Learning from the electoral defeat in Bihar

In the India Ideas Conclave list, I offered following borrowed comment on 8 November 2015:

Dear listfolk,

 

if I would say it, the people concerned would rush to accuse me of "white man's burden" and other diversions. Fortunately, for most everything I say, I can find a like-minded Indian source, so here goes:

---

Van: "Shrikant Talageri"
Aan: indicbookclub@googlegroups.com
Verzonden: Zondag 8 november 2015 08:22:31
Onderwerp: The Bihar Election Results: Heads You Win Tails I Lose

Dear Friends

The Bihar election results are out. Now there will very likely be a lot of breast-beating or apologetics on the part of the supporters of the BJP and Modi, and gleeful crowing by their opponents.

As a consistently staunch Hindutva supporter but NOTA voter, I would like to make two points which may lead to my being heartily disliked and criticized by both sides, but then even if the truth is bitter it has to be swallowed.

1. It was basically a battle between Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Supporters of one or the other will find something or the other to put forward in defence of their support for that particular group, but the truth is both the groups are equally indifferent to Hinduism and Indian culture. Bribing or blackmailing small groups of Muslims (as in Meerut) to convert to Hinduism (and ending up with egg on our own face), talking against reservations on the one hand and bribing more and more caste groups (and powerful ones like Jats and Marathas) with reservations on the other, pointlessly using abusive language against individuals from "minority communities", banning beef and attacking isolated individuals on the grounds that they possessed, ate or sold beef, defending disgraceful "Hindus" like Asaram "Bapu" and Radhe "Maa", etc. do not constitute acts of Hindutva. Real acts of Hindutva would have been: rigorously banning conversions from Hinduism to Christianity, making article 30 of the constitution applicable to all communities and disbanding the Minorities Commission and removing gender justice laws from religious ambits and making it clear that there would be no more such discrimination on the grounds of religion, openly declaring the cultural allegiance of the Indian state to India's ancient heritage and to its true history (which requires correction), etc. These would have constituted real acts of Hindutva. And all this would have to be done not by what is being called "fringe elements" and "hotheads", but by the very fountainhead of the so-called Hindutva power-hierarchy, i.e. by the Prime Minister, who would also have been required to publicly explain the full rationale of all these things clearly, logically and unapologetically to the whole world. However we had the BJP playing its usual two-faced games, with the top bosses maintaining a frigid silence or talking in doublespeak or in fact failing to openly disown fake "Hindutva" stands while totally failing to openly endorse genuine Hindutva stands. I have noticed in all my years of association with the Sangh Parivar and its supporters that they are actually inordinately proud of their "tactic" of doublespeak and double standards (criticising the Congress for certain things and then defending exactly similar actions of the BJP)! No amount of setbacks can convince them that only honesty and genuine ideology pays!

And not only did the BJP and its worshipping supporters not take an open and honest stand but we had the top leaders from the PM downwards making "secular" noises every time they were accused of Hindutva motives. What in my opinion took the cake was the God-given opportunity we had to make it clear to the whole world that genuine Hindutva, but not hate-ideology, was our ideology and that we were unapologetic about it. When Obama came to India and in his public address in the presence of Modi lectured to us about our treatment of "minorities" (something he would never have dared to even think of doing in, say, Saudi Arabia), it was a God-given opportunity for Modi to tell the world in Obama's presence itself (in diplomatic words of course) that treating Hindus as punching bags or as people who were permanently in the dock was now a thing of the past, and Hindus who had the most glowing history of treatment of minorities could teach the world a lot in these matters and did not require advice. But he maintained a benevolent silence and a few days later lectured Indians, in his turn, to treat the minorities better!

What is the difference between Tweedledum and Tweedledee? When Obama cracked the whip about FDI in multi-brand retail, the then PM Manmohan Singh jumped on to a stool like a lion in some circus performance and announced that he was willing to put the future of his government at stake in his determination to enforce FDI in multi-brand retail!

Doublespeak, double standards and two-timing games do not ensure electoral victories, as the Bihar results show.

2. The Bihar elections were ultimately a case of "Heads you win Tails I lose" for Hindus, Hindutva and Indian culture.

If the BJP had won, the secularist media would have shouted that it was a victory for Modi's "development agenda" and a defeat for the Hindutva "hotheads" and "fringe elements" and in fact for Hindutva or Hindu ideology itself, and the BJP would have dutifully accepted this logic and accelerated its increasing alienation and severance from Hindu ideology and pursuit of Americanisation and ruthless Capitalism= "development" Agenda.

Since the BJP has lost, the secularist media will predictably shout that it is a massive defeat caused by the BJP's "hotheads" and "fringe elements" and in fact by its "divisive" Hindutva policy itself. And not by its rabidly anti-poor, pro-rich, anti-environmentalist, crony-capitalist, pro-American, etc. policies and not even by the spiralling prices of pulses! and, again, the BJP will dutifully accept this logic and accelerate its increasing alienation and severance from Hindu ideology and pursuit of Americanisation and ruthless Capitalism= "development" Agenda.

Either way it was meant to be a defeat for Genuine Hindutva. And every election result will be the same so long as there is blind worship, election-oriented pseudo-Hindutva, doublespeak, dishonesty and insincerity, and where money and power mean everything and genuine Hindu causes mean nothing.

Shrikant Talageri   

          

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

Our comment on the Delhi election results has been vindicated, and now you know what more is in store. BJP secularism, focus on "development", and trying in vain to ingratiate yourself with the minorities, are sure-fire formulas for losing more elections. While the BJP strategists will draw all the wrong conclusions, the bulk of the time-servers who have clawed their way up in the Modi establishment will simply be pragmatic about it: since this government will not survive 2019, grab as much as you can now.

 

Kind regards,