Ram
Puniyani
The change in the
ruling dispensation (May 2014) has more than one aspect which is likely to
affect the very social-cultural-political map of India. Narendra Modi won the
last elections with an electoral success, 282 seats for BJP, with 31% of votes
polled, which is a landmark for a party. There was a meticulous planning to
come to power and there were many factors bringing them to power. One was the
communal polarization carried forward from the Gujarat carnage of 2002, to the
one witnessed in Muzzafarnagar in 2013. The unrestrained support of Corporate
World was another, as Modi had given all the facilities to the Corporate World.
Corporate in 2007 declared that they will like to see Modi as the future Prime Minister
of India. The backbone of the campaign was seven lakh RSS volunteers, who acted
as the steel frame of the campaign. The projected factors helping BJP win was the
myth of Gujarat’s development. The media management and the discrediting of the
ruling Congress was the effective tool for swinging the votes in BJP’s favor.
RSS-BJP-Modi want to bring in Hindu nation trampling upon the values of Indian
Constitution., which have laid the foundation of democratic ethos, which have provided
the ground for social transformation of caste-gender.
Pattern
of Power
The previous time,
1999, BJP came to power at the head of a NDA it did not have the simple majority
so it suspended its “Hindutva’ agenda. Hindutva agenda stands for abolition of
article 370, Uniform Civil Codes and building of Ram Temple on the site where
Babri Masjid stood. Now with the majority in parliament, the march towards this
Hindutva agenda has been unleashed. Modi has already instilled the
authoritarian streak in the new Government. Secretaries of different departments
have been asked to directly report to him, and he has not permitted the meeting
of the Cabinet in his absence, which was the norm with previous Governments.
Though there is a Cabinet, the major power is being centralized around the prime
minister.
Acche
Din
The major plank of
winning the elections was the slogan of Acche din (Good Times). The people at large,
who are victims of the rising prices and inflation, were sold the dream of
better days in the offing with victory of Modi. The relentless rise of prices despite
Modi coming to power has created a sense of disillusion amongst the people, as
high hopes were created through propaganda. Some say it is a bit too early to
comment on this, as it is a honeymoon period, while others point to the pattern
of policies, which do not give a hopeful picture for times to come. FDA in
retail has been raised from 26% to 49% in a single swoop. While in opposition;
BJP was opposing it. This is an opportunist turn around. The fear of
privatization of public sector is very much there in the air. The amendments to
Land Acquisition bill are going to affect the interests of the farmers in a
very adverse way. What is being proposed is to dilute the consent of majority
of the farmers for acquiring land.
Changed
Dispensation: Sectarian mindset
Many times we express
more by keeping silence than by speaking, so to say. The Pune techie Mohsin
Sheikh’s murder allegedly by the Hindu Jagran Sena was part of the well
designed communalization process. The violence in Saharanpur, Rampur and other
parts of UP and some parts of MP are part of the process to communalize the
assembly areas, which are going to face the polls soon. The silence of Prime Minister
on these issues is more than eloquent. Rather it gives signal of sorts, which
are not very healthy. There are scattered incidents which give us the glimpse
of the Modi Sarkar. The shrewdest part of the new Government is that it has solid
backing of vast Sangh Parivar to speak in different languages; these different
tongues make the whole picture of their agenda. In case of the tennis star
Sania Mirza being appointed as the brand ambassador of the newly formed
Telangana state, the BJP leaders on TV openly opposed this saying that she is
the daughter-in-law of Pakistan, while the top level functionary of the
Government said that she is pride of the nation.
Education
All said and done the
major problem of the present rule is going to be the changes in education,
which will alter the thinking pattern of the coming generations. The goal is to
instill a pattern in consonance with the Brahminical norms, to promote orthodox
medieval mind set and to undermine the scientific temper. One recalls that in
the previous BJP led NDA regime apart from other things, its major impact was
the changes in the history and social science books, where the divisive history
taught in the RSS shakhas, the communal history, the history where the kings
are looked at through the prism of religion, was introduced. One knows that the
communal historiography introduced by British was their main tool in implementing
the ‘divide and rule’ policy which formed the ideology of the communal streams
of Muslim League and Hindu Mahasabha-RSS. This type of history; by focusing on
the glories of ‘our’ kings also promotes the feudal values of caste and gender
hierarchy. Mercifully the BJP led NDA lost in 2004 and the rational, national
historiography was brought back.
Now already there are
signs that RSS volunteers are out to change the total education system and the
content of history, social science and other books. Even before this Government
came to power, with the rise of Modi on political firmament, with the
perception that he is likely to come to power, the Right wing organizations intensified
their offensive against genuine scholarship. Dinanath Batra, by now is a well
known name, he has been heading the RSS outfits, Shiksha Bachao Abhiyan Samiti
and RSS-affiliated Shiksha Sanskriti Utthan Nyas
(SSUN) from many decades. He succeeded in pressuring Penguin, the World’s
largest publisher, to pulp Wendy Doniger's scholarly book ‘The Hindus: An
Alternate History’. This book brings out through the interpretation of
mythology the need to understand the caste and gender aspects in a sensitive
manner. The history she has focused on goes against the hierarchical mind set
of RSS combine and so pressure was put to pulp it. Now Mr. Batra emerges as a
writer himself and a set of nine books written by him have been translated in
to Gujarati and introduced in 42000 schools in Gujarat. This may be a trial run
before doing similar things at larger scale. Former BJP
president and present union minister M Venkaiah Naidu explicitly stated as
early as last year (June 23, 2013) that “it (the BJP) will change textbook
syllabi, if it returns to power”. Batra is also quoted as saying that a nationalistic education system has to be developed
to address the requirements and through this we have to develop a young
generation that is committed to Hindutva and nationalism”.
The
sampling of Batra’s books gives a good idea of what is in store for us. A quote
from one of the set of books, ‘Tejonmaya Bharat’, (Radiant Bharat) tells us “America
wants to take the credit for invention of stem cell research, but the truth is
that India’s Dr Balkrishna Ganpat Matapurkar has already got a patent for
regenerating body parts…You would be surprised to know that this research is
not new and that Dr Matapurkar was inspired by the Mahabharata. Kunti had a
bright son like the Sun itself. When Gandhari, who had not been able to
conceive for two years, learnt of this, she underwent an abortion. From her
womb a huge mass of flesh came out. (Rishi) Dwaipayan Vyas was called. He
observed this hard mass of flesh and then he preserved it in a cold tank with
specific medicines. He then divided the mass of flesh into 100 parts and kept
them separately in 100 tanks full of ghee for two years. After two years, 100
Kauravas were born of it. On reading this, he (Matapurkar) realized that stem
cell was not his invention. This was found in India thousands of years ago.
(Page 92-93)
Indian
rishis using their yog vidya would attain divya
drishti (divine vision). There is no doubt that the invention of television
goes back to this… In Mahabharata, Sanjaya sitting inside a palace in
Hastinapur and using his divya shakti would give a live telecast of the battle
of Mahabharata… to the blind Dhritarashtra. (Page 64) What we know today as the motorcar
existed during the Vedic period. It was called anashva rath. Usually a rath
(chariot) is pulled by horses but an anashva rath means the one that runs
without horses or yantra-rath, what is today a motorcar. The Rig Veda refers to
this. (Page 60)
RSS
has already set up a consultative body called Bharatiya Shiksha Niti Ayog
(BSNA) to put pressure on Modi’s government to “correct or Indianize” the
national education system. In the new syllabus “The passages in the textbooks
which pointed out to any unsavory aspect of the Hindu faith like the oppressive
caste system in ancient Hindu society, untouchability of the low-caste people
and consumption of beef during Vedic ages were scrapped, and anyone who
resisted or opposed the changes was dubbed as 'anti-national'.(1)
Caste
and Gender
While these changes in
the text books give us a full idea of the agenda of this Government, which will
have to follow the guidelines set by its parent organization, its already manifest
in the appointment of Prof Y.Sudarshan Rao as the chief of ICHR. This national
body guides the research into the Indian history. Prof Rao is not much known in
the circles of Academic history, as he has hardly written any academic, peer
reviewed papers or books. He has been engaged with writing few blogs on his
understanding of history, which is more of a fiction suiting the agenda of
Hindu Rashtra, reinstating the caste system in particular. In one of his blogs
he emphasis that caste system served the society very well and there are no
complaints against it. As per him “Most of the
questionable social customs in the Indian society as pointed out by the English
educated Indian intellectuals and the Western scholars could be traced to this
period of Muslim rule in north India spanning over seven centuries.” He argues
that “The (caste) system was working well in ancient times and we do not find
any complaint from any quarters against it.” This is a distortion.
The customs related to caste oppression were integral to the so called Hindu
scriptures Vedas (Rig Veda, Purush Sukta) Upanishad, (2) the scriptures which
were written in the Pre Historic BC period. Even in Manu smiriti the caste
division is well articulated. Manu Smriti was written around 1-2 and Century
AD. Contrary to this Prof Rao states that distortion in caste system came with
the coming of Muslim Kings. He had so far been working on proving the historicity
of our mythological Mahabharat as a part of History. Interestingly RSS combine presents
only one version of Ramayan but there are nearly 400 versions of Ramayan. The
scholarly essay by A.K.Ramanujam on the diversity of Ramayan telling again was
withdrawn from Delhi University curriculum, and the publisher forced to
withdraw the book.
With the coming of this
Government the peripheral elements have started talking about making these
scriptures as a part of our curriculum. Justice Dave talks of bringing in Gita
and others are talking of Ramayana. Both these holy tomes have heavy
projections of caste. In Gita, Lord talks of taking birth whenever Dharma is in
danger. And this Dharma is Varnashram Dharma (Varna system). In Ramayan Lord
Ram kills Shambuk, as Shambuk a Shudra is doing penance and this is something
not permitted by Caste system.
Fringe
Elements or Division of Labor
VHP supremo
and RSS member Ashok Singhal has also called Modi “an ideal swayamsevak” and
emphatically declared that Muslims must respect the sentiments of the Hindu
culture, threatening that “they cannot survive for long by opposing Hindus”. He
has also asked Muslims to give up their claims on Ayodhya, Mathura and Kashi.
The idea is to reduce Muslims to second class citizens with no privileges and
rights. Another firebrand VHP leader Pravin Togadia, known for his ‘hate
speeches’, has endorsed these views by issuing a warning to the Muslims, saying
they may have forgotten the 2002 Gujarat riots but would remember the
Muzaffarnagar riots of last year. (3)
Goa's deputy chief minister Francis
D'Souza apologized for his comment that India was already a Hindu nation.
This was a tactical retreat. He was the one who said that all Indians are
Hindus. Christians are Christian Hindus for example. Deepak Dhavalikar
another BJP member stated that under Modi India will become a Hindu Rashtra.
This is what the deeper part of RSS-BJP-Modi agenda, to see that the religious
minorities adopt the Brahminical Hindu norms. That’s why they want that to use
terms like Christian Hindus or Ahmadiya Hindus. Gradually, the assertion will
be that since you are a Hindu you must practice Hindu norms.
On the long term agenda of
RSS-BJP-Modi one needs to see the statement of RSS worker Joshi, “During
a question-and-answer session, a volunteer asked Yadavrao Joshi, then the head
of Sangh workers across all of south India, “We say RSS is a Hindu
organisation. We say we are a Hindu nation, India belongs to Hindus. We also
say in the same breath that Muslims and Christians are welcome to follow their
faith and that they are welcome to remain as they are so long as they love this
country. Why do we have to give this concession? Why don’t we be very clear
that they have no place if we are a Hindu country?” Joshi replied “As of
now, RSS and Hindu society are not strong enough to say clearly to Muslims and
Christians that if you want to live in India, convert to Hinduism. Either
convert or perish. But when the Hindu society and RSS will become strong enough
we will tell them that if you want to live in India and if you love this
country, you accept that some generations earlier you were Hindus and come back
to the Hindu fold.” (4)
So where are we heading
to becomes clear in the last few weeks of Modi Sarkar. The government will be
trying to stick to the language which will be subtle while undertaking steps in
Hinduization. Its associates, VHP-RSS will tell us bluntly about their agenda.
Needless to repeat that this agenda, being unfolded is that of Hindu nation,
where religious minorities will be relegated to secondary position and the Chaturvarnya system will be slipped
in a subtle manner.
References
2. http://www.countercurrents.
3. (Modi and Hindutva footprints - Editorial, Kashmir Times Kashmir Times - Monday, July 28, 2014)
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