The Hindu : The march of the Right

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Aug 28, 2002

Opinion

Opinion - Leader Page Articles

The march of the Right

By V. Krishna Ananth

Those on the other side are letting the communal-fascist forces entrench themselves in the political discourse and expand making full use of all the institutions in the democratic edifice.

IN THE autumn of 1944, Ulrich von Hassell, a former German Ambassador to Rome and a courageous anti-Nazi, was executed in the aftermath of the July plot, an attempt to kill Hitler by exploding a bomb in the conference hall of a Prussian fortress where he was in a meeting. The plot failed. In accordance with an ancient German law, Ulrich's daughter, Fey von Hassell, who was married into a prominent Italian family (and living on their estate near Venice), was picked up as a "special prisoner" of the SS. She and several others including the famous Pastor of the Bekenntniskirche (the confessional church), Martin Niemoller, were shuttled across Hitler's burning empire in trucks and cattle cars.

Fey von Hassell, by no means a committed anti-fascist, survived to write "A Mothers War". Recalling Hitler's birthday celebration on April 20, 1937, hosted by her father (the then German Ambassador to Rome), Fey notes: "Ettel, the chief Nazi among the German residents, has obviously learned the whole of Mein Kampf by heart. It states that the best method of persuasion is to hammer the same slogans over and over again into people's heads. Ettel's idiotic speech consisted of an incredibly boring recital of Hitler's public appearances..." She then stresses: "Unfortunately, most people there did not see how absurd the whole affair was."

This, in a sense, seems to be the reality today. The articulate sections of our society and even a section within the political stable, with years of political experience (including those who were victims of authoritarian terror themselves), are now celebrating every time the state is revealing its oppressive claws; taking it out against those holding political views other than that of the establishment. Take for instance the recent detention and deportation of a few activists linked to the Maoists (in Nepal). There was not even a whimper of protest from any quarter in the mainstream political establishment. The deported men also happened to include journalists known to be fighting against the "end" of democracy in Nepal. Similarly, the refrain recently by the BJP leader from Tamil Nadu, L. Ganesan, on the detention of the MDMK chief, Vaiko. Mr. Ganesan termed the use of POTA against Mr. Vaiko as a case of abuse of the law; he went on to describe the MDMK leader as a patriot beyond doubt simply because he was unflinching in his support to the May 11-13 nuclear tests and then the weaponisation programme, the Kargil saga and the steps initiated by the Union Government in the aftermath of December 13, 2001.

In other words, the message was clear: that POTA and its provisions can be invoked, any day, against all those who oppose militarism as a political enterprise. Following from this, those opposed to the nuclear adventure and those who stand up for peace in the region (particularly with Pakistan) are vulnerable to being branded as anti-national and detained under POTA.

The same mindset is behind the construction that those who view Narendra Modi's recommendation for elections in Gujarat (earlier than scheduled) as a cynical manipulation of the democratic edifice are part of a conspiracy to deprive Gujarat of peace. The strategy here is to first redefine such concepts as nationalism and democracy from a point of view that suits the ruling ideology (in this case the majoritarian world view), reducing them to mere slogans in the process, and then appropriate them to suit partisan interests. This indeed is the rhetoric indulged in by L. K. Advani in Parliament accusing the Opposition of conspiring to prevent Mr. Modi from seeking the people's mandate.

"Going-to-the-people", after all, is the ultimate in a democratic set-up. But then, history is replete with instances when individuals and platforms had managed to distort democracy beyond redemption by resorting to the slogan of "let-the-people-decide" in a context witnessing a crisis of political legitimacy. The fact that the BJP's fascination for early elections in Gujarat emanates out of its plan to cash in on the communal polarisation (and the siege mentality that has afflicted the minority community quite naturally after the massive violence against it during March 2002) is sought to be pushed under the carpet by its pretensions to democratic values. The rise of the Nazis in Germany and the Fascists in Italy making use of the economic crisis leading out of the Wall Street crash is an experience that cannot be forgotten. The National Socialists destroyed the Third Reich (the bourgeois democratic edifice in Germany) by making full use of all the institutions that existed then; the point is that they were able to destroy the Reich's foundations too once they took over the edifice. This they could do by pretending to be the most democratic of all the parties of the time. The Narendra Modi project in Gujarat is no different.

While informed sections among the articulate middle classes may agree (even if they do so grudgingly) that the apprehensions over the BJP's agenda are just not visceral and may find some parallels between these developments in India — the curtailment of civil rights, the redefinition of nationalism and patriotism from the majoritarian standpoint and the enterprise of reducing such concepts as democracy and the "people's right to decide" into slogans — and the events that led to the fascist takeover in Europe during the 1920s, the tragedy is that the political stable continues to be occupied by those who ignore the larger crisis.

Take, for instance, the spectrum of parties in the Opposition (barring the Left to a certain extent); even while attempting to resist the BJP's game plan in Gujarat, such parties as the Congress, the Samajwadi Party, the Telugu Desam and the DMK refused to resist the temptation, whenever the opportunity came, of indulging in dangerous games such as war mongering (read Pakistan-bashing) or even playing ball with the Right on some other occasions. An instance of this kind in recent times was the decision by the Madhya Pradesh Government to order the closure of the Hoshangabad Science Teaching Programme that was in vogue in all Government-run middle schools in two districts (and also in select schools elsewhere in the State) run by a group called Ekalavya, only because the Chief Minister, Digvijay Singh, had received complaints against them from a BJP MLA. The Digvijay Singh Government is guilty, in a way, of the same acts as the Murli Manohar Joshi regime; distorting the curriculum to serve the right-wing agenda.

It is this inability of the Opposition parties (or is it their own approach to politics that is innocent of ideology?) that should raise concern. While the right wing is clear about its agenda and the battle lines are drawn so clearly, those on the other side are letting the communal-fascist forces entrench themselves in the political discourse and expand making full use of all the institutions in the democratic edifice. That they have been able to succeed in a big way in destroying some of the critical aspects of the democratic project in the course of this — the curtailment of civil liberties in much the same way as Indira Gandhi could do for a short while from June 25, 1975, — is something that cannot be glossed over.

The consequences of such short-sightedness could lead the nation into a perilous course that provoked Carl Friedrich Goerdeler, one of the leaders of the civilian resistance against Hitler, to note before his execution: "May the world and the Germans take my own and my friends' deaths as a penance for the sins that have been committed under the Swastika".

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