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Wooing the victim

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"Muslims are flesh of our flesh and blood of our blood", says the new BJP president. Is saffron changing colour? Or, haven't we heard that before? 

 

The newly–elected BJP  president,Bangaru  Laxman’s Nagpur state- ment that Muslims are  “flesh of our flesh and blood of our blood” and his invitation to them to make his party their new home has sent political analysts and commentators guessing the possible reasons behind the BJP’s “change of heart”. In order of decreasing scepticism, the explanations being offered are as follows: 

One: The BJP president’s pro-Muslim posture was nothing more than a PR stunt on behalf of his mentor, Atal Behari Vajpayee, on the eve of the latter’s foreign jaunt — UN summit and the US. The Prime Minister, understandably, did not want to face “awkward questions” from the international press. 

Two: Laxman’s call, though addressed to Muslims is, in fact, aimed at the liberal Hindus to ensure they do not get alienated from the sangh parivar, because of the unsavoury words and deeds of the ‘hard–line’ VHP and Bajrang Dal. It also will help keep the BJP’s allies in the NDA in good humour.

Three: Through Laxman, ‘moderates’ in the BJP, led by Vajpayee, are building the party’s distance from the embarrassing members of the same parivar — the parent RSS and siblings, the VHP and the Bajrang Dal.
Four: Laxman is merely articulating the BJP’s political compulsion. The BJP cannot hope to rise above the plateau it has reached if Muslims, who constitute around 12 per cent of the national electorate (in major states like UP and West Bengal, it is closer to 20 per cent), remain alienated from the party. For once, Laxman and other BJP leaders are quite candid about the fact that its vote–bank politics they are talking about: “This is not an appeasement, this is an appeal; There are 12 crore Muslims who vote en bloc, so we cannot afford to ignore them”. 
Five: The BJP president’s statement reflects the broad vision of the BJP. The 1999 Lok Sabha election results have led to “an unhealthy situation of Muslims not having a stake in the power structure. Laxman’s initiative is an attempt to broaden the social base of the ruling coalition. A legitimate political exercise”. 

Political analysts and commentators may continue their debate on the real intentions behind the BJP’s latest exercise in wooing Muslims. But it is more than evident that few among India’s Muslims have taken Laxman’s invitation seriously. 

(Curiously, little attention has been paid to other statement made by Laxman, a Dalit, in Nagpur, about the city being the ideological epicentre of both Hegdewar, a high priest of Hindutva and the founder of the RSS, and Dr. BR Ambedkar, who led half a million Dalits to convert to Buddhism on October 10, 1956 at Nagpur, because in his analysis “there can be no social and political emancipation for the Dalit within the Hindu fold”. 
Laxman believes that the participation of Dalits in the Ramjanmabhoomi movement, in the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya and in the riots in Ahmedabad, Mumbai and elsewhere has helped forge an “all Hindu identity” and resolved the tension between Hindutva and Amedkarism forever. But the poor electoral support to the BJP in the Lok Sabha elections in 1999 suggests that the vast majority of India’s dalits do not share Laxman’s love for the sangh parivar. (See box, ‘The BJP’s new social bloc’ and the comment piece by Kancha Ilaiah in this issue).

The many reasons for the lack of Muslim enthusiasm to the BJP president’s call are reflected in the responses of several prominent Muslims who spoke to Communalism Combat. (See box). The gist of these responses could be reduced to the following proposition: 

Depending on their political convenience, BJP leaders say one thing and mean another, say different things on different occasions, or speak with forked–tongues. Others from the saffron brotherhood — VHP, Bajrang Dal, Shiv Sena, Hindu Munnani, and a host of outfits floated by the RSS — are more honest and consistent. They say what they do and their hostility towards Muslims and other religious minorities is equally evident from their word and deed. 
Not for nothing is the BJP an integral part of the sangh parivar, ideologically and organisationally speaking. Every time there is ‘action on the field’ — demolition of Babri Masjid, targeting of the life and property of minorities in engineered communal conflicts — the cadre of the BJP and those of the others are invariably on the same side. 

From bitter lived experience, Muslims have learnt the truth contained in the saying: A man is known by the company he keeps. When matching word with deed, their experience indicates that the saffron soldiers draw their inspiration not so much from the conciliatory, poll–eve statements of leaders like Laxman but from stalwarts of Hindutva such as the second sarsanghchalak of the RSS, Guru Golwalkar.

“The non–Hindu in Hindustan must either adopt the Hindu religion or may stay in the country wholly subordinate to the Hindu nation claiming nothing, deserving no privileges, far less any preferential treatment, not even citizens rights,” Golwalkar wrote in his We or our Nationhood Defined in 1936. 
“Muslims are flesh of our flesh and blood of our blood”. In speaking thus at the BJP national council meeting in Nagpur in late August, Laxman was merely repeating what the then Jana Sangh leader, Deendayal Upadhyaya, had said in his presidential address to the Jana Sangh in Calicut, way back in 1967. 
But actual developments on the communal front in the next few years are best summed up in the findings of judicial commissions, appointed by different government’s to inquire into the causes of the communal riots that have plagued the country since the ‘60s:

  • Report of the Justice Jagmohan Reddy Commission on the Ahmedabad riots, 1969: “Here was not only a failure of intelligence and culpable failure to suppress the outbreak of violence, but (also) deliberate attempts to suppress the truth from the Commission, especially the active participation in the riots of some RSS and Jana Sangh leaders.”
  • Report of the Justice DP Madon Commission on the Bhiwandi, Jalgaon and Mahad riots of 1970: “The organisation responsible for bringing communal tension in Bhiwandi to a pitch is the Rashtriya Utsav Mandal. The majority of the leaders and workers of the Rashtriya Utsav Mandal belonged to the Jan Sangh (the BJP’s predecessor) or were pro–Jan Sangh and the rest, apart from a few exceptions, belonged to the Shiv Sena”. 
  • Report of the Justice Joseph Vithyathil Commission on the Tellicherry riots, 1971: “In Tellicherry the Hindus and Muslims were living as brothers for centuries. The ‘Mopla riots’ did not affect the cordial relationship that existed between the two communities in Tellicherry. It was only after the RSS and the Jana Sangh set up their units and began activities in Tellicherry that there came a change in the situation. Their anti–Muslim propaganda, its reaction on the Muslims who rallied round their communal organisation, the Muslim League which championed their cause, and the communal tension that followed prepared the background for the disturbances.
  • Report of the Commission of Inquiry into the Communal Disturbances at Jamshedpur, April 1979: “The dispute on the route of the procession became sharp and agitated reactions from a group of persons calling themselves the Sanyukt Bajrang Bali Akhara Samiti who systematically distributed pamphlets to heighten communal feelings had organisational links with the RSS.” 

Closer to the present time, who can forget the bloody yatra (from Somnath to Ayodhya in 1990) that none less than the then BJP president and now the Union home minister, LK Advani, chose for his party’s rise to power? 
In seeking Muslim votes to lift the BJP above the plateau where it finds itself, Laxman may now be using different words, but he is saying nothing new. Since the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992 and the countrywide riots that followed, in every election season, the BJP has come up with attempts to wash off its communal taint and woo Muslims. (See box). 

But the actual experience of the last few years is proof to the Muslims that the BJP’s promises and ‘guarantees’ of security amount to very little. 

Firstly, the fact that across the country, it is Christians who have been the more obvious targets of Hindutva in the last few years is of little consolation to Muslims. They see in these sustained assaults on yet another religious minority in India a deliberate Hindutva ploy to keep the saffron brigade fighting fit. Who is to know when these ‘kar sevaks’ will be asked to revert to the old battlefront and go for the ‘Babar ki aulad’? Or will it be ‘Jinnah ki aulad’ and ‘ISI agents’ next time? 

There have been enough indications in the last few years to make Muslims believe that their fear is not mere paranoia. Gujarat, a state where the BJP rules unchallenged and where no effective opposition is presently in sight, is proving to be an ideal ‘laboratory for Hindutva.’ For others, the state offers an insight of what India’s minorities can expect in Ram Rajya of the Hindutva variety. For Christians and for Muslims, too, Gujarat has increasingly turned into a nightmare state in the last few years. (See box).

Gujarat’s Muslims, however, are not the only ones who need to worry. For the RSS mouthpiece, Panchjanya, the war over Kargil last year was not a conflict between two countries, but a link in the 1,000–year–old clash between ‘barbaric’ Islam and ‘Hindu tolerance’. The Bajrang Dal chief went on to say that no peace is possible between Hindus and Muslims until the Quran is banned.

Since April this year, arms’ training is being given to activists of the Bajrang Dal and the VHP. The reason, according to the chief of UP’s VHP Purushottam: “anti–Hindu forces are very active in UP…The ISI has spread its tentacles in the state. To counter these forces, Bajrang Dal activists are being trained”. Outlook magazine reported that the Dal activists being trained at ‘Karsevakpuram’ near Ayodhya began their morning with the chant: “We will demolish all mosques.” 

No sooner had he returned from the BJP’s national council meet in Nagpur, where Laxman made all the right noises, that the BJP stalwart from UP, Kalraj Mishra, went rushing to Ayodhya. What else does this mean except that the BJP identifies with the VHP’s agenda of commencing building of the Ram mandir in Ayodhya soon and court orders be damned?

Muslims and Christians, who feel insecure in today’s India, would certainly welcome a friendly gesture from the BJP. But not if it looks like a tactic with an eye on votes. Or a strategy of running with the hare and hunting with the hound.

But if the hollowness of the BJP’s intention to woo Indian Muslims needs no further emphasis, Laxman’s comments on Hindu–Dalit mobilisation and unity with the caste Hindu need careful scrutiny because they do, in fact, reflect the competing pulls on the nationwide Dalit movement today. This could prove pivotal in future Dalit mobilisation.

Besides linking Hegdewar and Ambedkar, Bangarau Laxman went further on Dalit and caste Hindu alliance building. When asked by journalists to comment on the Ayodhya movement, Laxman praised the movement saying it was one in which “people from all walks of life participated and moreover a movement where all caste feelings receded.”

The fact that the sub–text of the campaign to build a temple in the name of Lord Ram at Ayodhya was the demolition of a 400–year–old mosque that was systematically portrayed as a symbol of Babar ki aulad (who are deserving of summary treatment) was left unexamined. 

The Ayodhya movement has made a hitherto unique achievement in terms of all–Hindu mobilisation. From many parts of the country, the movement managed Dalit participation in pogrom–like attacks on Indian Muslims. The very same, all–Hindu kamandal project is today being aggressively promoted not only in Gujarat — where Dalit women interviewed by Communalism Combat have testified to Dalit youth being attracted to Bajrang Dal shakhas for arms training on ‘salaries’ of Rs. 5–10,000 per month — but all over India. 

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2000 Year 8  No. 62, Cover Story 1

Saffron promises and performance

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Saffron promises… 

Jan 24, 1993, The Indian Express 
‘Advani promises Muslim welfare’ 
AHMEDABAD: The Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) president, Mr. LK Advani warned Muslims to be aware of both Congress and their leaders and repose faith in the BJP…When a newsman sought to know the measures the BJP was contemplating for the welfare of Muslims to win their confidence, Mr. Advani said, “The BJP will protect their lives and they will enjoy equal justice.” Asked why he chose to skip the Muslim affected areas (due to riots) or relief camps in Ahmedabad, he quipped, “It’s a good suggestion for action.”

April 15, 1994, The Economic Times 
BJP bid to shake off anti-Muslim image
NEW DELHI: The Bharatiya Janata Party seems to have begun to feel concerned over the anti-Muslim tag that has come to stick to it and it likely to embark on an exercise to shake it off. A serious effort in that direction was made at the recent Sariska conclave of the BJP’s top brass with the senior vice-president, Mr KR Malkani, spelling out the concern over the party having been branded as an anti-Muslim outfit. 

March 29, 1995, The Statesman
Muslims have nothing to fear under BJP rule: Keshubhai
NEW DELHI: Muslims have nothing to fear under the rule of the BJP government in Gujarat and can look forward to getting a much better deal than what they got during Congress(I) rule, the state chief minister, Mr. Keshubhai Patel has said. “You will see how well we treat Muslims and other minorities under our rule”, the new chief minister said, adding that his party believed that Muslims were as patriotic as Hindus, but had been “misled and misused by the Congress(I). 

April 21, 1995, The Indian Express
BJP tries to win over Muslims with Sanskrit Koran
BOMBAY: The Koran in Sanskrit? The idea is not as bizarre as it may seem. His is the spoonful of honey for the Muslim minority in the country… The in-camera convention of top BJP executives, including chief ministers, deputy chief ministers and leaders of Opposition, which got underway on Thursday, has been called to finalise poll strategies for the Lok Sabha elections which the BJP expects might take place earlier than scheduled. High on the agenda is a follow-up of the resolutions with regard to the minorities at the Goa convention of the party early this month whereby, following BJP president LK Advani’s call to “remove misconceptions (about the BJP) in the minds of the minorities”, the party resolved to revive the earlier Congress slogan of Hindu-Muslim bhai-bhai. The more well-known of the resolutions were the three Ts – taaleem (education), tanzeem (organisation) and tijarat (employment) for Muslims.

May 2, 1996, The Telegraph
Advani ‘guarantees’ justice to Muslims
MUMBAI: The BJP president, Mr. LK Advani, today extended a “guarantee to every Muslim” of “security, justice, equality and full freedom of faith and worship.” Going all out to woo the community in the last lap of the party’s campaign, he said “no BJP government will tolerate any dilution of this guarantee.”

May 19, 1996, Mid–Day
Full protection to Muslims: Vajpayee
NEW DELHI: …In a long interview to a private television channel, Vajpayee said that all Muslims should be able to live with self-respect and honour. “For this, Muslims should give all support to my government”, he said  adding that he could not understand why the community was keeping away the mainstream”. 

June 16, 1997, The Times of India
Advani uses every trick to woo Muslim voter
BHOPAL: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president, LK Advani, on Friday praised Jawaharal Nehru for his secular policies and promised to create a riot-free, violence-free and discrimination-free India when the BJP comes to power at the Centre.

November 15, 1997, The Asian Age
BJP plans a grand Muslim convention
NEW DELHI: In what will be a show of Muslim support for the BJP, the party’s youth wing, headed by Ms Uma Bharati, is planning a grand convention on December 4 which will be attended by over 5,000 members of the community.
According to the party, such a large number of Muslims attending a BJP conference itself will send the signal that the community was not averse to it any longer. “In a scenario where elections are expected any moment, such a message will be crucial for us. We will use the opportunity to wash the communal taint”, BJP sources told The Asian Age. 

May 3, 1999, The Hindustan Times
BJP’s image as anti-Muslim party blunted: Vajpayee
Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee today said his bus initiative to Lahore had greatly blunted the “false image” of the BJP of being an anti-Muslim party. 
May 8, 1999, The Times of India
‘BJP will get Muslim votes’
NEW DELHI: The BJP finds a “radical change” in the attitude of Muslim voters and is confident of getting “a major share of their votes” in the coming Lok Sabha polls as the party has given them a feeling of national pride unlike the so-called secular parties which always portrayed them in a poor light”, minister for information and broadcasting Mukhtar bbas Naqvi said. 

September 8, 1999, The Times of India
PM appeals for Muslim votes
Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee on Tuesday asked voters to make the Opposition “pay the price” for bringing down his government and give a clear decisive majority to the BJP-led coalition…Making a special appeal to the minorities (during his election broadcast on Doordarshan), Mr Vajpayee said national unity without a firm commitment to secularism was unthinkable. He said that contrary to the propaganda of “our adversaries”, the past 17 months have been remarkably free from communal tension. 

September 11, 2000, The Asian Age
BJP trying to woo Muslims for more votes: Sher Khan 
Former Union minister Aslam Sher Khan has blamed Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and Union home minister LK Advani for not keeping their word about upliftment of minorities and said the BJP’s new incarnation is a well-calculated move to mislead minorities and dalits on the eve of Assembly elections in five states. Mr Sher Khan, who had joined the BJP in 1997 said that he quit the party within one year after realising that the BJP had no love for Muslims and dalits and wanted to use them as a ladder to achieve power.
 

…and performance

Two states, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh, both under BJP rule, have truly imbibed saffron values of governance. For Muslims, Christians and Dalits inhabiting these two states in northern and western India, the past two years have meant living in vastly altered circumstances — always under threat, sometimes physically attacked. 
What has been the lived experience of India’s minorities in these two ‘laboratories of Hindu rashtra’?

  • Since 1998, when VHP-Bajrang Dal squads hounded Muslims out of their villages in Randhikpur and Sanjeli, life for the Muslim in Gujarat is marked. Where he lives,  what he eats, how he celebrates his festivals – everything is under close surveillance.
  • Last month, ‘retaliation’ against Gujarat’s Muslims for the killing of Amarnath yatris in Kashmir by Pakistan-inspired mercenaries, meant a loss of Rs 20 crore worth of Muslim property in Surat (powerlooms), Sabarkantha (printing presses) and elsewhere in the state. 
  • In July 1999, the Kargil war had its spillover in Ahmedabad’s own ‘war zones’ as BJP’s Yuva Morcha splashed provocative graffiti in Muslim areas to taunt and provoke Indian Muslims – “Ab to nagara baj chuka hai, sarhad pe shaitan ka/ Nakshe par se nam mita do, paapi Pakistan ka/ Khun se tilak karo, goliyon se arti/Pukarti hai yeh zameen, pukarti Ma Bharti”.
  • Muslims are forcibly prevented from buying property in ‘secular’ areas of Ahmedabad, Rajkot, Baroda and other Gujarat cities and forced to reside in ‘ghettoes’.
  • At the Hindu-managed VR Somani and Bhakta Vallabh schools, where 95 per cent of the students are Muslims but the teachers are Hindus, the teachers have adopted a unique technique of getting at the students: they just do not teach.
  • Muslim students and teachers in schools in many cities in Gujarat are forced to sit, or be invigilators, for examinations on Eid day.
  • In many Gujarati-medium schools run by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation, at the beginning of the class, Muslim students are asked to sit separately. 
  • A recent circular by the Gujarat Education department will force all students to write their names on examination sheets of school and government examinations. This will leave the religious identity of the student in no doubt, making discrimination possible and introduction of the religious element in the assessment of answers. 
  • Dozens of prominent politicians belonging to the ruling BJP in Gujarat and its allied organisations, like the VHP and Bajrang Dal, have been named in police FIRs (see Communalism Combat, October 1998 and April 2000. The Gujarat DGP, CP Singh, even admitted to the culpability of these organisations but needless to say no action has been taken.
  • Since 1998, more than 200 Christian institutions – both secular and religious — have been attacked and Christian religious persons killed or assaulted; a vast majority of these attacks have taken place in Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh.
  • A virtual curfew during Christmas at the Dangs in south Gujarat in 1998 was a shameful travesty of the Indian Constitution. In December 1999, too, despite protests, Christians in the area had to suffer protests and terror.
  • The echelons of the higher judiciary and the police and paramilitary are being filled with devoted RSS followers committed to a sectarian and inequitous polity.
  • Not a single educational institution has been granted minority status during the entire tenure of the BJP in UP, off and on since 1990.
  • As of now, not a single district magistrate or a superintendent of police in UP is a Muslim.
  • The UP state Minorities Commission was scrapped during Kalyan Singh’s first tenure. Under pressure of a coalition partner, the Gupta-led ministry has now revived the commission; but only in name.
  • In 1998, Kalyan Singh’s tenure was marked by gross human rights violations, wherein most of the victims of brutal encounters by the state police were Dalits and Muslims;
  • In 1998, the UP minister of state for home announced an insidious plan linking every state-run school to the local RSS sarsanghchalak (known as the kulp yojana, it ran into rough weather after a storm of protests but it has not been formally withdrawn); Neither Keshubhai Patel’s promise of 1995 — “You will see how well we treat Muslims and other minorities under our rule” – nor LK Advani’s 1996 ‘guarantee to every Muslim” — “security, justice, equality and full freedom of faith and worship,” — has been of much help to the hapless Muslims and Christians of Gujarat. Bangaru Laxman’s invitation to Muslims notwithstanding, apparently, Hindutva and religious minorities simply don’t mix!

The BJP’s new social bloc

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‘The BJP’s new social bloc’, an analysis by CSDS (Centre for the Study of Developing Societies), based on the electoral outcome and the findings of a nation–wide post-election survey (Lok Sabha polls ’99) published by the fortnightly magazine ‘Frontline’ offers  interesting insights into the political compulsions behind the BJP’s decision to woo the Muslims, dalits, adivasis. The study clearly shows that the BJP simply cannot hope to grow beyond the plateau on which it presently finds itself unless it succeeds in befriending Muslims and Dalits. 

It is evident from the tables reproduced here (Courtesy: Frontline and CDS) that:

  • The BJP has certainly come a long way from is identity as a Bania-Brahmin party. But the fact remains that as one goes down the caste ladder, electoral support for the BJP declines consistently and dramatically. The post–poll, all–India survey conducted by the CSDS showed that as against 46 per cent of the upper caste Hindus who voted for the BJP, the party could get only 19 per cent votes of the adivasi and a much lower 12 per cent of the Dalit votes. In sharp contrast to these figures, 49 per cent adivasis and 40 per cent dalits voted for the Congress. Even the BJP’s allies in the NDA coalition could manage only 12 per cent of the total adivasi and 10 per cent of the Dalit votes.

The CSDS analysis observes: “Although both these figures (percentage votes of Dalits and adivasis for the BJP) are higher this time (1999 polls) compared to the 1998 elections, it is clear that these groups are not the primary constituents of the new social bloc”. 

  • A mere 6 per cent of the ‘Upper (Caste) Muslims’ (Ashrafs) voted for the BJP, while the ‘Lower (Caste) Muslim’ votes for the BJP were almost negligible (2 per cent of the total). This contrasts even more sharply with Muslim support for the Congress — 59 per cent ‘Upper Muslim’ and 58 per cent ‘Lower Muslim’. The alienation of the Christian community from the BJP, is equally evident from the figures. 

Considering that between them, Dalits, adivasis, Muslims and Christians, make up for around 37 per cent (well over one–third) of the total electorate, the BJP’s political compulsion in wooing them is evident. Equally well, the existing hardcore support of the BJP has come through its identification and association with the strident Hindutva pursued consistently by other segments of the sangh parivar — the parent RSS, VHP, Bajrang Dal and its allies such as the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra and the Hindu Munnani in Tamil Nadu. 

In other words, the BJP is being pulled in two diametrically opposite directions — ideologically towards a strident Hindutva, and electorally towards centrism and an inclusive agenda. So far, the BJP has tried to run with the hare and hunt with the hound. But the limits of such realpolitik is becoming increasingly obvious. The saffron brotherhood is showing signs of growing disenchantment because of the BJP’s conciliatory gestures towards the minorities, while the minorities continue to be suspicious of the party because of its continued attachment to the saffron brotherhood. Is there a danger that the BJP might end up falling between two stools? 

  • The CSDS analysis also clearly shows that in the perception of the voters, the BJP remains a party of the rich. The poorer an upper caste voter is, the lower his preference for the BJP; the richer an adivasi or Dalit is, the greater his attraction to the BJP. Taken together, “both caste and class converge in the BJP’s support base”.

In short, despite its impressive growth, the BJP continues to be seen as a party of the  upper castes/upper classes. The new social bloc has helped elevate the BJP from its position of “majestic isolation” to the political high ground it presently occupies. But the existing arrangement, is, obviously, not good enough for the party that aspires to rule India on its own. The apparent disenchantment of the OBCs in the electorally critical Uttar Pradesh only compounds the situation. 

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2000 Year 8  No. 62, Cover Story 3

If Laxman plays Hanuman…

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The new BJP president, Bangaru Laxman, may well turn out to be the first Dalit to occupy the Prime Minister’s chair. But India’s SCs and STs stand to gain little from such a likely scenario 

 

Bangaru Laxman’s statement, after he formally took over as the president of the BJP, that  “Nagpur is a place of both Ambedkar and Hegdewar” must have come as a surprise to the upper caste leaders of the RSS, particularly its chief, KS Sudharshan, who must all be Ambedkar haters. Nagpur, ironically, is the headquarters of both Ambedkar’s Buddhism and Hegdewar’s Brahminism. 

Laxman made it somewhat clear that he would like to be loyal to both Ambedkarism and Brahminism but this may prove to be an impossible task. Laxman’s colour (the Dravidian black) is itself an anathema to the Aryan racism that Hegdewar and Golwalkar stood for. Laxman’s position at the top of the party pyramid and having to live with his ‘un–Hindu’ statements are certain to be seen as the result of the unfortunate presence of Ambedkarism in the Indian politico–social space. 

The Hindu spiritual world has been hoping against hope all these years that it would not have to see a day when the Chandalas  emerge as a powerful force and undermine the divine dictum of the Adi–Brahmin-Purush, Brahma, that the Chandalas forever remain untouchables. Ambedkar has become a modern Buddha and Laxman knows that only too well. But for the Ambedkarite presence in the Indian political scene, Laxman would still be elsewhere, possibly stitching a shoe and certainly not the president of a party that was meant to be a Brahmin–Baniya saddle. 

Arun Shourie, who called Ambedkar a “False God”, must have licked his own boots as Laxman made his presidential pronouncements. Laxman’s statement proved that however weak a Dalit might otherwise be, when in a position of power he can make a difference. 

The appointment (not election) by Vajpayee of Bangaru Laxman, a Dalit leader from Hyderabad, as the president of the BJP has been done with a design to woo the votes of Dalits and appeal to South Indians as the BJP has been accused of being an enemy of both Dravidism and Dalitism. As a party that aspires to be a ruling party on its own, the BJP has to overcome both these images. 

In the sufficiently well established line of Dalit leaders like Jagjivan Ram, Damodaram Sanjeevaiah who were given similar positions  in the Congress party, some Dalit leader was badly needed to salvage the anti-Dalit image of the BJP. Laxman, given his name, colour and caste, appeared to be the most suitable person. What Laxman can do to Dalits depends on how the educated Dalits assert themselves and how an ageing Kanshi Ram builds his party. In politics, the strength of the Bahujan Samaj Party helps in the Dalit bargain with other parties. It is in this political backdrop that Laxman climbed the BJP ladder. 

The problem for the BJP would however be, that like Jagjivan Ram and Sanjeevaiah, Laxman seems to be behaving unpredictably. He has publicly stated that he got this post because of Vajpayee and like Rama Bhakta Hanuman even touched the latter’s feet of Vajpayee. In the process he has placed the self–respect of Dalits at the feet of a classical Brahmin. I do not think Jagjivan Ram and Sanjeevaiah ever did this to Nehru. But to overcome this surrender to a political ‘Swamiji’, he said his attempt would be to combine Ambedkar with Hegdewar. 

This very statement, however, creates a tension in caste ideology. Laxman has to salvage Hinduism, which does not want to give Dalits the right to priesthood, but the party that emerged to safeguard upper caste interests has to mobilise Dalit votes. Hinduism as a religion destroyed the moral foundation of Dalits and without reforming that religion a Hindu political party cannot salvage the situation. 

This is the reason why more and more Dalits are looking towards either Christianity or Buddhism. The Hindutva forces know pretty well that apart from Ambedkar and Kanshi Ram what threatens Brahminism is the “Acclesia in Asia” document that Pope John Paul II released at Delhi during his visit to India last year. 
The Pope said that the Cross was planted in Europe in the first millennium, in America and Africa in the second millennium, and that Christ will return to his birth place – Asia — with all the strength at his command in the third millennium. The Christian resolve seems to be that the last segment of  global spiritual slavery — India’s untouchables — have to be liberated by all means in this century. This resolution of global Christianity coupled with its cultural liberalism poses very serious challenges to Brahminism today. 

Whenever Hinduism found itself in deep crisis because of the Shudra-Chandala revolt, it took the help of  a Shudra or Chandala to overcome that crisis and they made these Trojan horses speak their language. Valmiki, a Dalit, was made to write the Ramayana, as they wanted it to be written; again a Krishna was made to write the Gita, as they wanted it to be written. Only Ambedkar refused to do that and that has pushed Hinduism in to a deep crisis. 

Given the threat of globalisation and Christianity in the era of Ambedkarism in India, Laxman has been chosen to overcome the present crisis of Hinduism. But Laxman is too inadequate a person to salvage the situation. Despite the promise that Krishna would incarnate, yuga after yuga, to protect Brahminism would not turn up in this yuga because of the God who originated  in Israel and has produced globally commanding capitalism and the English language. The gods who understand only Sanskrit are suffering a heavy loss of social base in their own land. The Dalits are the main social base of the expanding Christianity. The sangh parivar has to do something about it. Laxman seemed be the only alternative. 

Neither Hinduism nor the Hindutva organisations can offer spiritual and social liberation to Dalits, tribals and OBCs. The OBCs are fixed to Hinduism like nuts and bolts; hence the sangh parivar does not see any threat from OBCs in spiritual terms.  The sangh parivar does not mind marginalising any number of OBCs in the political sphere, too. Kalyan Singh and Uma Bharati are cases in point of this marginalisation. But that is not the case with SCs. But because of the overall impact of the organised church and Ambedkarite Buddhism, the SCs and STs have become a social force who can lobby for their Dalit cause in international fora. 

The OBCs could not evolve as a force to interact with the West. They could not modernise and acquire proficiency in English, which could loosen their nut and bolt location in Hinduism and allow them to look for global recognition of their position. So they are becoming a butt of ridicule in the hands of Brahminical  forces within the sangh parivar. Kanshi Ram once rightly said that the ruling classes of India are afraid of only SCs because they are a force to reckon with in the bureaucracy and in politics and section of them have got westernised. 

So Laxman becomes a useful tool to address some of the socio-spiritual and economic problems that Hinduism as a religion and Hindutva as a political force are facing today. If Laxman realises the historical context in which he has been given this position, he can work his way to South Block and become the first SC Prime Minister of India. After Vajpayee, there is no leader from the BJP top brass who is acceptable to all the NDA constituents. Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi have already burnt their fingers with their right–wing extremism. 

Laxman, who kept a low profile in the aggressive phase of the BJP, leads a non–controversial life style and has no base of his own in the party or at the mass level. These are good qualifications for a Dalit to be seen as a candidate for the Prime Minister’s post. 

Laxman has all the qualities that PV Narsimha Rao had when he emerged as a Prime Ministerial candidate in the Congress party after the death of Rajiv Gandhi. Laxman’s Dalit background is an added bonus. Judging by how Laxman has been speaking and conducting himself after being appointed the party president he is moving in the right direction. His statements on the minorities and Ambedkar seem to have been well–received in political circles. 

Laxman is right when he says that minorities are “blood of his blood and flesh of his flesh” in so far as he speaks as a Dalit. When talking of Ambedkar or of minorities, Laxman is speaking like a Dalit. Laxman is also expected to ease the BJP’s relations with Christians as the latter also feel quite comfortable negotiating with Laxman as head of the party rather than some upper caste leaders. Thus, there is good mettle in him to aspire to becoming the first Dalit to occupy the Prime Minister’s chair. 

But all this will be possible only if Laxman plays the part of Hanuman very carefully in a party of Aryan Brahminism. He must not think of crossing the laxman rekhas drawn by his Lord, Vajpayee. Of course, he can acquire his own small temples here and there. But his limited spiritual space will be safe only as long as the real Hindu heroes operating from Hindu temples feel secure with him as their watchdog. Advani, a Sindhi, a non–practising Hindu but a hard-line Hindutvavaadi, does have much support of the Hindu Brahmin priests. The NDA leaders do not trust him either. 

The Indian media, too, takes its cues from the temple of Brahminism before it projects somebody as an acceptable man or woman for the highest position. The Indian media used to hate Ambedkar. It hates Kanshi Ram. Its love–hate relationship with KR Narayanan turned into a pure hate relationship after he delivered his two historic lectures on the occasion of Republic Day this year. Laxman is still a bird in the egg so far as the media is concerned. If he chooses to play the role of Hanuman well, the future for him is very bright. 

But the Dalits as a historical community have every thing to loose. Just as the first Dalit president of the BJP, even the first Dalit Prime Minister of India would come and go without changing the socio-spiritual and economic status of Dalits even an inch. But many Kanshi Rams can be vanquished with this Dalit weapon called Bangaru (gold) Laxman. 

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2000 Year 8  No. 62, Cover Story 4

Not a single educational institution has got minority status during the BJP’s rule in UP’

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Bangaru Laxman’s invitation is nothing but a stunt. Their intentions are dishonest. On the one hand, he issues a daawat to Muslims; on the other, Laxman maintains that the BJP remains committed to Hindutva. If they are still committed to Hindutva, they must be committed to Golwalkar’s vision on the place of minorities in ‘Hindu India’ (see main copy).

On the very day that Laxman extended his invitation to Muslims he and Vajpayee went to the RSS headquarters in Nagpur to renew their pledge that they remain committed to their RSS roots. How can we take them seriously?

Laxman has also said that the ‘controversial issues’ are not relevant today but they remain on the BJP’s agenda. And his mentor, Atal Behari Vajpayee has stated in the Lok Sabha that his party has not abandoned those issues. In that case, do they want Muslims to help them come to power on their own so that they can then implement Hindutva’s agenda?

In any case, what standing does Laxman have in the BJP? The sangh parivar, very conveniently, has 25 different organisations, so that different leaders or different organisations can say different things at the same time. How can Muslims believe one of them and not the others?

Now that elections are due in UP, every few days, they catch some Muslim and dub him an ISI agent. Assuming that some of the Muslims arrested are, in fact, involved in passing on information to the ISI, the fact remains that they are mere carriers. Who are the big culprits, those occupying important government positions and have access to sensitive information that they pass on through these carriers? Why are none of them caught? This is nothing but a ploy to terrorise and demonise ordinary Muslims.

Now the RSS has announced it will act as ‘secret police’ to identify ISI agents and report them to the police. RSS volunteers have been provided the mobile phone numbers of the state’s director general of police and the home secretary so that they can pass on information directly to top officials. In other words, the RSS will now decide who is an ISI agent and who is not. Can you imagine what this means?

Some years back they had talked of taaleem (education), tijarat (employment) and tanzeem (organisation) for Muslims. If the UP experience is anything to go by, they have done nothing at all.

Take taleem, for example. Their main contribution is this field is to have declared that Muslim madrassas where children get some education are all ISI addas. Secondly, not a single Muslim educational institution has been granted minority status in their entire tenure.

They talk of fairplay with Muslims. Let them name one district in UP today where either the district magistrate (DM) or the district superintendent police (SP) is a Muslim.

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2000 Year 8  No. 62, Cover Story 7

Why hasn’t Laxman uttered a single word about Christians, the current target of the sangh parivar?’

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Even if we assume that Bangaru Laxman is sincere, before Muslims can take him seriously, he should publicly declare that the BJP has nothing to do with the RSS. We know that the BJP is the brainchild of the RSS. The RSS top brass always decides who assumes leadership of the BJP. The RSS wants to treat India’s Muslims in Hitler’s fashion. How, then can we believe the political wing of the same RSS, when it talks of Muslims being ‘blood of our blood’ etc.?

If Laxman tells us that the BJP president determines the policies of the party, he must explain how when Vajpayee was the BJP president and talked of ‘Gandhian socialism’, other leaders of the BJP were openly hobnobbing with Gandhiji’s assassin, Nathuram Godse and the RSS mouthpieces, Panchjanya and Organiser, were singing a different tune.

If Laxman really has a different attitude to India’s minorities, why has he not uttered a single word about Christians who are the main target of the sangh parivar today? As a part of India’s minorities, I would say that if Laxman really wants to take Muslims into confidence, he should first of all win the confidence Christians. To do that convincingly, he will have to openly condemn the Bajrang Dal and the VHP for targeting Christians.

Besides, a BJP MP from Orissa is openly raising money for Dara Singh’s defence. The concerned MP should be immediately expelled from the BJP. And finally, on the Babri Masjid issue, is Laxman prepared to make an unequivocal statement that he will ensure that the BJP respects the court’s verdict.

We do not expect any satisfactory answer from the president of the political wing of the RSS. Therefore, the only conclusion is that Laxman is making these statements merely to hoodwink some Muslims. Basically, all that the BJP is interested in is some ‘bonus’ Muslim votes for its own political benefit.

In my view, just as hostility towards India is the very basis of Pakistan’s existence, the BJP is founded on anti–minority sentiments. How can either be expected to undermine the very foundation of their edifices?

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2000 Year 8  No. 62, Cover Story 7

‘We have got cooperation from government officials irrespective of the party in power’

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To be honest, our work has nothing to do with any political party. Ordinary Muslims are ill–informed about the opportunities that exist for government jobs. Our emphasis is in creating this awareness in the community, seeking the help of government officials and trying to remove any bottlenecks that might exist.

Take the example of jobs for Muslims in the police force. Muslims need to know that the first step in getting a police constable’s job is to get your name registered with the employment exchange. If your name is not registered with the employment exchange, how will you get jobs?

We placed ads in Urdu papers, told them to go. They went, they got jobs, there was no hitch at all. In this connection, I must say that three successive police commissioners of Mumbai, under different governments, have been equally positive and supportive.

Similarly, in the matter of jobs in the army, I had a very positive, encouraging response from a colonel. He was very clear that people of all communities are equally welcome in the Indian army. We did not face any special problem at the level of government servants while the Shiv Sena–BJP government was in power in Maharashtra or because the BJP was or is leading the government in New Delhi.

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2000 Year 8  No. 62, Cover Story 7

Muslims not the only culprits’

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Sanjay Nirupam is the editor of the Shiv Sena mouthpiece, Dopahar ka Saamna. He is also a Rajya Sabha MP. By virtue of his double distinction one would imagine that he is a well–informed man. In the popular weekly programme, ‘The Big Fight’, telecast by Star TV a few weeks ago, Nirupam was the ‘big fighter’ on the Sena’s behalf in the debate over whether the Maharashtra government should or should not act on the recommendations of the Srikrishna Commission pertaining to the Mumbai riots. Teesta Setalvad, on the other hand, argued strongly in support of the implementation of the commission’s recommendations.

During the programme, Nirupam repeatedly demanded to know why people arrested in India for spying for Pakistan or acting as agents of the ISI were all Indian Muslims.

In raising this question, Nirupam was either lying or furnishing proof of his utter ignorance on the subject. For Union home minister LK Advani could any day remind him, if he so desired, that of the several persons from his own ministry who were arrested on charges of passing on vital information to Pakistan in the midst of the Lok Sabha polls last year, not one was a Muslim.

We would like to draw the ill–informed or communally motivated Nirupam’s attention to the answer given by the IG Intelligence, BSF, Vibhuti Rai to a question on ISI agents in India. (See Rai’s interview in this issue).

We challenge Nirupam to prevail upon Big Brother Advaniji to release a full list of all those charged with acting as agents of Pakistan/ISI since Independence. Meanwhile, to cite just a few instances, we reproduce below excerpts from news reports published by different national newspapers in recent years pointing out that non–Muslims, too, have been nabbed for acting against the national interest.

Arrested Pakistan militant is Hindu

JAMMU, August 11: For the first time in the over a decade long period of militancy, the Jammu police have arrested a Hindu youth who is a dreaded Pakistan-Afghanistan militant. Four of his associates, including two Hindus were also arrested. They were sent to Jammu by Major Irfan of Inter–Services Intelligence (ISI) to disrupt the city on Independence Day.

A huge quantity of arms and ammunition, two very powerful explosive devices including a milk container IED and a tiffin–bomb (filled with RDX) were recovered during the arrests.

The arrested militant, who had joined Hizbul Mujahideen sometime back after his differences with Harkat–ul Jehad Islami (HUJI) outfit, has been identified as Bharat Kumar alias Bharat Singh alias Bharat Malhotra alias Munna (code name Tariq), a resident of Jammu City’s outskirts. His four associates include Harjit Singh alias Jeeta of Jammu, Sodagar Singh of RS Pura, Sammi–ul–Rehman alias Sammi and Sheikh Mukhtiar, both residents of Jammu. (Mid–Day, August 11, 2000).

"The ISI is now luring Hindu youth from Jammu and Muslim boys from Uttar Pradesh to act as couriers for them in an attempt to hoodwink the security forces.

(From the Intelligence report on ISI)

‘ISI presence in India is massive’

MUMBAI: Top state government officials yesterday said that the access of Pakistan’s Inter–Services Intelligence (ISI) was not restricted to Muslims here alone.

"More than Muslims, ISI agents are said to be mingling on the sly with members of the majority community and that makes our job of combing these dangerous elements real difficult and challenging," these officials admitted.

They said there were more undercover ISI agents among the Hindus than in the Muslim community. "And we suspect that ISI contacts in the majority community are highly educated and influential people with connections in politics," officials said.

According to these sources, money, which was said to be available aplenty with the ISI, was the single most factor that ‘brought’ the dreaded outfit ‘sympathisers’ in the majority community.

"It is a misnomer then that ISI men take shelter in Muslim areas and mingle only with the minority community. The fact, ironically, is they mostly mingle with the Hindus and may be operating from such localities where you have the least suspicion of finding them," officials said.

(Afternoon Despatch and Courier, July 15, 1998).

Cop sacked for links with ISI

Bombay, Oct. 22 (PTI) Police Commissioner A. S. Samra has removed a police inspector from service in connection with his involvement in the case of an Iranian national, suspected to be a spy of the Inter–Services Intelligence of Pakistan, who was nabbed in the city.

Inspector Prabhakar Ingle, attached to Pydhonie station in South Bombay, was the chief investigating officer in the case involving the Iranian national.

The Commissioner served a notice to inspector Ingle on Wednesday night terminating his services under Article 311 of the Constitution of India under which the police chief has the powers to remove from service any staff member if there is a prima facie case of his links with anti–social elements.

On similar grounds, Mr Samra had removed from service two senior inspectors of police, Mr Vinayak Patil of Antop Hill police station and Mr S. P. Kalankar of Oshiwara police station, in May and July last, respectively.

(The Hindustan Times, October 23, 1993)

Another defence staff held for spying

AHMEDNAGAR, AUG. 8. Close on the heels of arrest of a senior officer of the Army’s Vehicle Research and Development Establishment (VRDE) here on Monday, police apprehended another employee on charges of spying for Pakistan’s Inter–Services Intelligence (ISI).

Police sources told PTI here today that Achut Menon, a technical assistant in VRDE, had allegedly supplied vital secret documents to the ISI.

The Additional Sessions Judge (First Class) here today remanded Menon to police custody for 12 days, the sources added. Police had last night arrested Sunil Kadanna Chinchane (40), who had stolen classified information and allegedly sent it to Pakistan through the Internet.

(The Hindu, August 9, 2000, news report)

ISI infiltrated into Dalits, OBCs : Book

NEW DELHI, DEC 26: The Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) of Pakistan has infiltrated into the Dalits and other backward classes to carry out subversive activities against India, a new book on Kargil says.

Pak Proxy War: A Story of ISI, Bin Laden and Kargil, by Rajeev Sharma claims the ISI has been recruiting members of Dalit and the other backward classes since the mid–90s with the help of the under-world in Mumbai, Dubai and Nepal. The underworld funded the ISI’s design and promoted a nexus among Muslims, Dalits and the backward classes at its bidding, it points out. It goes on to add that the ISI also targeted members of renowned Muslim organisations who did not buy their plan.

(UNI, The Indian Express, December 27, 1999)

ULFA informs ISI via Internet

Darshan Balwally (Guwahati, June 25):

The inscrutable Internet is proving a challenge to the intelligence wing of the Indian Army in keeping track of the messages allegedly passed on to the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) wing of Pakistan by the banned United Liberation Front of Asom. Faced with the Herculean task of tracking down websites, allegedly established by the insurgents, the 4th Corps of the Army, at Tezpur, has recently acquired specialists endowed with skills to peep into suspicious websites.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, an extremely knowledgeable source in the Indian Army admitted recently that "we had ‘electronics experts’ flown in" some days ago. However, more sinister, according to senior Army officials, is ULFA’s rapidly becoming hi–tech. Armed with computers, the ULFA cadres/ sympathisers are suspected to be feeding information to various sources within and outside the country through websites.

(The Hindustan Times, June 26, 1999).

 

"If a section of minority community is involved in anti—India activity then so are the members of the majority community who have reportedly joined the ISI for easy money. It is the majority community that dominates the ULFA whose links with ISI have been confirmed".

(From the Intelligence report on ISI)

Meghalaya couple arrested

On Sept 27th 99, the Meghalaya police arrested a couple suspected to have close links with ISI with an amount of Rs.46,000 fake currency. Couple was identified as Rajendra Rahul Yadav and Minu Marak from a village in Meghalaya district.

(From the Intelligence report on ISI)

I am not an ISI agent, says Raja Bhaiyya

…Mr Sandhu in an interview to India’s Most Wanted programme, telecast on Zee TV last week, had said that Mr Raghuraj Pratap Singh, also known as Raja Bhaiyya, was working as an ISI agent and supplying arms to the notorious Brijesh Singh gang of UP, besides harbouring criminals of the rival Mukhtar Ansari gang.

UP minister Raghuraj Pratap Singh reacted by demanding a CBI enquiry against himself so that a verification of the IPS officer’s charges could be made at the earliest. According to the minister, relations between himself and the officer have been strained since the time the officer was posted as superintendent of police in Pratapgarh district.

(The Asian Age, June 9, 1999)

ISI–trained Sikh militants find haven

in Bengal

Calcutta: AT LEAST 200 Sikh extremists, all trained by the Pakistani secret agency Inter Service Intelligence, are now very much in West Bengal, Punjab director–general of police KPS Gill said. This has sent shivers down the spine of almost every sleuth engaged in intelligence activities, leave alone the highly tensed up higher officials.

These extremists belong to the Khalistani Commando Force and the Babbar Khalsa group but there are half a dozen dreaded activists belonging to the Panjwa group and they carry a cash award of Rs 50 lakh if caught red–handed. If state police intelligence higher–ups are to be believed, a Gurdwara near Baranagar and another in south Calcutta shelter some of these extremists.

(The Observer of Business and Politics, January 12, 1994).

Archived from Communalism Combat, August 2000, Anniversary Issue (7th) Year 8  No. 61, Cover Story 2

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