(In the) debate on the "rea!" or "hidden" agenda of the Vajpayee Government, it is alleged that though "Sarva pantha sarvadara", that is, the Indian tradition of equal respect for all faiths, finds a mention in the National Agenda of the alliance, in reality this is the real Hindutva agenda of the BJP masquerading as promotion of "genuine secularism". The crux of the issue is that the Vajpayee Government as an alliance ... has two faces. The present reality of governance of India under the BJP dispensation can be further demystified by recognising that all its regional partners like BJD or Trinamul Congress or Lok Shakti, etc. , are confined to specific regions. Moreover, they are out of the present state governments in their respective states. The BJP occupies a large space in the governance of the country because Gujarat, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh and UP are managed by the BJP and along with Shiv Sena, Akalis and HVP, the party participants in the governance of Maharashtra, Punjab and Haryana.
The real agenda ... is quite clear to the Sangh Parivar, which, along with the BJP, has a full-fledged agenda for pursuing the politics of Hindutva. The cat was out of the bag when ... national dailies on April 8, 1998, carried the new programme of the RSS, the Bajrang Dal and the VHP. A few special features of the programme announced by the Sangh Parivar deserve to be mentioned in order to understand its real meanings and implications for the future of Indian society, polity and culture. Another mobilisation for Hindutva may not be undertaken on the Ram Janambhoomi issue but similar kind of Hindutva forces are bound to be unleashed for the "liberation of Government-controlled temples in non-BJP ruled states" ...
A pure Hindu agenda with political militancy around sacred temples in three religiously sensitive states may lead to a Hindu-Muslim Christian divide but that will only help to strengthen the base of the Sangh Parivar.
This is because temple issues can play upon irrational Hindu emotions. The politics of emotions is the hallmark of the Sangh Parivar. Its programme announced on April 8, 1998, is a comprehensive programme of the mobilisation of Hindus by setting Bajrang Dal units in all 750 districts and 7531 blocks in the country. These units of the Bajrang Dal bal upasana kendras (centres to pay obeisance to strength) are where Hindu youth is trained in "judo, karate and other martial arts" to give a fitting reply to the Pakistan Inter-Service Intelligence Agents, Christians and carriers of cultural invasion ... National Agenda for Governance mentions the need for harnessing youth power by establishing National Reconstruction Corps ... This programme for the youth as envisaged in the National Agenda and as concretised by the Hindu Parivar deserves an analysis to properly appreciate its real implications.
The BJP is the only cadre-based party in the real sense of the term. While the Communist parties and the Congress have their front organisations, these parties have their own clear identity. Such is not the case with the BJP, which is only a political arm of the RSS meant to implement its programme. Thus, the Hindu youth of India has always been the target of the Hindu parivar ...
The VHP was established in the 1970s to launch anti-Christian missionary campaigns in the North-East. The new programme is an aggressive continuation of the Sangh Parivar's confrontationist attitude towards Christian missionaries. The BJP umbrella is now available to the Sangh Parivar to launch movements in the North-East ... a sensitive and troubled region.
A particular kind of Hindu ethos is being promoted by the BJP Government where temples, rituals, priests, tilak on the forehead of ministers and MPs are on public display. The PM inaugurated Lord Krishna Temple with fanfare in Delhi, the Education Minister enters office with tilak on his forehead, and Shankaracharyas and sants are new role models for Indians ... Professor Morris- Jones in his perceptive book on Indian politics in the 1960s had talked of modern and saintly "idioms of politics of India". But his identification of the saintly idiom was with Gandhi or Vinobha Bhave. Leaders who distance themselves from the politics of power are respected in India and they act as "moral conscience keepers of the Indian politics". JP's movement in the 1970s proved Morris Jones' analysis of the "idioms of Indian politics" right.
India has turned full circle and the Hindu saints in politics in the 1980s and 1990s are legitimising a politics of militant Hindutva directed against every minority community in the country ... Sant sammelans are being used today for targeting Muslims by raising the issue of "liberation of temples" from "Government control" or for using violence to halt the so-called invasion of foreign culture, Muslim, Christian or a vaguely defined Western.
The National Agenda and the Sangh Parivar's elaboration of that Agenda on April 8 herald a new era in Indian politics where official interpreters of Hinduism or Indian history will be fighting unlicensed street battles and a sympathetic Government will not intervene, as it happened in Gujarat when the Christian missionaries were under siege by VHP and Bajrang Dal activists. The central issue is that regional partners of the BJP Government do not have any national concerns. Only the BJP has a national agenda and its real agenda is the promotion of Hindutva through the Sangh Parivar. It does not have any hidden agenda of its own. This is the crux of the matter. (Source: The Pioneer)
