Author: Lakshmi Iyer
Publication: India Today
Date: February 24, 2003
As senior leaders root for accommodating
Hindutva, the party struggles to redefine itself
On January 31, Madhya Pradesh Chief
Minister Digvijay Singh declared in Delhi that there was nothing wrong
in taking up issues concerning Hindus. Defending his decision to write
to the prime minister on beef exports, he said he had merely forwarded
a letter by a cow-protection group. He also took full credit for banning
cow slaughter in his state in 1994, even talking about the medicinal and
commercial value of cow's urine.
A day later, Arjun Singh, Digvijay's
mentor-turned-rival organised a meeting at the Parliament Annexe. The People's
Integration Council (PIC) meet not only aimed at uniting secular parties
but was also meant to reassure minorities about the Congress' secular credentials
and to clear the air on the party's soft-Hindutva stance during the Gujarat
elections. The PIC was Arjun's answer to the failure of successive governments
at the Centre to convene the National Integration Council (NIC) meeting
since 1992. Five members of the NIC, including Arjun, are among the 113
members in the new body. The PIC's 20-point resolution, among other things,
called for a law to punish those guilty of genocide.
The Arjun initiative on combating
communalism and Digvijay's moves aimed at wooing the Hindu vote bank, all
within a week, represent the contradictory ideological impulses in the
Congress today. If secularism is a sacrament to one, Hindutva is not abominable
to the other. They were both responding to Hindutva, the concept that has
overwhelmed the political discourse since Narendra Modi's stunning return
to power in Gujarat last year. But while Arjun seeks to combat Hindutva,
Digvijay feels it would be best to co-opt it.
In the wake of the Gujarat debacle,
there are more takers in the party for Digvijay's line - unthinkable till
a few months ago - than Arjun's. And though Arjun's colleagues share his
reiteration of the party's commitment to core values, they also see the
PIC more as a bid by the leader to assert his own relevance, his counter-offensive
to his marginalisation within the party. His close identification with
the Muslims proved such an embarrassment for the party's candidates in
Gujarat that they did not allow him to address any public meeting during
the poll campaign.
Now with the PIC, Arjun feels he
is on his way to re-establishing his utility value in the party. The council
is being viewed in political circles as a secular political alliance, a
rival to the ruling National Democratic Alliance. Congress President Sonia
Gandhi spent three hours at the meeting, while Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam
Singh Yadav was there with party General Secretary Amar Singh in tow. At
the end of the two-day show, Mulayam promised to back the Congress in Uttar
Pradesh's Gauriganj assembly by-election. In response Sonia, who till now
had been depending on the CPI(M) to establish contact with other opposition
parties, offered to host a dinner for opposition leaders ahead of the budget
session of Parliament beginning February 17.
Party circles liken the Arjun's
PIC effort to his setting up of the Congress (Tiwari) in 1995. "Eight years
ago, he felt the Congress' ethos was threatened, so he floated the Congress
(T). Today he has floated the PIC to protect the secular credentials of
both the party and Sonia," says a party leader. Post-Gujarat, it is clear
that neither Arjun nor Sonia can persist with unequivocal commitment to
secularism within the party. Arjun's views on secularism found no takers
at the January 5 CWC meeting that assessed the party's Gujarat debacle.
AICC General Secretary Kamal Nath, his junior in state politics, was outright
uncharitable as he dismissed Arjun's views on secularism as "history"-a
remark that stung the senior leader.
It was at the January 5 meeting
that signs of the ideological churning in the Congress first became visible.
While some members felt the party lost Gujarat because of a lack of ideological
clarity and soft-Hindutva, others felt its textbook secularism had distanced
it from the people. Kerala Chief Minister A.K. Antony had endeared himself
to Hindus by extending the management quota allowed to minority-run educational
institutions to those run by Hindus. "The party should not be seen as going
against the mood of the nation," Antony said. He was supported by Rajasthan
Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, who had recently backed a controversial Ramkatha
hosted by state Governor Anshuman Singh at the Raj Bhavan to raise funds
for drought relief. "Soft Hindutva is just a new term coined by newspapers,"
was how Gehlot later dismissed questions on the issue.
The chief ministers may be seen
to be taking independent positions on ideological matters, but party leaders
admit that it is Digvijay's strategy of identifying with Hindu causes that
can insulate the party against the anti-incumbency factor in states like
Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan that will soon be going to polls. Dubbing
the Left and liberals as pseudo-liberals, former UPCC president Salman
Khursheed feels the liberals are indirectly helping communalism, "The liberals
say we cannot have bhajans at our public meetings. They question innocuous
moves like Soniaji's visit to the Ambaji temple that strikes a chord among
common people. They are trying to alienate us from the average man in a
country that is deeply religious."
Increasingly, leaders like Khursheed
feel, the party needs to do some soul searching. That the party should
not offend Hindu sentiments, without compromising on its core secular values.
This question- raised by the late V.N. Gadgil after the 1989 election debacle-has
split the CWC once again. There are those who feel that the party should
redefine secularism in tune with the changing times, while others feel
it should not compromise its ideology even if it means losing the next
Lok Sabha polls. There is a generational divide on this question, admits
a CWC member. "It's the old timers with no stake in the party's future
who are clinging to the past and saying there is no need to redefine secularism.
The younger lot feels the party should not appear to be anti-Hindu or appeasing
the minorities," he says.
A senior functionary admits the
AICC now has to deal with the generation that couldn't care less about
what the Congress did in the past. "Unlike in the 1960s and 70s, the young
today are deeply religious. There is also a Hindu backlash to Muslim fundamentalism,"
he says. When sadhus stormed Parliament in 1966 on the cow- slaughter issue,
"Indiraji (the then prime minister) met Vinoba Bhave to mollify them",
says the party leader to argue that Hindutva is no anathema to the Congress.
While Congress leaders feel using
sadhus for campaigning is an issue best left to individual candidates,
there is a consensus on the need for discussion on ideological questions.
Perhaps another Pachmarhi-type brainstorming would be in order. The only
hitch is that Sonia, the one who should give direction to the party, is
in no position to provide it.
THE NEW SCHOOL
"The Congress cannot afford to be
led by the NGOs."
Salman Khursheed Former UPCC chief.
"We should not be seen as going
against the mood of the nation."
A.K. Antony, Chief Minister, Kerala.
"Arjun Singh's views on secularism
are now history."
Kamal Nath, AICC General Secretary.
