Of Hindu Demons and the Death of Democracy
Sid Harth
Sangh Parivar gunning for Brajesh Mishra?
By Rajesh Ramachandran
NEW DELHI: Is the Sangh Parivar behind the anti-Brajesh Mishra campaign
being waged by Jain TV's owner, JK Jain? According to reliable sources
in the Parivar, the two-minute Mishra-bashing promo that Jain TV began
showing on November 30 was screened - prior to its telecast - at the
Jhandewalan office of the RSS for the benefit of senior Sangh leaders.
When contacted, Jain refused to confirm or deny this `preview'. The RSS
too has declined to comment on the subject. Lending credence to this
version of events is the fact that the Parivar is making no bones about
its dislike for Mishra. Some Sangh leaders want Mishra to be eased out
of his powerful position as principal secretary to the Prime
Minister. "The PM has put all his eggs in one basket. That has to be
altered," said a senior Sangh leader.
Interestingly, even before the Parivar leadership was shown the promo,
the RSS had given a clean chit to Jain over allegations, apparently
made by an intelligence agency, that he is as ISI agent. MG Vaidya, the
RSS spokesman is believed to have told Jain TV that he could never
believe the allegations. The Jain-Mishra controversy erupted when,
according to Jain, the PMO had circulated a paper terming him an ISI
agent.
But the Jain episode may be incidental to the Parivar's grouse. A
powerful section of the Sangh accuses Mishra of forcing the resignation
of minister of state for defence Harin Pathak after he was
chargesheeted for murder last month. The Parivar's unhappiness has been
compounded by the fact that this resignation has been the basis for the
Opposition's demand for the resignation of LK Advani, Murli Manohar
Joshi and Uma Bharti.
The Parivar is now looking for an alternative in the PMO who would be
``more sensitive'' to the needs of the Parivar's politics.
http://www.timesofindia.com/today/19edit1.htm
Three's not Company
The country's political clock seems to have turned a full circle. The
BJP has returned to Ayodhya and the Third Front, which had become a
political dead-ringer is back, even if only as a concept.
And all this courtesy Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, who, having
suddenly turned up at an iftaar party, proceeded thereafter to make one
controversial statement after another on the Ram mandir. If Mr
Vajpayee's mandir wahin banayenge refrain was meant to lift the sagging
morale of BJP cadres, buy peace with an increasingly restive RSS and
deflect attention away from the three chargesheeted ministers, then he
has quite clearly succeeded. And yet look at the allies, whose extreme
discomfiture is evident from the high decibel of murmurs emanating from
the camps of the Trinamul Congress, Telegu Desam and the DMK. With five
states soon going in for assembly elections, parties such as these are
obviously under pressure from within the rank and file, who wary of
being tarred by the BJP's saffron brush, are urging their leaders to
distance themselves from the coalition leader. The dilemma came into
focus sharply with the allies demanding in Parliament that the prime
minister give an assurance about respecting the judicial verdict on
Ayodhya.
Though it's too early to predict whether the BJP's allies will
eventually break away from the NDA, one thing is certain: That the BJP
cannot afford to take its allies for granted any longer. Not when the
political scene is brimming with other possibilities, starting with a
depleted version of the United Front floated by the Left Front parties,
the Rashtriya Janata Dal supremo Laloo Prasad Yadav, the Raja of Manda,
V P Singh and former prime ministers, H D Deve Gowda and I K Gujral.
Had all this happened a few months ago, the Front would have been
dismissed as another rag-tag coalition of has-beens. Today, with the
NDA deeply divided, the possibility of some parties being lured by the
idea of a new Front no longer seems remote. Of course, we can bet on
the Front's latest avatar going the way of its predecessors, the
National Front and the United Front. There are a host of problems here,
principal among these being the selection of a leader. Who will lead
the Front? Will it be Mr Laloo Yadav, Mr V P Singh, Mr Mulayam Singh
Yadav or the octogenarian Mr Jyoti Basu? Mr Singh and Mr Mulayam Singh
Yadav may have made up, but this hardly means that they'll agree upon a
common candidate. Already, Mr Laloo Yadav has opposed the idea of Mr
Jyoti Basu leading the Front. As for a common agenda, we just have to
journey back to the past and the numerous differences that cropped up
over the common minimum programme. Then there is the question of
composition. Who will find space in this new Front? Will the RJD's
ally, the Congress party, be able to live with the TDP, the Samajwadi
Party and the JD? Will the Trinamul Congress share a platform with its
bitter rivals, the Left Front parties? Clearly, the odds are heavy and
that is perhaps why the prime minister has confidently embarked on the
Ayodhya agenda.
http://www.timesofindia.com/today/19mbom2.htm
Goswami re-elected ABVP president
MUMBAI: Dineshanand Goswami and Atul Kothari have been unanimously re-
elected the national president and the general secretary of Akhil
Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad respectively, ABVP release says. Both the
president and the general secretary, who have been unanimously re-
elected for one year term (2000-2001), will assume their office at the
national conference of ABVP to be held in Raipur from December 25-27
this year, the release added. (UNI)
http://www.hinduonline.com/today/stories/05192523.htm
The PM, secularism & Ram mandir
By Asghar Ali Engineer
MR. ATAL BEHARI VAJPAYEE issued a statement saying construction of a
Ram mandir at Ayodhya is in keeping with the national sentiment. This
raised a storm at various levels, political, social and religious. The
Prime Minister could not have been unaware of the consequences of such
a statement. His remarks came at a time when the Opposition had stalled
Parliament proceedings demanding the resignation of Mr. L. K. Advani,
Mr. Murli Manohar Joshi and Ms. Uma Bharti all of whom have been
chargesheeted for complicity in the demolition of the Babri Masjid on
December 6, 1992, in Ayodhya.
The Prime Minister has connected construction of a Ram temple in place
of the Babri Masjid with ``national sentiments.'' Who will decide what
the national sentiment is? In a multi-religious country like India can
one religious community's sentiments become the national sentiment? Is
nation constituted by one religious community? Or is Mr. Vajpayee
endorsing the two-nation theory by implication and yet claiming to be a
secular Prime Minister.
If some ideologue of the BJP or the VHP had made such a statement it
would have been understandable. But the Prime Minister of a secular
country and head of a coalition Government which has a common agenda
for governance? This common agenda excludes communal issues like
construction of a Ram temple at Ayodhya.
A Prime Minister has no right to equate purely communal sentiments with
the national sentiment. The sentiments of the Sangh Parivar cannot be
equated with the sentiments of the entire Hindu community. All Hindus
are after all not for construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya in place
of the Babri Masjid. They would prefer construction of Ram Mandir
elsewhere rather than demolish a mosque.
I am saying this after interacting with many Hindus, otherwise quite
poor and illiterate. It is politicised, middle class educated Hindus
who are showing fervour for construction of a Ram temple by demolishing
the Masjid.
The ordinary Muslims in this country too have a great reverence for
Lord Ram. Many rural Muslims take part in Ramlila enthusiastically and
even play the role of Hanuman.
They would even help materially and physically in constructing a
mandir. But they were certainly agonised at the destruction of a mosque
by some Hindus raising a false controversy about it and causing
bloodshed of innocent people in the country.
Ordinary Hindus are not, and cannot, be communal. They are quite
respectful of other religious traditions and would not like to see
religious places of other communities demolished. The demolition of the
Babri Masjid was not a religious project; it was the communal project
of a communal party which was misusing the religion of the majority
community for its own political purpose.
The BJP's earlier avatar, the Jana Sangh, had admitted in 1977 by
renouncing communalism and taking a vow that it would embrace
secularism and Gandhian socialism that it was a communal party and that
from then on it would shun communalism.
It was an irony of history that the BJP has become the most
aggressively communal during the 1980s, after taking a pledge for
`secularism' and `Gandhian socialism.' It was during the late 1980s
that the BJP took up the Ram temple issue. In 1990, Mr. Advani took out
a Rath Yatra in support of this project which became practically a
`blood yatra.' What do politicians care if a few hundred or even a few
thousand innocent lives are lost if they can grab power in the process.
Who knows all this better than Mr. Vajpayee?
His statement has exposed Mr. Vajpayee in many ways; even if one takes
into account the tremendous pressures he has to function under - from
hardliners in his own Parivar, coalition allies and the Opposition. A
statesman would not have issued such a rash statement which could raise
the communal temperature to unacceptable levels. It has taken several
years for our country to emerge out of the communal abyss into which it
was pushed by the Ayodhya controversy.
Mr. Vajpayee had earned lot of goodwill by his Ramzan peace offer in
Kashmir as he had earlier by undertaking a bus journey to Lahore. A
statesman has to continue on his hazardous path, come what may. Mahatma
Gandhi never wavered in the face of much greater difficulties and often
staked his own life for the sake of a cause. I am not comparing but
only giving an example.
Mr. Vajpayee's admirers have also tried to project him as a Prime
Minister comparable in stature to Jawaharlal Nehru. Nehru was very
consistent in his commitment to secularism and composite nationalism.
Nehru too came under tremendous pressures, especially during Partition
and also from his own party colleagues in post-Partition India.
However, he never wavered in his conviction and commitment to
secularism even for a moment.
Mr. Vajpayee, on the other hand, has always been torn between his
loyalty to the RSS and to secular nationalism. Witness his speech at
Staten Island in the U.S. where he said amidst applause from hundreds
of VHP sadhus that the RSS was his soul and Hindu Rashtra his dream. If
he made his recent statement on Ayodhya with an eye on the upcoming
Assembly election in Uttar Pradesh, it is more proof that Vajpayee is
far from being moderate and that his moderation is nothing more than
political posturing.
Who knows better than Mr. Vajpayee that the process of nation building
is highly challenging and much more so if what is involved is a
composite, pluralist nation like India. Let us not forget that because
our political leaders, with some honourable exceptions, could not
handle the delicate process of working out a constitutional arrangement
for power- sharing, our country got divided in 1947. The process of
composite nation- building being much more challenging needs to be
handled with even more care and sensitivity.
The Ram mandir controversy must be avoided at any cost. Such
controversies neither serve our nation nor even the Hindu community.
There are much more challenging problems before India today and those
who are sensitive to the basic needs of the people would be more
concerned with these issues rather than with raising artificial
controversies.
The Muslims had not taken in good faith the statement issued by Mr.
Bangaru Laxman, soon after he was elected BJP president, that Muslims
should support his party. Now the Prime Minister's statement has
confirmed their belief that Mr. Laxman's statement was just a political
ploy . One can of course also argue that since the Muslims did not bite
the bait, the BJP had to resort to another gamble, this time that of
Ram mandir and through a more weighty person like Prime Minister, to
revive its fortune.
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/181200/detfro02.asp
Thackeray at his rabble-rousing best
Sujata Anandan
(Mumbai, December 17)
SHIV SENA chief Bal Thackeray is at it again. The latest round of
vitriol from him: “It is time to disenfranchise all Muslims in the
country”. Thackeray’s advice is part of a long interview that appears
in Saamna, the Sena mouthpiece.
Former Maharashtra minister and Islamic scholar Dr Rafiq Zakaria,
laughed heartily when informed about the “saffron roar”. He said, “I
think Thackeray is losing his balance. He is trying to whip up a
religious frenzy. Nothing could please Gen. Musharraf more than what
Thackeray has just said”.
Thackeray’s statements seemed to be carefully aimed at the BJP and what
he sees as the party president’s “appeasement of Muslims”.
The Sena chief also says it is high time that the memorials of carry
the line “Hey Babar” in much the same way that Mahatma Gandhi’s samadhi
at Raj Ghat has “Hey Ram” on it.
In the same interview, Thackeray “forgives” Vajpayee for
the “appeasement trip” he is on because “the PM is not in full control
of his government”. For good measure, the Sena chief observes, “Give us
the numbers and see what we can do”.
"Thackeray is living in a fool’s paradise," says Dr Ishaq Jamkhanvala,
chairman of the Anjuman-e-Islam group of educational institutions in
Maharashtra. "Surely it is not up to him to decide who should be
disenfranchised. Is he saying this because he himself has been
disenfranchised? What makes him think he has the powers to take away
ours?"
Said Samajwadi Party state unit chief Abu Asim Azmi, who has a running
battle with the Shiv Sena chief: "This man, who himself has been
disenfranchised, can never rise above his politics of poison. Hatred
and communalism are his life’s blood. I think has become brave ever
since the government restored his personal security. Take those guards
away and watch him turn into a coward."
Assassination plan: Four Kashmiri militants arrested by Maharashtra
Police recently had plans to attack RSS headquarters and assassinate
Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray, police said on Sunday.
The militants being interrogated in Srinagar after they were handed
over to the local police revealed that they also planned to “wreak
havoc communally sensitive places all over the country.”
--
http://www.indiacyberportal.com/index.html
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