Dew drops never quench a man’s thirst . So far, Hindutva has come in driblets like ban on cow slaughter, chorussing Bharat Mata ki Jai, compulsory standing up and singing of national anthem in theatres , love jihad, Gau cess, informal ban on critical references to the armed forces, and ‘othering’ of minorities in myriad subtle ways. Is that it ?
Shashi Tharoor (Congress MP) , at the cost getting his office in Thiruvananthapuram vandalised by BJP vigilantes, has ignited a public debate with his prognosis that says no ; a BJP win in LS 2019 will leapfrog Hindutva or Hindu Rashtra into political consciousness as never before.
Already in control of over half the states, if it pulls off a two thirds majority it would ,in due time , result in a similar strength in RS as well. What would then stop BJP from dressing up the constitution in a manner that hands Hindutva on a platter to Sangh parivar ? And why would it not, after all a Hindu Rashtra is Sangh’s existential be all end all.
There are just four possible reason why it may not - a genuine faith in the existing ethos of the constitution, or the moral imperative to make good on protestations of fealty to it, or fear of judicial obstruction, or finally, dread of adverse global opinion.
Let’s first take the moral question first. No BJP leader ever pledged not to amend the constitution. So it will suffer no moral qualms in altering it through the laid down process. A wolf set to guard a chicken poop doesn’t sanctimoniously turn vegetarian. So the chickens will soon start disappearing and among the first ones will be secularism, socialism, free judiciary, independent institutions, election laws, even Citizenship Act.
Even judiciary may not turn out to be as big an impediment as it looks. With SC and HC justices unabashedly accepting state employment post retirement with no cooling period , and the MoP for appointment of higher judges empowering Centre to reject or delay indefinitely consideration of Collegium vetted names that it finds inconvenient or not amenable to its overtures , or simply failing to notify them, ‘committed’ High Judicial benches doesn’t look improbable. For instances the link between re-employment of Justices AKGoel, RK Agrawal, Anthony Dominic and P Sadashivam and pro state judgements in important cases , including Amit Shah cases seem less than tenuous.
Further, the collegium appears powerless , or so it wants to be , in getting its recommendations through in the face of obdurate refusal by state. Justice Kurien to SC and advocates Md Mansoor, Basharat Ali Khan, Nasir Ahmed Beig to HCs are some cases in point. Coincidentally, the ‘disfavoured’ all belong to minority groups. Does it disclose an unfolding pattern ?
Nor is the ruling regime high strung on adverse international opinions/reports. In the perception of women, world-wide, India is perched at top of countries deemed most dangerous for women ; UN wants to investigate alleged human rights violations and atrocities in Kashmir ; its own party wings, VHP and Bajrang Dal, are put on UN’s list of religious militant organisations ; a Swedish think tank has tolled the tocsin on our steep decline in Liberal Democracy Index score under since Mr Modi’s helmsmanship, none of these raise its hackles. It’s life as usual, unfazed and unapologetic.
That brings us to the last one , faith in constitution. Our constitution bestows to all its citizen a secular federal polity, a social life free of discrimination on grounds of religion, caste and ethnicity. Its ineluctable ethos is promotion of scientific temper, and individual’s right to free speech and dissent.
The ideological nursing of BJP leadership is in the school of Hindutva. And Hindutva is the very anti- thesis of our constitution. It conjures up a vision of one race, one religion, one language, one culture , one history, and , presumably, one political party - a convergent singularity that admits of only Hindus , others living at its sufferance. To put it succinctly, the conflict is one of - majoritarianism vs secularism, unitary vs federalism, backward looking nostalgia vs scientific temper, mono-culture vs pluralism, constitutional authoritarianism vs liberal democracy, monolingual vs multilingual, conformity vs creativity, ‘Othering ‘ vs ‘We’ feel . If the nation falls under the sway of Hindutva, the constitution risks being reduced to a dark shadow of its former self .
There is little evidence that PM has disowned the heirloom of Hindutva. Confronted with public outrage over abominations, including man slaughter and lynching by various Vigilante groups on Muslims and Dalits PM elects to wear a cloak of silence, or responds belatedly and softly. Is it that the victims are on the wrong side of Hindutva , one for reason of religion, the other, for caste and therefore ineligible for his mercies ?
It is precisely at these times that PM needs to shed his customary obtuseness and assert vehemently his moral authority. With 22 of the 29 states in his party’s kitty, he wields unlimited persuasive powers across large swathe of the political spectrum should he so wish. How else can he claim to represent ‘sawa sau crore deshwasi’?
We see today a strange spectacle of hitherto unheard of restraints on conduct of individual’s social life being privately imposed and supervised by Sangh parivar goons- beef ban, meat ban on occasion of Hindu festivals, community bans on inter caste marriages, ban on muslims offering namaz in public spaces in some cities, more than subtle hints to women to dress demurely, love jihad vigilantism, anti-Valentine day and anti-Romeo squads, ban on films .........all in consonance with elements of Hindutva philosophy.
The impunity with which these crimes are committed is distressing. The perpetrators publicly orchestrate their crime and expect to be feted and felicitated. A sympathetic administration blinks, if not winks. Even union ministers stand in solidarity with these goons , doing photo ops sessions. A sense of elation , rather than shock and horror at perpetration of a crime prevails. This only emboldens and empowers these politically sponsored thugs.
These incessant onslaughts have muffled voices of minorities and Dalits in political and social life. Nothing could be more stark than BJP’s denial of a fair proportion of seats for minorities to contest in assemblies and Lok Sabha . It only aggravates their feel of being unwanted, of being ghettoised, precisely what the fate Hindutva has decreed for them - living at the sufferance of the majority. Isn’t this proof of an inexorable creep towards majoritarianism, Hindutva by stealth ?
In 2014 the middle classs were seduced with slideshows of vikas leaping out of a Gujarat Model. Four years down the line Vikas seems more familiar as the name of the neighbour’s boy than economic growth. In the circumstances, BJP may, as a winning strategy, turn minorities into a surrogate mother to birth a supposed ‘repressed consciousness’ of Hindu identity.
Mr Tharoor’s anguish is no cry wolf. A bellicose evangelism of Hindutva has the potential to brainwash the republic into handing BJP a two third majority in LS. The Hindutva creep will then become a leap. That would not bode well for those who value liberal humanism and freedom of speech and expression. And for parties that swear by it . Unless they adumbrate an appropriate counter narrative and put it across effectively , for them the dungeons await. A majoritarian polity treats dissentient voices rather brutally.
All talk of a Hindutva democracy is oxymoronic.
PS Regretably, a draft composition on the subject got inadvertently posted earlier. It has been deleted.
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