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BJP : Commitment to Hindu India |
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The BJP national executive at its meeting in Ranchi last week has reiterated the party’s strong commitment to its Hindutva ideology. In his speech at the opening of the meeting, party president Advani said the BJP is unambiguously committed to the idea of a Hindu India. He said if anybody tries to take the cover of secularism to indulge in anti-Hindu politics and statecraft, the BJP will stand in their path like a rock, prepared to make any sacrifice. The corner-stone of his speech was a no-holds barred attack on “pseudo-secularism” and assertion of India’s ethos, outlined in much stronger terms than even during his Rath Yatra days in 1990. He said the arrest of Shankaracharya of Kanchipuram has provided the BJP with the same opportunity for ideological mass mobilisation as the Ayodhya issue had done in the 1980s and 90s.
The tempo continued till the end of the session with Advani claiming in his concluding speech that the BJP is God’s chosen instrument to protect Hindu India.
In a formulation reminiscent of the medieval European doctrine of the divine right to rule, Advani declared that “the BJP is really the Chosen Instrument of the Divine to take our country out of its present problems and to lofty heights of all-round achievements.”
Advani’s invocation of divinity in his concluding speech at the meeting was not an off-the-cuff remark, but reflected the BJP’s turn towards a very overt religiosity as the antidote for demoralization and indiscipline that has swept the party in the wake of a series of electoral defeats.
In many ways, the Ranchi national executive session has been as ideologically significant as the famous Palampur national executive in June 1989 when the BJP formally adopted a resolution backing the Ramajanmbhumi movement and signaled an unapologetic adoption of Hindutva as its political ideological doctrine.
Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in his speech on the concluding day of the national executive meeting on Friday (Nov. 26) endorsed Advani’s call for a return to the Hindutva ideology. He said there is no difference between the concepts of Hindutva and Bharatiyta.
“Hindutva is a philosophy of life,” he said, adding “it cannot be an electoral issue.”
Vajpayee harped on Advani’s “kushal netratva” (capable leadership) and recalled how he had been offering guidance to the party since the Jan Sangh days. “Advaniji stands like a rock before any difficulty,” he said.
Signs of early return of Uma Bharti
Indications of the early return of former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Uma Bharti to the BJP fold came in Advani’s press conference. She had been suspended from the BJP for defying the party leadership earlier this month.
Breaking his silence on the Uma episode for the first time since she walked out of a party office bearers’ meeting before TV cameras, Advani clearly hinted at her possible return. The BJP chief said : “In these three days not a single member had raised the issue even once. She has gone on vacation and when she returns from there finally, she will discuss some issues with me.m In a letter to me she had expressed the desire to discuss some things,” Advani said.
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