[Reader-list] Pardon Us, If This Is The Ram Rajya By Aleem Faizee (Countercurrents.org)

[Venugopalan K M]

Pardon Us, If This Is The Ram Rajya

By Aleem Faizee

09 April, 2009
Countercurrents.org

Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) while releasing the party manifesto on
Friday April 3, 2009 reaffirmed its faith in Ram Rajya. ‘If there's a
definition of an ideal state in India it has been the idea of Ram
Rajya’, the BJP leaders have reportedly asserted. It was not
surprising to see the party coming with such a manifesto as the
assertion has always been there in BJP’s agenda. This is altogether a
different story why when it came to power in 1999 general elections,
along with other favorite party agendas, this agenda also took the
backseat. Congress spokesperson is right when he says these are the
issues BJP remembers only at the time of elections.

However one needs to ask the BJP leaders what kind of Ram Rajya they
intend to bring to the country. For not very long ago we had seen them
endorsing the demolition of the Babri Masjid and blissfully dancing as
the errant mob pulled down the historic mosque brick by brick. Before
that the Prime Ministerial candidate of the party, which is assuring
to bring Ram Rajya, riding on the Rath was spurting venom in the whole
country. Ram Rajya as far as we have learnt is supposed to provide
safety, equality and justice to everyone and respect to every religion
and every cast. How then the BJP leaders justify their leading and
encouraging the mob to demolish a religious site?

When in Orissa Graham Stewart Stains was burnt alive along with his
innocent children, the country expected, the BJP leadership would
behave responsibly and would condemn the culprits. Sadly they were
mute spectators to the barbaric act. They remained so even when
hundreds of people were killed in Gujarat and properties worth
millions were looted and set on fire. The women were forcibly
stripped, raped and then paraded naked on streets in the clear
daylight. Those were the tragic moments when even the unborn children
still in the womb were not safe. BJP was part of the Government in
Orissa and was in power during the Gujarat genocide. The country
rightly expected tough actions from them. However the BJP leaders not
only shied away from fulfilling their constitutional duties but in a
brazen act some of them even tried to justify the heinous crimes.
Almost whole of the country was crying for action but its Chief
Minister was gleefully floating the action and reaction theory to
justify what everyone was terming as genocide of the innocent people.

Even after the massacre of over two thousand innocents, the state
Chief Minister failed to bring peace to the people belonging to the
minority community in Gujarat. The areas where the riot victims were
rehabilitated became the hunting ground for the investigating agencies
after every terrorist attack in the country. Police encounters killing
the people who were allegedly up in arms to kill the BJP leaders
became order of the day. Ironically the entire theory of the plans to
kill the BJP leaders widely publicized to score political mileage
received a severe blow when few of the encounters were declared as
fake and Human Rights activists raised doubts over other encounters.
However the BJP leadership who is promising a Ram Rajya for the
country never showed any kind of remorse over the innocent killings.

Interestingly while the BJP was rejoicing as its support base widened
with every terrorist attack, the slain ATS Chief Hemant Karkare
decided to come with the unusual. To their misery, Karkare not only
unveiled the hitherto hidden face of the Hindu Terrorism but dealt
with those found guilty with an iron hand. The country had expected
the BJP leaders would take the same stand they had taken so far while
dealing with the Muslim Terrorists. But the entire Saffron Brigade
shocked the nation by defending the terrorists and some of them by
showering the terrorists with flowers.

Nowhere in the country had people seen the kind of affections that the
Saffron Brigade extended to the terrorists allegedly involved in
Malegaon and other terrorist attacks. Not even from them who had
raised objections over the indiscriminate detention of the Muslim
youths. ‘If the Muslim accused had done anything wrong they should be
hanged in public’, Muslim leaders and the parents of the accused had
reiterated at more than one occasion. In total contrast to this some
of the people owing allegiance to the party, which is now luring the
electorates with Ram Rajya, were demonstrating their fondness for the
alleged terrorists belonging to the Hindu right wing organisations.
‘We are proud of them even if they masterminded the terrorist
attacks’, they were proclaiming in front of the TV cameras.

On the contrary when it came to actually fighting the terrorism, the
country was stunned to find the BJP leadership surrendering to the
terrorists and its Minister himself carrying them to their designated
destination. Same is the party’s record when it came to dealing with
corruption. The fact that the TV cameras caught its party president
taking the bribe money is enough to show the party’s seriousness in
tackling the danger of corruption. As for the foreign policy, whenever
BJP looks for allies in the world there one and only choice is Israel,
the state no friend of anyone.

Sure like any other party in the country BJP has the right to seek the
majority in elections. Likewise LK Advani too has every right to
aspire for the top post. However the party and LK Advani owe an
explanation to the nation about the kind of Ram Rajya they intend to
bring to the country. On one hand they speak of the Ram Rajya but on
the other they indulge in the politics of hatred, injustice and
inequality. The party’s support extended to Varun Gandhi’s hate speech
is the latest example. The party has been accused of dividing the
nation on communal lines by none other than the Prime Minister. It has
also been termed as responsible for the growing terrorism in the
country by Sharad Pawar.

Moreover the country has not yet forgotten what Gujarat Chief Minister
Narendra Modi had said to then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in
reply to his advice to uphold the values of Rajya Dharma in Gujarat,
where the violence was reaching its peak. To the shock of the nation
and perhaps former Prime Minister Vajpayee too, Modi had replied, Wahi
to ker reha hoo (That is what I am doing). One does not need any
further explanation to know what Narendra Modi and his state
missionary was doing at that time. Is this the kind of Ram Rajya BJP
intends to bring to the country? If it is really so, then the country
surely needs something else.

(The writer is Executive Editor of the Internet Magazine
http://www.ummid.com. He can be reached at aleem.faizee at gmail.com)






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