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THE NATION:
BJP
Swadeshi
Time Bomb
The
Vajpayee Government's pro-market thrust is alienating the party's traditional
support base and is causing disquiet in the ranks
By
Farzand
Ahmed
It's
a small victory but the swadeshi proponents are planning to celebrate
it in a big way. On September 12, a day before Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee
began his Washington yatra, the Government lifted the ban on the sale
of non-iodised salt. The Swadeshi Jagran Manch (SJM)-which was all set
to launch the Dandi-to-Sabarmati-to-Parliament "Namak Andolan"
between the birth anniversary of Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya (September
25) and Gandhi Jayanti (October 2)-claimed it was the first victory over
the MNCS that were lobbying hard to capture the Rs 1,500-crore salt market
and render lakhs jobless.
 |
| Swadeshi
supporters set ablaze symbols of some multinational corporations at
Raj Ghat in the capital |
But why did
the Government give in? Was it merely to keep the SJM in good humour while
Vajpayee was trying to improve Indo-US relations? Or was there a grudging
recognition of the dangerous potential of a swadeshi backlash? Whatever
the reasons, the sop has not deterred the SJM from its drive to prepare
the people for "driving out" MNCS as part of the "second
freedom struggle". "MNCS quit India" is the new swadeshi
war-cry.
The "Quit
India" theme had its echo in the BJP National Executive meeting in
Nagpur on August 26. Leading the attack from within was former Delhi chief
minister Sushma Swaraj, who asked the leadership to first convince the
party about the compulsions behind the economic reforms before the party
was asked to convince the people. Was the BJP's long-standing economic
philosophy wrong or was the Government acting out of expediency? Those
who backed Swaraj included K.R. Malkani and Pyarelal Khandelwal, now a
vice-president, both with deep roots in the RSS.
Doubts were
expressed stridently despite the fact that both the PMO and Finance Minister
Yashwant Sinha had ensured that the resolution offered to the party National
Council was supportive of the Government's economic reforms. As the leader
of the coalition, it was important that the BJP should endorse the Government
agenda.
But those
assigned the task of fine-tuning the resolution had something else in
mind-how to keep the pro-reforms leadership happy while simultaneously
placating a cadre that has been nurtured on swadeshi slogans and taught
to differentiate between India and Bharat. In the process of hammering
out the draft, a group of leaders led by the then party general secretary
K.N. Govindacharya added a carefully worded line in bold print: "Swadeshi,
swavalamban (self-reliance) and decentralisation will continue to be the
guiding principles of India's economic development."
Govindacharya
is backed by a large section of the party that believes an avalanche of
MNCS is threatening to wipe out small and tiny industries. Arguing that
both "statism" and "marketism" were anti-human and
contrary to nature Govindacharya painstakingly tried to convince the leadership
about the need for a "third way" which strengthens agriculture,
artisans and the SSI sectors. In fact these sectors, along with traders,
have been at the core of the party since the Jan Sangh days.
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