoted from the RSS application in the court of the District Judge, Nagpur, in 1978: "The RSS does not participate in day-to-day politics though the Sangh has a political philosophy within its wide sweep of cultural work. It is possible for the Sangh to change this policy and even participate in politics." The BJP cannot and will never cut the umbilical cord. Hence, the strange and unique phenomenon in India of a cultural organisation controlling a political party. Noorani rightly calls it duplicity and gives numerous examples of the RSS practice of deception and deceit, and shows how its style is one of calculated ambiguity.

I don't know why Noorani sub-titled this book "A Division of Labour". The French scholar Christophe Jaffrelot used this term in his study The Hindu Nationalist Movement and Indian Politics while describing the acceptance of the Palampur Resolution on the Ramjanmabhoomi agitation. "A division of labour then took place between Advani and Vajpayee, who presented a more moderate face of Hindu nationalism."

A division of labour is possible between Advani and Vajpayee. It is also possible among Sangh Sampradaya organisations like the BJP, the VHP, the Bajrang Dal, and the Hindu Jagran Manch because they are all sisters fathered by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. But given their unequal relationship, there can never be a division of labour between the RSS and the BJP. The BJP can never turn back and ask the mother institution to do this or that. They are not equals. It is necessary to understand this relationship not only to understand the dangers of having an institution like the Sangh Sampradaya but also to democracy and the Indian ethos that sustains our liberal and secular democracy.

Noorani has also quoted the oft-quoted study - The Brotherhood in Saffron - by Walter Anderson and Shridhar Damle. According to Anderson and Damle, "It is questionable if the BJP could survive politically without the RSS cadre and the cadre will not stay unless the leadership of the party stays firmly in the hands of the brotherhood." Also quoted is Bangaru Laxman, the hand-picked Dalit president of the BJP. On August 27, 2000, at Nagpur, Laxman claimed: "there is nothing in our ideology, policies and programme for anyone to surmise that we should not or cannot reach out to the Muslims." But, at the same session of the National Council, he said to Panchjanya: "Look here, the question of giving up Hindutva simply does not arise. After all, Hindutva is in-built in the party."

Bangaru Laxman made an effort last year to woo Muslims in an attempt to reassure liberal Hindus, the majority of this country, who have always rejected the politics of hate practised by the Hindu Mahasabha of V. D. Sarvarkar and Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, and the RSS and the fronts it established. The Bangaru Laxman "rekha" has since been thoroughly violated by the RSS leadership. The RSS wants the Muslims to "Indianise" Islam, to become a sect of Hindutva. Essays in Noorani's book, such as "The RSS: Outlook and Policies", "The Sangh Parivar and the British", "Current Agendas" and the epilogue, "Retrospect and Prospect" convincingly show what kind of a nation India would become if the Sangh Sampradaya has its way.

As Noorani has warned, "Either the Sangh Parivar will have to be contained and defeated or Indian secularism, already enfeebled, will have to be abandoned and with it, democracy as well." No one foresaw this menace more clearly than Jawaharlal Nehru, says Noorani. Indeed, Nehru was a great secularist, but it was during his leadership that the communalism of the minority and that of the majority were characterised as different.

The Sangh Sampradaya used Nehru's differentiation to exploit the Hindu sense of vulnerability and inferiority - using "the strategy of stigmatisation and emulation" - to communalise and Hinduise the majority. The Congress at first converted this difference into a tool to consolidate the Muslim vote bank. Indira Gandhi and later Rajiv Gandhi forgot the difference and played into the hands of the Sangh Sampradaya. Containing and defeating the Sangh Sampradaya would need a new strategy. Would Noorani devote his knowledge, skill and commitment to developing a new strategy?

The RSS and the BJP: A Division of Labour, A. G. Noorani, Leftword Books, Rs. 75 (paperback).

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