The Bharatiya Janata Partys (BJP) bid to capture power in the current election is based on a dual political strategy: first, to distance itself form the militant postures of other members of the Sangh Parivar and secondly, to project its prime ministerial candidate Atal Behari Vajpayee as a humanist and a liberal. This strategy has yielded rich dividends; the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) was made possible by this obfuscation, both of the character of the party and the ideological commitment of its leader. Some of the alliance partners who treated the BJP as a pariah in 1996 now testify to its changed character. They also see Vajpayee's virtues, whatever they are, as unparalleled in the history of Indias political leadership. In the past the BJPs political campaign drew upon three main issues: Ram Janmabhoomi, common civil code and Article 370. In the campaign for the mandir, the leaders of the BJP, all of whom are members of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), were in the forefront. In fact, it was Union Home Minister L K Advani, who through his infamous rath yatra, which left behind in its trail the dead victims of the communal passion he had aroused, imparted a real momentum to the Mandir movement. The commitment of the BJP leadership to the construction of the temple was never in doubt. They were all present, including the liberal Vajpayee, and some of them had danced in wild abandon, when the mosque was demolished. They were equally passionate about the enactment of a common civil code and the abolition of Article 370. However, these contentious issues do not find a place in the national agenda of the NDA. Nor do they form the main planks of the election campaign. Given the contradictions within the NDA and the social base of some of its allies, the BJP was forced to make such a compromise for the sake of gaining immediate political power. It is pragmatism, term it, if you like, political opportunism. And decidedly not the pricipled stand of a party which prided in its ideological purity. Nevertheless, neither the BJP nor the other members of the Parivar have actually abandoned these issues. On the contrary they are being actively pursued. Take the case of the mandir, for instance. The construction of the mandir is a project of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP). And it is unmistakably at it. In fact, the temple is being prefabricated in Rajasthan for its eventual construction in Ayodhya. The BJP leaders are privy to it. In fact, there is no ambiguity about their attitude. They have reiterated times out of number of their commitment to the Parivars agenda and that they are only waiting for an oppotune moment to implement it, that is when the BJP gets an absolute majority in the Parliament. This agenda is not any more hidden from any one. It is openly advocated and pursued by almost everyone in the Privar from Vajpayee and Advani to Uma Bharati and Vinay Katiyar. But the issues like the Ram Janmabhoomi and the common civil code do not constitute the Parivarss real and hidden agenda. They are only incidental to a large project transformation of secular India into a Hindu state. That in fact is the hidden agenda. The BJP government secretly and surreptitiously pursued it during the last 13 months of its rule. This is an agenda that the RSS had conceived and elaborated during the last 75 years. And the BJP, it is no secret, is the political arm of the RSS and while in power worked in close collaboration with it. The RSS laid down the rules. Gave directives and the government implemented them, Ramakrishna Hegdes, Chandrababu Naidus and George Fernadeses feigned ignorance. The program of the RSS is essentially cultural and ideological with a long-term perspective. In the past they have pursued it silently by setting up institutions and organizations and using them as channels for the creation of communal consciousness in civil society. Education has been particularly important area. By now they have set up about 20,000 schools under different denominations. The Human Resources Development Ministry under the stewardship of RSS stalwart Murli Manohar Joshi, tried to mould the national education on the RSS lines. A scheme for effecting this transformation was actually prepared by an RSS activist and presented to the state education ministers. It defined India as Hindu, Indian culture and civilization as Hindu and in fact sought to privilege the Hindu in all spheres. If Joshi had succeeded in implementing it, it would have been a major step in transforming India as Hindu. Complementary to this is the attempt to change the character of Indian polity. The BJP rule has consistently tried to undermine the democratic institutions of the country. Its leaders have not spared even the President. The liberal Vajpayee has publicly criticized the President for upholding democratic traditions. In fact, the BJP wants to change the secular democratic character of the constitution and possibly, if the VHP leader Swamy Vamadev is to be believed create a Hindu and authoritarian constitution. There is thus a hidden agenda which is communal, anti-democratic and fascist. However, the BJPs political base is not wide enough now to realize such an agenda. It is there fore necessary to conceal it in the garb of national agenda legitimized by parties and individuals with a secular and democratic past. For those who are prepared to learn from the tactics of the fascists else where , it would be clear that these crutches are only temporary and would be discarded once the transitional phase is over. The BJP stand for all that the Parivar represents its intolerance, communal ideology and violent methods. That it is different from the other members of the saffron brigade is a myth, purposely created and propagated. And Vajpayee is its leader whose studied innocence and moderation is nothing but pretense. He is as much communal, anti-democratic and anti-humanist as any other leader of the BJP or Shiv Sena.
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