BJP'S "VISION DOCUMENT"

 The Mukhota Has Slipped!

THE 52-page so-called `Vision Document 2004' released by the BJP is a photo album of Vajpayee interspersed with usual rhetoric and falsehoods.  A `vision' usually suggests a holistic conception of what ought to constitute the future, in this case, of India.  This document, instead, is a list of unsubstantiated propositions and claims falling short even of the standards of a manifesto. The concept of a `vision' itself has, thus, been insulted!

Before we take up the contents of this document, it is necessary to note as to why the BJP has chosen to come out with its own set of demands and propositions. In the 1999 elections, the BJP contested on the basis of an NDA manifesto.  That they have chosen to independently state their position reveals the actual motive of seeking to consolidate the communal Hindu vote bank. So far, at least ten allies of the NDA have deserted, thus, making it all the more necessary for the BJP to send out a clear message that the core agenda of the RSS continues to remain the BJP's raison d'etre.  The BJP, after all, is the political arm of the RSS.  This document, therefore, contains all the core issues of the Hindutva agenda. 

In addition, there is also the declared intention to prevent Indian citizens who are not born in India from occupying "important offices of the Indian State".  This agenda is couched with Vajpayee's photographs. Indeed, Vajpayee is the fast slipping RSS mukhota (mask), which seeks to confuse and mislead the people. 

There is an orchestrated campaign of disinformation that suggests that the BJP has softened its stand on the contentious Hindutva agenda.  Mere verbal acrobatics cannot remove, or, conceal the real intentions.  The document highlights the construction of a temple at the disputed site in Ayodhya; uniform civil code, Article 370; (we are told that this is only of a transient character. Indeed for the RSS, the secular democratic republican character of the Indian Constitution itself is transitory to be abandoned at the earliest opportunity!) ban on cow slaughter -- and the rest of the Hindutva agenda of the RSS.

In this context, it is, indeed, obnoxious to see a photograph of Mahatma Gandhi as one of those that inspire the BJP!  The tallest of the Indian leaders in the struggle for freedom was a victim of the RSS assassination conspiracy.  To invoke his legacy to justify their pernicious ideological agenda is something even the devil would shudder to do. 

What is more contemptible is that Advani has claimed at Porbandar, the birthplace of Gandhi, that Hindutva is essentially secular and has emerged through contributions by people like Ramakrishna Paramahans and Swami Vivekananda!  This is a monumental atrocity. The personalities referred to have contributed to defining the theory and practice of Hindu religion.  Hindutva, on the other hand, as its author V D Savarkar himself stated, has little to do with Hinduism and is essentially a political slogan to capture State power.  It is this that is sought to be camouflaged by the BJP in this campaign to mislead the people.  The BJP, indeed, is a chameleon that changes its colours depending on the environment. The RSS, however, is a leopard, which cannot change its spots.  This document of the BJP is an expression of this leopard-chameleon partnership.

The rest of this document repeats all the untruths contained in the nauseating disinformation campaign of `India Shining'.  We have been systematically exposing these lies, damned lies and statistics.  These need not be repeated.

In sum, therefore, this so-called `Vision Document' of the BJP is nothing but the repackaging of RSS agenda.  The attempt has been so characterless that it cannot even be termed as "old wine in a new bottle".  Surely, the Indian people will see through the real intentions of the BJP in implementing the RSS agenda, which seeks to convert the secular democratic republican character of India into a rabidly intolerant fascistic "Hindu Rashtra".  This is the BJP's unstated real vision of India's future.