October 26, 1998
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BOOKS Coloured Views of Saffron Western academics with pre-conceived notions about the BJP and India. By Swapan Dasgupta THE BJP AND THE COMPULSIONS OF
POLITICS IN INDIA
Unfortunately, academics are not given to contrition and certainly not when realities on the ground go against years of painstaking research. The inevitable temptation, in the circumstances, is to show that actually speaking nothing has changed. In 12 essays on the BJP, a group of academics -- relying excessively on clippings from the print media and casual interviews with party functionaries -- seeks to prove that the more things change the more they remain the same. The central line of argument is predictably familiar. The BJP, like its parent body, the RSS, is an out and out Brahminical outfit committed to contesting and appropriating the social upsurge from below. It is an upper-caste movement that has put a big question mark over "pluralism and the very notion of a composite and multilayered identity". It believes in undermining the subaltern identity by encouraging Sanskritisation and a homogenous form of Hinduism. In short, it is everything India is not. By implication it is a political freak. There are many examples to drive home the freakiness of the BJP experience. Satyanarain Jatia, a five-term MP from Ujjain, is a Dalit, but he is an accomplished Sanskrit scholar. He must, therefore, be part of the great Brahmin conspiracy. Likewise, there is something sinister in Babulal Gaur -- a minister in the Sunderlal Patwa government of 1990-92 -- describing himself as an Ahir and not a Yadav. Moreover, Gaur "stressed the special relationship that this caste of herdsmen entertained with Krishna; for him, the Krishna cult was obviously a means to integrate into the high traditions of Hinduism". I wonder what the scholars would have to say about Mulayam Singh Yadav's and Laloo Prasad Yadav's constant invocation of the Krishna legend. Would it also be interpreted as a sign of "willingness to oblige upper castes in what they consider as restoring their legitimate dominance in a crumbling social order"? The authors are miffed by the BJP in Rajasthan "constantly invok(ing) fragments of history for partisan purposes". They have obviously never witnessed an election in Rajasthan where praise of Maharana Pratap is almost mandatory -- by all parties. The problem is the contributors miss the wood for the trees. In trying to detect the use of Hindu symbols, they pretend to not notice that Hindutva had a profound ideological impact throughout India. Of course, the translation was mediated by social equations at the grassroots. But that is true for any ideology. At the end of the day, Indian voters are capable of thinking for themselves. Caste and community are important but they are not insulated from broader currents. Before dissecting the BJP, the contributors (Ghanshyam Shah apart) would be advised to undertake a familiarisation course on India. Maybe one tailored to radical tourists.
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The election of a BJP-led coalition Government in
1998 came as a shock to the India watchers who dot the landscape of western academia. Not
because the election results were entirely unexpected in India, but because the outcome
did not fit into a pre-conceived theoretical construct. It was bad enough for the BJP to
maintain its position as the largest party in the Lok Sabha for the second consecutive
election, the confusion was confounded because so-called "secular" groups
readily entered into a pre-poll alliance with it. 
