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RSS cooks a trouble,
Badal does khichrri
The
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has again stirred up a hornet’s
nest with its comments on Sikhism not being a separate religion but
part of a larger Hindu fold. Predictably the Shiromani Gurudwara
Prabandhak Committee is up in arms at this renewed attempt by the
RSS to dilute the Sikh identity. The RSS’s assertion that the Hindu
Code Bill should apply to minorities, including the Sikhs, is not
likely to go down well either.
The
RSS forgets that its political arm, the BJP has over the years
improved its political fortunes through strategic alliances, often
with parties whose ideologies are vastly different. In fact, the Akali Dal, a dyed-in-the-wool Sikh party is an ally of the BJP.
This is not the first time the RSS has put the BJP in an
embarrassing position. Over the years, the BJP has been attempting
to get away from its exclusivist Hindu image and project itself as
an accommodative organization. To an extent it succeeded in the
years that Atal Bihari Vajpayee was prime minister. But, every now
and again, under pressure from the RSS, the BJP has had to prove its
Hindutva credentials with one or the other anti-minority statement.
But
with the latest stance of the RSS, the issue arises whether it is
embarrassing the BJP or is it fulfilling one slice of the larger
task by doing that the BJP cannot. The saffron domain is keeping
ahead in the power turf with the help of the BJP while the
ideological agenda is being advanced directly by the mother RSS
forum.
Thus, the BJP and the RSS is a singular construct, not twin. And the
fact that the Akali Dal in Punjab led by Parkash Singh Badal has a
political truck with it only enrages those who are dead set against
any plans to saffronise and poison the minds of a younger
generation.
On
its own, the RSS is stagnating. The number of its shakhas has
declined dramatically and its dedicated pracharaks too have
not increased significantly However, the BJP’s numbers have grown in
the last decade, indicating that power politics rather than ideology
is what draws people.
The
RSS’s best bet would be to try and keep in sync with the pragmatic
politics of today It must endeavor to tone down pronouncements on
minorities and try to project an image that it respects the
diversity of faiths that puts India in a class apart from many other
countries.
As
for the Akalis, they will do better than to depend too heavily on
the RSS-BJP crutches. As of now, the Badal government is dependent
on the support of the 19 BJP MLAs who are all clamoring for the post
of Deputy Chief Minister. As for the image of the government, it is
hardly being helped by daily statements on BJP’s “right” to have a
deputy CM or a minister’s insistence on taking oath in Sanskrit.
The
RSS has given rise to an offspring called Rashtriya Sikh Sangat, its
local avatar meant specially to create trouble for the SGPC and the
Akali Dal. The saffron body has played its card by making a hardcore
Sangh man as the president of the Punjab BJP. And it signals little
in terms of lessons learnt.
That Badal makes his own efforts at keeping the peace by praying at
Ram Navmi or bowing before Lord Parshuram is not helping either. We
need ideological clarity, not religious khichri.
9 May, 2007
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