The Hindu : Opinion / News Analysis : Advani in a dilemma

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Monday, Oct 25, 2004

Opinion

Opinion - News Analysis

Advani in a dilemma

By Neena Vyas

NEW DELHI, OCT. 24. Perhaps the most difficult question facing the Bharatiya Janata Party is how to take forward the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh's Hindutva agenda — after all, the BJP is the political arm of the RSS — and yet not annoy its allies in the National Democratic Alliance to the point that they think of quitting the alliance.

Agenda in abeyance

The problem is that for six years while the BJP was in power at the Centre it repeatedly told the RSS that its agenda, which was also dear to the BJP itself, could not be taken up as the party was in a coalition government. Now that the next Lok Sabha elections are far away and the BJP has to sit in the Opposition, this "excuse'' may no longer be bought by the Sangh Parivar.

After a post-defeat `chintan baithak' (brainstorming session) in Goa this July-August in which the RSS also took part, the party prepared the "Tasks Ahead'' document at its Mumbai executive which clearly said the party should go "back to basics'', that it had wrongly ignored its "core constituency'', and it needed to give an "ideological orientation'' to its agenda.

Mr. Advani, who had helped shape the BJP's Hindutva plank in the five years from 1985, when he first became party president, can once again be expected to give the ideological thrust that the RSS insists the BJP must have.

Disguised as nationalism

To resolve the dilemma it faces — how to keep its "ideological orientation'' and please the RSS while ensuring that its allies do not begin distancing themselves from the NDA — the BJP has tried to disguise Hindutva as "nationalism''. Over the years, Hindutva has been rechristened many times — "integral humanism'', "cultural nationalism'' and now just "nationalism'' and whenever the party speaks about "nationalist organisations'' it means all the organisations affiliated to the RSS.

It seems that the dropping of the Hindutva nomenclature for the party's ideology was a conscious move to assuage its NDA allies as well as reassure the RSS that Hindutva remains the BJP's plank although under a different name.

Under this new "nationalist'' ideology the BJP has already raised issues such as "insult to Savarkar'', the influx from Bangladesh (Mr. Advani used the RSS language when he talked about the threat of a third Islamic state in the subcontinent), the spread of "jihadi terrorism.'' And more recently, it jumped to give a totally unwarranted and alarmist reaction to the Census Commissioner's initially botched-up statistics on population growth on the basis of religious denomination.

Divisive ideology

There is no doubt that as long as the BJP remains a part of the Sangh Parivar — and even a Vajpayee was proud to claim the RSS heritage — it cannot and will not move away from Hindutva. By describing it as "nationalism'' or a "nationalist ideology'' it has only tried to give a sugar coat to a divisive ideology.

But what the BJP has not yet come to terms with is the fact that the Hindutva it had espoused during the years leading to the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992 stands thoroughly exposed. Not even affiliates of the RSS such as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad are ready to believe its declarations on "idealism'' and "ideology''.

But it seems that the party has yet to come to terms with the electoral defeat and understand that no matter what name it calls it by, Hindutva will not fetch it votes; it did not, except in the last Gujarat Assembly elections which were held following a blood bath.

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