Muslims' dilemma before elections

The community seldom looked beyond the Congress in the past. At best, a few regional parties caught its attention since it regarded them as secular. The Bhartiya Janata Party, or its earlier version, the Jana Sangh, was never in the picture because the Muslims found it biased against them. Still for first time, many in the community, particularly the educated lot, are fiercely discussing the BJP as an option for casting their vote in the election beginning April 20. Some of them are even toying with the idea of joining the party as Arif Mohammad Khan has done. They believe they can change its thinking from within. Also, the growing impression is that the BJP under the leadership of Atal Behari Vajpayee is moving towards liberalism. There is yet another consideration: many Muslims argue that since they have to live in India, they should cultivate the BJP which they consider is the most representative body of the Hindus.

The Muslims who have suffered the pangs of partition and they are still paying for it -- are justified in seeking a person or party to be their messiah in the difficult time they face. The Congress, its refuge, took the community for granted and left it to fend for itself. But that was the time when this attitude mattered little since India's temper was secular. Even seven to eight years ago, saffronisation was too limited to be feared. The BJP had to resign from office after 13 days because no party was willing to sully its image by joining hands with communal forces. The situation has changed since. The BJP-led government has nearly completed its term with the support of those who once swore by secularism. Power became the ideology for them. Seeing the development, the Muslims were worried whether secularism had a future in India.

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The BJP leaders' appeals to the Muslims to join the party have come at a time when many among them are uncertain and confused. Arif told me that he did not get the ears of Hindus at any platform and expected to convince them through the BJP that Muslims were not their adversaries. On the other hand, many Muslims have begun to say: If Hindutva is what the Hindus want they can have it since they constitute 80 per cent of the population.

If this is the approach, it is wrong. The majority of Hindus are pluralistic in their thinking. Only some in the upper caste have redefined Indian culture as Hindu. Still the challenge to pluralism is a challenge to all Indians -- the Muslims or others -- to prove their commitment to the basic doctrine of secularism. My worry is that the Muslims may one day convince themselves that they are second rate citizens and may acquiesce to Hindutva in the absence of a united front of secular forces.

The nation has to go back to the ideals for which it had struggled to win freedom. The top on the agenda was to build a country which would be secular and not mix religion with politics or the state. The majority of the people opposed the two-nation theory and consecrated pluralism in the constitution they adopted even after the country was partitioned on the basis of religion. The constitution guaranteed equality to all before law, without making any difference on the basis of caste, creed or colour.

The ruling BJP believes that Hindutva and secularism are synonymous. The party cites a perverted Supreme Court judgement to buttress its contention. Vajpayee argues, "Secularism is pitted against Hindutva in the belief that the two are antithetical to one another. This is incorrect and untenable. L.K. Advani rejects the talk that the BJP has put Hindutva on the backburner for the sake of power politics. Whatever its contention, the Vajpayee government is busy saffronising even the administration. Count the appointments of governors, heads of institutions, chairmen and members of Prashar Bharti and film censor boards and many secretaries to the Government of India. There is hardly anyone outside the charmed circle of the RSS which makes no bones about establishing a Hindu rashtra.

True, the BJP has put its best foot forward. But the Muslims should have known by this time that militancy and moderation are part of the Sangh parivar tactics. The RSS came to the fore in the 1940s, particularly around partition. A climate of militant Hindu nationalism culminated in the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi by Nathuram Godse, a former RSS member. Jawaharlal Nehru took a series of steps which weakened Hindu communalism.

The RSS revived its militancy in the 1960s by latching on to the demand that the government should ban cow slaughter. After a few years, the parivar took the line of moderation. Vajpayee was made the BJP president from 1969 to 1972. The RSS found in him a perfect mukhut (mask) to hide its design of changing secular India into a theocratic state.

The militant phase of the Sangh parivar was seen again when Advani led the rath yatra to Ayodhya. Hundreds of Muslims were killed. Even after a lapse of 14 years, those who committed murder have not been punished. The Babri masjid was razed to the ground in 1992. The inquiry commission appointed nearly 12 years ago is still working -- and getting extension after extension -- to find out who the guilty are. Whoever they are, they are definitely not the Muslims.

The parivar adopted a low profile after destroying the Babri masjid. But militancy was back in full fury in 2002 when as many as 2000 Muslims were killed during the planned massacre in Gujarat. The complicity of the state government is proved and reproved almost everyday by the new evidence which is coming forth against the state police.

Still Vajpayee claims that during his regime there were no communal riots expect the "chota" (small) ones. The Gujarat massacre was the biggest after partition. It was no "aberration," as the BJP leadership goes on saying. It was plain ethnic cleansing. And if Vajpayee is sincere about winning the confidence of Muslims, some action should still be taken against chief minister Narender Modi.

Those who feel that Vajpayee is distancing the BJP away from the RSS should recall his words in America: "No one can take away my right to remain a swayamsevak". And those who differentiate between the BJP and the RSS should be wiser after the disclosure by Ram Vilas Paswan, a former minister in the Vajpayee cabinet: "There is no difference between the BJP, Viashwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal; they are all alike and work for the RSS." Still, it is up to the Muslims how they appraise the BJP. But they must remember that the Sangh parivar has always blown hot and cold. This is the period of moderation because the BJP badly wants the Muslim vote to cross even the figure of 200.

Kuldip Nayar is an eminent Indian columnist.