BJP culture changes unalterably

BJP culture changes unalterably

FPJ BureauUpdated: Saturday, June 01, 2019, 07:26 AM IST
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Some 25 years ago, a scholar who was by no means sympathetic to it, compared the political orientation of the RSS and its fraternal organisations to the coral reef. He was emphasising the huge dose of gradualism—an inch forward every decade or so—that marked the RSS’ attempts to influence Hindu society. Since the Sangh, he claimed, was committed to expanding its influence with infinite patience, it was unmoved by temporary blips that included adverse or favourable election results and changes of government. As an observation that was located at a time when social change in India was slow and even invisible, the coral reef theory made some sense. For the RSS, it was said, there was no premium attached to time and it used to be joked that its functionaries invariably travelled in the slowest of mail trains. Even V.D. Savarkar, who popularised political Hindutva as an alternative to Gandhism, was sharply critical of RSS for its unending patience and lack of urgency. In particular, Savarkar berated the RSS’ over-emphasis on sangathan (organisation) and its relative neglect of ideas.

The centrality of sangathan among individuals who have come to politics with an RSS orientation remains. Yet, since the Ram Janmabhoomi movement transformed it from a fringe opposition to the Congress to what L.K. Advani rightly called an “alternative pole” of politics, the BJP has been playing for higher stakes—much higher than their nominal organisational network warranted.

With Narendra Modi at the helm, this over-reach has entered into the DNA of the organisation. After Modi was named the prime ministerial candidate in September 2013, the political orientation of the BJP underwent another radical shift. If the Ayodhya movement established a Hindu vote bank in northern and western India, the Modi campaign of 2013-14 sought to blend a Hindu orientation with economic aspiration.

More than any other politician, Modi detected the new political potential of a social constituency that had been created out of India’s hesitant economic liberalisation. He understood that the so-called demographic dividend could also witness a decisive rupture from the social and political traditions of the past. Since the BJP was a few steps away from fully grasping the shifts, a presidential-style campaign became a special purpose vehicle.

The remarkable success of the 2014 Lok Sabha campaign has ensured the harmonious merger of the SPV to the main body of the BJP. In the mid-1990s, Pramod Mahajan’s mobile phones used to invite derision in the RSS; today, technology is accepted as an indispensable feature of political messaging. The BJP has been changing steadily since the early-1990s; Modi has institutionalised that change. He has made it possible for the BJP to expand its orbit far beyond the networks of the Sangh and include social groups that were hitherto untouched by it. This doesn’t merely include the fast-growing middle classes. In Haryana, the electoral success was also a result of the social expansion into Dalit communities.

The spectacular performance of the BJP in last week’s elections to the Maharashtra and Haryana Assemblies can be better understood in this light. With Amit Shah at the helm and a highly motivated election machine in operation, the BJP has sought to blend the twin advantages that accrue from the sangathan and wave approaches.

What is significant is that the BJP didn’t shy away from aiming very high. In Maharashtra, it hadn’t contested nearly half the Assembly constituencies since 1991 and in Haryana its social influence was limited to a few urban clusters. That it won 123 of the 288 seats in Maharashtra may seem an under-achievement to those who are pathologically hostile to both Modi and Shah. However, considering that the Shiv Sena was at best willing to concede only 119 seats for the BJP to contest, the final result was a dramatic surge—almost as dramatic as its great leap forward in Uttar Pradesh in 1991.

As for Haryana, where the BJP lacked both organisational and social depth, its outright victory is comparable (on a smaller scale) to N.T. Rama Rao’s spectacular debut in Andhra Pradesh in 1982.

In both places, the conventional BJP approach has been turned on its head. Rather than electoral success following sustained organisational groundwork, in both states (and more so in Haryana) a victory in elections has preceded the creation of an organisational base. This may explain why the BJP had to take help from a large number of defectors from other parties to field credible candidates. It may also explain why the new BJP government may encounter more teething troubles in Haryana than in Maharashtra.

It was the timetable that forced the BJP’s hand in both Maharashtra and Haryana. There is at least a year or more available for Bihar (where it already has an established network) and West Bengal (which has been relatively untouched by a BJP presence). Consequently, the next few Assembly elections may witness a more rounded blend of sangathan and hawa. In West Bengal, the BJP will probably need to create new social units of political mobilisation. It will be a formidable challenge but Haryana has shown that virgin territories are also receptive to waves emanating from outside.

The mix may change from state to state but, overall, the political culture of the BJP has changed unalterably. Those who persist in caricaturing the BJP in pre-Modi imagery haven’t got the hang of their foe. We are seeing the first signs of a new politics in competition with the old.

Swapan Dasgupta

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