Right-wing extremism and the rise of the BJP in India can be traced to (several) factors. Thus, clearly, the right has used the fear of "outsiders within" to build a support base. Immigration has been one way of doing this (Bangladeshi migrants, for instance), but more important in India has been the portrayal of religious and ethnic minorities as aliens whose loyalty to the nation is questionable.
Secondly, economic deprivation has played a role. The lack of employment opportunities for young men in particular has been a factor. Unemployment and economic ears (post-Mandal) have made available a pool of recruits or the shock troops of the right.
Thirdly, a popular philosophy of history that is built round India's golden past and its subsequent defeats, onquests, and shames has gained ground in the elite and ven popular imagination. The theme of national veakness, even 'cowardice' (to quote the RSS) has been Il too evident in the breast-beating over separatism, Largil, and the recent hijacking.
Politically .,. the decay of the left and centrist parties India is so palpable that it hardly needs comment. The ame of shifting coalitional politics since 1977 has been layed brilliantly by the Indian right ...
Thus, the RSS deliberately cultivates an image of goofiness from the mundane affairs of state in Delhi ... This asures that the Sangh cannot be blamed for political lismanagement, and its weaknesses cannot be exposed. he right ... advocates extreme and flagrant positions and en retreats and recants as a way of disarming critics and ponents - and succeeds only too well.
Finally, international politics has encouraged righting extremism in India ... The United States' victory, the llapse of the Soviet Union, and the rise of China have ntributed to a feeling of geopoliticai vulnerability that s been exploited by the right. Globalisation too has ade Indians feel vulnerable. Economic globalisation has plied economic exploitation and political penetration.
The globalisation of human rights has been seen as a form external intervention. The extension of the non-liferation regime appears like a dagger drawn against. Islamic fundamentalism and terrorism and kistan's unremitting involvement in Punjab, Kashmir, i other parts of India have fostered a sense of siege.
The record of intimidation, destabilisation and lençe by the right (in India) has no match (elsewhere). Consider the record: the Rath Yatra in 1991, the nolition of the Babari Masjid in 1992, the attacks on slims in Mumbai after the Babari demolition, the dalisation of cricket pitches, the attacks on Christians, enumeration of Christians in Delhi by the local police, the threats to cultural personalities (Hussain over the paintings, Dilip Kumar during Kargil, Deepa Mehta for her films), the rewriting of textbooks and curricula, the calls to outlaw western-style clothing for Indian girls in Delhi schools and universities, the threat to overturn well accepted norms (on religious conversion, on places and practices of worship in UP, on RSS membership for civil servants, on the sanctity of Article 370 and the basic structure of the Constitution), the maintenance of intimidatory organisations such as the RSS, VHP, and the Bajrang Dal - the list can go on.
Indians ... cannot afford to be (philosophical) about right-wing extremism at home. The hope that right-wing politics is being moderated by elections, coalitions, and day-to-day governance is misplaced. The opposite is true.
Right-wing politics has used the electoral system to gain power with 25 per cent of the vote; the BJP is gradually absorbing its coalition partners; and the levers of governance are being deployed to accustom Indians to the domination of the right.
(Source: The Hindustan Times, 13 February, 2000) [Kanti Bajpai is Associate Professor of International Politics at the Jawaharlal Nehru University)]
BJP Implementing RSS Agenda with your Support
Saifuddin Soz's Letter to Leaders of NDA Partners, 20 Jan., 2000
Inspite of your close association with the BJP through the NDA agenda, many of us never doubted your secular credentials. We thought your association signified a strategy to share power for certain goals set for the foreseeable future. But, now, the BJP's hidden agenda is unravelling itself and your continued silence is interpreted as your agreement to what is happening around in pursuit of RSS agenda.
The Ministries whose charge is held by RSS/BJP are engaged in vigorous pursuits of ... a 'hidden' agenda. Like an iceberg, the entire agenda is not visible, but whatever has been revealed ... cannot be allowed if India has to be a democratic and secular country. I will cite only a few exampies. I ... urge you kindly to ponder over the agenda the RSS is pursuing through the BJP (and) the public perception that they enjoy your support!
Sidharth Bhatia On BJP's Cultural Agenda
Liberal opinion about the BJP today is divided into two streams of thought: There are those who are viscerally opposed to the party and its shadowy cousins and claim it has a hidden agenda that will become apparent in due course. and the other camp which contends that the compulsions of coalition politics will make the party give up some of its more contentious planks ..
How simplistic both points of view are became amply clear within the first week of the new Government being sworn in. The VHP which chose to keep a low profile for the past few months, emerged out of its purdah to declare that the Pope must apologise during his forthcoming visit for the "forced conversions" carried out by Christian missionaries ..
Which brings us to the other criticism of BJP-baiters - that there is a secret plan of the party ... It is not as if there is no such plan: but it is hardly hidden. Even its worst-critics cannot claim that the BJP has made any bones about what it wants to do as a Government. Its speeches and writings have always given a clear idea of its Weltanschauung and its theories have been known for decades ... The BJP's gameplan is crystal clear: It means to impose its own imprint on the country by all means at its disposal. Critical to its strategy are the Big Five ministries that it will never give to any of its allies, no matter what: Home, Finance. HRD (which, inter alia, incorporates education), I&B, and Youth Affairs and Culture, all these portfolios are non-negotiable.
The central pillar of this agenda is culture. Culture has long been the battlefield, the main theatre of operation ... It has taken upon itself not only to transform the culture of India, but also transform India through culture. And what better way to do it than through the machinery of the Government?
The BJP. for all its pretentious Brahminism and harking back to India's glorious civilisation, is uncomfortable with ... cultural elitism. It is rooted in the idiom of the middle-classes and thus can speak to them on their own terms ... It has its adherents in the millions ...
Thus, Saturday Prime Time on National Television consists of Jai Hanuman and a ballet on Ram Charita Manas; no amount of inducting "liberal" faces in the Ministry or on Doordarshan will change that reality ... Every political party in power is entitled to mould the country in its own vision. Some of their erstwhile opponents may not mind joining hands with the BJP to give shape to that cultural vision. Others may continue being against it for ideological, social and above all aesthetic reasons. It is their dharma to fight the BJP's agenda, especially if it is imposed through coercion or lately, co-option. which is a far more potent tactic. For this, it will be important to understand what the agenda is and evolve a cohesive strategy to counter it. Mere strident opposition will not have much of an impact.
But this will demand some serious thinking on the part of liberal forces. It will mean shedding the naivete that has characterised the Left-liberal discourse so far. (Source: The Pioneer, 19 October, 1999)
Freedom Watered Down Editorial, The Indian Express, 1 Feb, 2000
The issue (is) whether a group of people, however politically well-connected they may be, can be allowed to function as the unofficial culture police of the country. It was for this very reason that the Shiv Sainiks' action in disrupting the show of her earlier film Fire in Delhi and elsewhere evoked widespread condemnation.
At the root of the problem is the artist's right to expression ... The incident (has) also brought to the fore a new trend whereby the threat that such attacks on the artist's freedom of expression is overlooked by harping on other secondary issues. Thus when playwright Antony's Kristuvinte Aram Thirumurivu (The Sixth Sacred Wound of Christ) was under attack from the orthodox Christians in Kerala, like Tasleema Nasreen's Lajja in Bangladesh and M.F. Husain's nude drawing of Goddess Saraswati in Mumbai and Baroda, there was quibbling over the artistic and literary merits of these works, when the issue was the violence against the people concerned.
The argument that filming destitute widows in Varanasi would cause disrepute to the country or Hinduism is as ancient as the charge that Satyajit Ray's Pather Panchali affected the prestige of the country as it depicted poverty. At a time when TV channels, Indian and foreign, beam incidents ... from the heart of the country into drawing rooms all over the world, why should anyone be concerned about a ... Film producer choosing a subject as hackneyed as the widows of Varanasi? Let no one deny Deepa Mehta her right to produce a film, India is not a fundamentalist nation ... The right place for the self-appointed culture police is behind bars.
