People's Democracy

EDITORIAL

 What A Hoax!

PRIME Minister Vajpayee has sought the re-election of his government on the grounds of seeking to complete the `incomplete' projects that have remained half way through the last six years. It speaks volumes of their governance that six long years have not been sufficient for them to put into practice what they have sought to do!  More ominous, however, is the fact that some of these `unfinished' tasks are precisely the reason to ensure that this government does not return to power. 

During the course of these six years, systematic efforts have been made to undermine the secular democratic character of the Indian republic. Every single institution of parliamentary democracy has been undermined and every single office infiltrated by the RSS to advance the communal agenda.  Through these columns, we have repeatedly narrated the various dimensions of this effort. This is, indeed, a task that is left `incomplete'.   Mr. Vajpayee & Co. have not been able to succeed completely, despite serious efforts to transform the secular democratic republican character of India into a rabidly intolerant fascistic "Hindu Rashtra" of the RSS variety. Surely, the Indian people will not give them another chance to succeed in fulfilling this diabolic agenda. 

On yet another score, another term for this government would prove disastrous.   During the course of the past six years, Vajpayee & Co. have systematically sold the country's economic assets for a song and they have heaped unprecedented burdens on the vast majority of the Indian people. Another term of this government means the total sale of India and the ruination of its people. 

More interestingly, the prime minister has claimed that he is in the electoral fray because without him, there would be "chaos" in the country!  Apart from the grand illusions that he may entertain for himself, it is clear that his party is portraying him in a `larger than life' image in order to reap electoral benefits.  This, however, runs completely contrary to the nauseating advertisements of `Shining India'!  If India has never felt as good as it is feeling now; if India has never been stronger and more confident than now after six years of this government, then why should chaos follow, Mr. Vajpayee?  Clearly, Mr. Vajpayee himself does not believe the claims of his own achievements!  What a hoax!

While every individual has a right to consider himself indispensable, Vajpayee's remarks remind us of the French King Louis XV.  He had once remarked, "after me, the deluge". His reign laid the basis for the disintegration of the Bourbon Empire.  Though formally the French revolution occurred during the time of his successor Louis XVI, Louis XV is considered to have laid the foundations for the dismantling of the monarchy in France and the rise of the  Republic.  What was a "deluge" for Louis XV was for humanity an advance towards a democratic republican social order. The French revolution, with its slogans of liberty, equality and fraternity, gave a qualitative progressive shift in the evolution of human civilisation. 

Likewise, the chaos that Vajpayee entertains could well be the movement for the consolidation of the Indian republic which, at this moment, is under severe strain. Like the rule of Louis had to be ended and the decadent feudal monarchy had to be destroyed for the sake of the French republic, so too in India, this rule of Vajpayee & Co. has to be ended in order to consolidate the Indian republic. 

This becomes all the more necessary considering the rising emphasis on the Ayodhya dispute during the course of the Advani's `rath yatra'.  As he reaches the Hindi heartland, the deputy prime minister is unerringly focussing on the Ayodhya dispute with the clear objective of consolidating the Hindu vote bank through communal polarisation. He is seeking votes for the construction of the Ram temple at Ayodhya on the disputed site and for the construction of the temple of India based on Mahatma Gandhi's  slogan of `Ram rajya'.  By invoking Gandhi, the victim of an RSS conspiracy of assassination, the BJP, displays the extent to which it can stoop to capture electoral support. 

In any case, it is worth the while to recollect what Mahatma Gandhi has said about his concept of `Ramrajya': "Let no one commit the mistake of thinking that `Ramrajya' means a rule of the Hindus. My Rama is another name for Khuda or god. I want Khudai Raj, which is the same thing as the Kingdom of God on earth" (February 26, 1947).  This is in complete contrast with the RSS vision of a fascistic "Hindu Rashtra" that the BJP, as the political arm of the RSS, in government is advancing.  Can there be greater deceit than invoking Gandhi to advance an agenda that is completely opposed to his conception?

Clearly, if the Indian republic has to be consolidated as truly and completely a secular democracy, then the RSS/BJP must be kept as far away from power as possible.