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Is India a Hindu state : Debate within Parivar (RSS family)

	November 25, 2002

Deputy Prime Minister Advani is having to pay a heavy price for his attempt to put some sense into VHP diehard activists. Advani echoed Vajpayee’s secular principles and advised against exploiting the Godhra carnage and also affirmed in Parliament last week that India cannot be a Hindu Rashtra (State.) This brought a sharp attack from the VHP which accused Advani of virtually betraying the Hindutva cause.

Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray criticised Advani for “backstabbing the cause of staunch Hindutva”. In the Sena’s mouthpiece Saamna, Thackeray wrote, “You have no right to decide if this is a Hindu nation or not. This country is and will continue to be a Hindu nation. We do not need your permission for it.”

The Sena chief then issued a veiled threat of withdrawing support to the NDA government at the Centre if the BJP leaders continued to take a soft stand on Hindutva. “If you continue to throw Iftaar parties and continue to soften your stand on Hindutva, then we are neither interested in Vajpayee continuing as Prime Minister nor we would want Advani to remain his deputy. Don’t force the Hindus to make you step down from power. We are supporting this government only for the cause of Hindutva,” said Thackeray.

Thackeray said his party is aware of Vajpayee’s stand on the subject but Advani was always known for his hardcore Hindutva policy. He also objected to Advani throwing an Iftaar party. “As it is the Prime Minister tries hard to portray a secular image of himself. But the entire country looks to Advani as a staunch supporter of Hindutva. There was no need for him to make the statement in the Lok Sabha. He has stabbed the nation and the Hindus in the back,” Thackeray

On November 18, Advani said in the Lok Sabha that “BJP and other related organisations should see that the elections [in Gujarat] are free and fair and that good governance and safety of minorities are key poll issues.”

The relationship between the Shiv Sena and the BJP has seen many ups and downs in the recent past . Earlier, the Shiv Sena objected to the UTI scam and the role of the PMO. In crucial decisions. When Pakistan President Musharraf visited India to attend the Agra Summit, Thackeray was very upset over Vajpayee’s decision to invite Musharraf and hold talks with him to solve end to Indo-Pak problems. Similarly he contested the NDA Government’s ways of combating terrorism. He equally criticised government’s efforts to bring about changes in labour policy. The Shiv Sena chief was critical of disinvestment policy and has accused the NDA government of selling the country to outsiders.

Deputy Prime Minister Advani has been a supporter of staunch Hindutva and wanted it to be the main poll plank for Gujarat and the next Lok Sabha elections. The Opposition and the media have constantly criticized him for supporting the cause of Hindutva. Advani has extended his support to Narendra Modi, despite the anti-minortiy agenda pursued by him. Observers are of the opinion that Advani might have softened his stand to safeguard the image of the BJP among Muslim voters.

The BJP quickly came to the defence of Advani. The way the VHP raised a controversy over Advani’s remark, that India could never become a Hindu state, was unnecessary, the BJP stated. “The Vishwa Hindu Parishad seems to have reacted in haste to the Deputy Prime Minister’s remarks,” BJP parliamentary spokesperson V K Malhotra said. He pointed out that the VHP, like the BJP, agreed with the Supreme Court observation that Hindutva was not a religion and that the Constituent Assembly had never said that India would be a theocratic state. Malhotra pointed out that Advani had only reiterated what the Constituent Assembly had said.

Observers note that no one could have imagined that L.K. Advani 1990 rath yatra would one day face face the ire of Hindutva hardliners ? Their criticism of Vajpayee is understandable. The Prime Minister’s known moderation has never been liked by the hawks. Advani, however, was in a different category primarily because of the perception of his intrinsically hardline attitude. But his Lok Sabha speech on Gujarat has caused a flutter. Not only has the Deputy Prime Minister echoed Vajpayee’s appeal to all political parties not to exploit the Godhra tragedy in their election campaign, he has also asserted that India can never become a Hindu Rashtra.

Although this is not the first time that Advani has made such remarks about how the country’s heterogeneity militates against a dogmatic approach, it is the context in which he has said it which is of concern to the hardliners. Their gameplan has been to push their hawkish line during the campaign. There is a two-fold reason for this stance. For a start, it is the belief among the conservative elements in the BJP and the Parivar that the only reason why the party is seemingly losing ground is because it is not assertive enough about its Hindutva agenda. So, they want to test this thesis in Gujarat and, if successful, extend it to the rest of the country.

However, the realists in the BJP are uneasy about such belligerence. They believe that it will not only scare away its partners in the NDA but large sections of the voters as well who are more interested in governance than in ideological battles. As long as Vajpayee followed this moderate line, the hawks were not too worried since they felt that they had Advani on their side. Now this belief has been shattered, provoking the VHP to level the old charge of minority appeasement - so long reserved for the Congress and ‘pseudo-secularists’ - against Advani.

Advani’s reply to a discussion in the Lok Sabha on Gujarat was a crucial and enormously reassuring intervention in a larger debate that the political battle for Gujarat has once again propelled centrestage. It has been clear that the fight in Gujarat is not simply over the leadership of one state and that it isn’t simply the BJP versus the Congress. At stake is the very idea of India, and the more vicious tug of war appears to be taking place within the ranks of the saffron parivar - between those who wield Hindutva to undercut India’s secularism and those who believe in a less restrictive, more inclusive definition of Hinduism that is at ease with the secular principle, say analysts.

Advani’s statement in Parliament does something very important : it separates the fringe from the mainstream. The senior BJP leader has unequivocally distanced his party, and the Government it leads, from the divisive and sectarian agenda of the VHP and Bajrang Dal.



Sonia targets Advani

But there was no relief from the Opposition. The NDA Government and Advani came under severe criticism from Congress president Sonia Gandhi when she addressed the general body meeting of the Congress Parliamentary Party. The move came as no surprise considering that Gujarat elections are just round the corner. While the Congress chief expressed confidence in the party’s performance in the forthcoming Gujarat elections, much of her speech was targeted at the NDA. Deputy Prime Minister Advani, in particular, came under severe criticism when Sonia accused him of being partly responsible for the BJP and VHP’s recent utterances against the Election Commission (EC).

Commenting on Advani’s reply to the debate in the Lok Sabha on November 18, she said: “The BJP and the VHP, apart from disrupting peace and hampering progress, have launched a systematic attack on constitutional institutions such as the Election Commission. Sadly, Advani’s reply failed to disapprove of this most dangerous trend.”

Sonia said she was sure that the people of Gujarat would reject the forces which were spreading “hate and bigotry.” She added, “I am confident the state will reject the forces that have done so much to damage its fair name, its legacy of religious tolerance and understanding.” Charging the NDA Government with having no clear agenda to revive the country’s economy, she said it has failed on all counts during its three-year rule. “The Government,” she added, “has been in office - just that and no more. There has been no purposeful governance, no coherent leadership, no clear sense of direction.”