The bleak future of Hindutva politics
THE bloodletting in the BJP has turned out far more prolonged and self-destructive than the party's staunchest critics, including me, had expected. Not a day passes without senior leaders calling their colleagues names which would embarrass street-level thugs. As the BJP suffers painful upheavals, its cadres lampoon their bosses as cartoon characters like Tarzan, and exhort loyalists to "bombard the headquarters," imitating Mao during the Cultural Revolution -- perhaps with equally disastrous results. Many observers are dismayed at this explosion of virulent recrimination. Some even rue the BJP is blurring its line of demarcation from the Congress, which stifles inner-party debate.
This betrays astounding naivety. The BJP has never had inner-party democracy. Its core political and organisational concepts derive from the Sangh Parivar, which is profoundly undemocratic and doesn't elect its leaders. The BJP cannot comprehend the causes of its consecutive election defeats in structural terms linked to changes in the balance of social forces, Hindutva's receding appeal and the attraction of inclusive agendas in a society as badly divided, and hence in great need of healing, as India. The Congress understood this, and won. The BJP remained stuck in Hindutva, too-clever-by-half leadership projection, caste arithmetic and image management. It's now blaming individuals for its losses.
The person who has been most ruthlessly attacked and suffered the greatest loss of stature is none other than the BJP's tallest functioning leader -- prime ministerial-aspirant-forever L.K. Advani. Mr Jaswant Singh has pilloried him for his "consuming ambition" and for not defending him against his summary expulsion from the BJP. The "Iron Man" has become the butt of inner-party jokes. He was told by RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat that he must quit as leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha. The RSS also wants BJP President Rajnath Singh to make way for a younger leader.
This isn't a way of levelling the BJP's two competing power centres: the unelected core group dominated by Mr. Advani, and the other controlled by Singh loyalists. Mr. Rajnath Singh will complete his full term as party president at the end of 2009. He cannot have a second term unless the party constitution is amended. Singh, a provincial, petty-minded, intrigue-obsessed politician, cannot bring this about. The RSS's real target is Mr. Advani, who breached his promise that he wouldn't be the BJP's prime ministerial candidate beyond 2009. After the election results, he offered to step down as the opposition leader, but unilaterally re-usurped that position. The RSS won't let him stay.
The BJP is in its worst-ever crisis thanks to a total collapse of organisational authority, political disorientation and strategic bankruptcy. Nobody in the BJP can arbitrate between its warring leaders. This has allowed the RSS to brazenly dictate terms to the BJP. The RSS decided that the BJP must promote leaders aged 55 to 60 years. And four such leaders duly landed at Mr Bhagwat's feet. The RSS wants the choice of the next party president to be extended beyond the Advani coterie (Arun Jaitley, Venkaiah Naidu, Ananth Kumar and Sushma Swaraj).
So serving/former state-level ministers are suddenly in the running. The RSS is now micromanaging the BJP. It'll probably dictate its political line. In some ways, this function is new. The RSS has doubtless messed with the BJP in the past. Sarasanghachalak Sudarshan's "midnight knock" in 1998 famously ensured that Mr. Jaswant Singh wouldn't become finance minister.
After the BJP's 2004 debacle, the RSS summarily replaced Mr. Naidu as party president with Mr. Advani. In April 2005, Mr Sudarshan publicly demanded that "there should be a generational shift in BJP," and that Messrs. Vajpayee and Advani "should step aside." This directive was unambiguous. Mr. Vajpayee shrewdly ducked it by saying he held no post. But Mr. Advani refused to quit. Soon, the RSS succeeded in sacking him by using his remarks praising Jinnah as "secular" during his Pakistan trip.
What's new about the present RSS-BJP relationship, shaped by the unprecedented turmoil following the BJP's election defeat, is the scope and quality of the RSS's interference in its day-to-day affairs. Even BJP leaders without RSS backgrounds, like Mr. Arun Shourie, pleaded for this by demanding the RSS should "take over" the BJP.
This inaugurates a new phase in the BJP's evolution. As long as the Vajpayee-Advani duo was strong, and while the BJP held central power, they could get a certain degree of autonomy from the RSS in the party and government's day-to-day running -- without breaking with Hindu communalism ideologically, or the RSS organisationally. Neither leader had the conviction to put the BJP on the path of moderation or turn it into a conservative Right-wing party -- like, say, European Christian Democrats -- without its communal baggage.
The RSS adopted a low profile, but remained the BJP's mentor, political guide and organisational gatekeeper. It conceded some policy space to the BJP in governance, especially in economic matters. But behind the scenes, it always asserted its primacy, especially that of Hindu nationalism.
A key to this was the BJP's dependence on RSS pracharaks to mobilise votes for it during elections. This dependence has recently grown not least because the BJP's base has shrunk. RSS leaders claim that 40 percent of the BJP's votes in the last election came from their work. The RSS influence is even stronger in the party organisation than in its Parliamentary wing. Thus, only 30 of the BJP's 116 Lok Sabha members come from the RSS. But two-thirds of its national executive members have RSS backgrounds.
That means the RSS will overtly and blatantly tighten its hold on the BJP, further damaging its credibility. Unless the BJP returns to the politics of passion and mass mobilisation, it's likely to become a rump party, much like the Jana Sangh, albeit bigger in its Lok Sabha presence than the latter, with its 20-35 seats. Even such a rump cannot be written off. But it'll be a far cry from a force that's about to come to power.
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