The last couple of decades one has been coming
across pamphlets, leaflets and other material containing the propaganda that
Christian missionaries are converting the people at rapid pace; the examples
given have mostly been those of the North Eastern states. This propaganda has
been extensively used at pan India level, particularly before elections in most
of the states. It is this propaganda which formed the base of hate against
Christians and we witnessed the ghastly murder of Pastor Graham Stuart Stains
in 1999, the horrific Kandhamal violence in 2008, and in recent years the low
intensity violence and attacks on Christians and churches in different parts of
the country. So how come BJP, the party flaunting Ram Temple, Mother cow and
Hindu nationalism, could make its inroads into an area with many states
where Christianity is the majority religion, where beef eating
is part of the people’s dietary habits and where different tribes with diverse
and clashing political interests articulate their aspirations by forming
various groups which have been asking for separate state for their tribes.
While the situation in each state is
different, there is a pattern of BJP strategy, which in a flexible manner,
supplemented by massive resources, near perfect electoral machinery and the
backing of its parent organization’s swayamsevaks is getting the cake in state
after state. In Assam it focused mainly on the Bangladeshi immigrants, the
Muslims swamping the state and threatening that Hindus will be reduced to a
minority. It was clever enough to strike alliances even with separatist
organizations. Most of the regional organization in the area looks at Congress
as the party which has not focused on the development work, and the BJP, while
at one level abuses those differing with its ideology as ‘anti-nationals’, has
no compunctions at all in allying with those who have been talking of separate
state or even secession. In Tripura, the Left government, despite its clean
record, failed to fulfil the aspirations of tribals and OBCs in matters of
reservation. It also failed miserably in creating employment opportunities for
the youth which gave the ground to BJP to promise and create the illusion of
development.
BJP here mainly harped on two major factors.
One is the promise of development. By now its claims of development stand
exposed as mere vote catching slogans
all over the country;
in North East, they still could sell Modi as a development man. Also, Manik
Sarkar’s failure to implement the new pay commissions must have hurt a large section
of the State’s population who are still stuck at fourth pay commission while
talk of seventh pay commission is in the air. In Tripura, they could also harp
on ‘Hindus are refugees: Muslims are infiltrators’ to influence the Bengali
Hindu votes. In tribal area, RSS swayamsevaks working consistently by
organizing religious functions, opening schools etc. from long time have
succeeded in turning the tables, as Manik Sarkar Government failed to address
the needs of tribals in matters of opportunities. In matters of beef, BJP
openly took a hypocritical line that their ban on cow slaughter and eating
beef, which is being imposed in different parts of country; will not be
enforced in North East. As such, one also knows that like most of the issues
raised by RSS-BJP, holy cow is a political tool for dividing the society and
when the crunch comes they manipulate the issue as they have done in Kerala and
Goa on the issue of beef and cow slaughter.
In a very loud manner, towering over Christian voters, Mr.
Modi talked of
rescuing 46 nurses in ISIS captivity
in Iraq and Father Alex Premkumar from Taliban captivity. What can one say on
these issues? Were they rescued as they were Indians or were they rescued
because they belong to a particular religion? As is the wont with Modi type
politics, they do take advantage of these incidents in a crass political
manner. Despite the fact that their ideology regards Christians and Muslims as
foreigners they do at the same time manipulate these identities for electoral
gains. In Tripura the majority of Congress and TMC MLAS migrated to BJP as well
as the electoral support shifted to BJP. What worked for BJP here was the anti-Bangladeshi
sentiment along with the illusory promise of development.
In Meghalaya, the situation is different.
Though Congress did emerge as the single largest party and logically should
have been given the chance to form the Government, the Hindu nationalist
Governor, thought otherwise and the second largest party, in alliance with
practically everybody including BJP are going to form the Government. Here the
failure of BJP to win over electorate is writ large on the results, what is
putting them in the camp of power, is the alliance with a regional party, which
has not been having amicable attitude and relations with Congress. The role of
BJP’s all round clout including money and muscle is the undercurrent of the
story.
The Left in Tripura has lot of lessons to
learn. The issue of addressing problems of youth, Tribal and OBC are paramount.
In addition, the issue of BJP manipulating in all possible ways to come to
power is something, which can be ignored at the risk of severe declines in the
electoral power of the Left and other parties. What is being labelled as Karat
line, not allying with Congress, will surely decimate the Left in times to
come, probably sooner than later, as this line underestimates the potential and
the deeper agenda of BJP-RSS. It ignores the threat of powerful electoral
machine built by BJP over a period of time and its capability to manipulate
issues, like beef and conversion by Christian missionaries, in different parts
of the country, taking two opposite positions and getting away with it!
The emotive politics unleashed by BJP RSS is
visible again in the form of attacking Lenin’s statue and attacks on CPM
workers. What is in store for future of the region if democratic forces don’t
rise to the occasion is anybody’s guess!
