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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/indiahom...evangelists-undermining-idea-nationalism.html
The creeping fascism of Hindu evangelists is undermining the idea of nationalism
By Bindu Dalmia23:43, 29 Aug 2016, updated 23:43, 29 Aug 2016
+4
+4
PM Modi must rein in rabid Hindu ideologists keen to bully people who don't share their views
Nationality is an accident by birth.
In my deepest prayers I have wished to re-incarnate again as a Hindu-Indian, despite the flaws in inequity of caste, gender, or economic disparity within my country.
Yes, flaws abound, but are my sentiments seditious or secessionist in their expression for change?
Were I to fly to Rome for Mother Teresa’s canonisation, would Modi-bhakts troll me for being a ‘sickular’\anti-nationalist?
India was once an amalgam of states and is now a federation, embracing multi-cultural diversity and respecting plurality.
How can the multitude be bullied into conformity? Which party or individual holds the patent or propriety to ‘Indutva’?
There is a growing untenable position adopted on sedition by those in power, reminiscent of the British who punished natives fighting for freedom from oppression.
Neither holding a flag nor chanting ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’ would sanctify me as a nationalist. This is just symbolic cultural nationalism. As a patriot, my sentiments go much beyond tokenism.
Threat
The creeping fascism being introduced into the BJP by right-wing Hindu evangelists threatens to condemn as a traitor anyone who is a beef-eater, pro-Pakistan, or does not hail the chant of Bharat Mata. This is nationalism as viewed through a rabid prism.
Whether it’s vigilantism or extending the seditious arm of the law to muzzle student or social movements that are in conflict with the government or RSS, they will try to bully anyone whose position is contrary to their ‘Idea of India’.
+4
A creeping fascism is being introduced into the BJP by right-wing Hindu evangelists. (File picture of Kashmiri protesters)
The fact is that the BJP rose to power on the back of a social coalition of the Hindutva Parivar’s cadres, and the Sangh and the saffron party need each other to expand their social and political footprint.
The PM can neither silence the hardliners or dispense with them at will by sending them back to their ‘shakhas’, because of the diarchical structure of governance.
We experienced dyarchy, meant to be a symbiotic sharing of responsibilities, during the UPA, when Sonia Gandhi managed party affairs and the PM functioned as the administrative head.
In an ideal division of labour, shared power between two vertical heads works for the greater good of the citizenry. But when the two function as polar opposites with separate agendas, it works to the detriment of the populace.
Ram Mandir, the hyper-nationalistic symbol of the last century that unified Hindus, cannot be replayed by the BJP in 2016 to unite the majority community and isolate as seditious anyone at variance with the Parivar ideology.
Modi the futurist is a progressive with an incremental economic agenda, yet he is unable to control culturally and socially the tyranny of dogma that is drowning the voice of reason. An orchestrated fear is beginning to silence the voice of innocence.
When RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat appeals to Hindus to procreate more to counter the “imaginary rise” in Muslim demographics, or when Dalits are flogged by Hindu gau rakshaks in Una, it reveals the underbelly of Hindu radicalism at its worst.
It is the same Parivar Modi has to rely on, as the crucial UP polls near, to help the saffron cause.
Sedition
How does actor Ramya’s pleasantry, "Pakistan is not hell, people there are like us", come within the ambit of sedition?
Even in the victimization of cartoonist Aseem Trivedi, the Bombay High Court opined “expressing disapproval of government by lawful means without violence” cannot come under Section 124(A).
Activism to rectify the perceived injustices of an errant state is reformist, and cannot be deemed seditious by intent.
+4
RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat appeals to Hindus to procreate more to counter the “imaginary rise” in Muslim demographics.
Hardik Patel’s agitation demanding reservations for Patidars, or JNU students union president Kanhaiya Kumar’s activism are an extension of the same challenges, where status quoism and the official line of thinking chain any liberated thinker.
Agitation
Campus life is about critical thinking, activism for creative disruptions in politics, and democratic dissent. Sedition claims cannot be unleashed on a whim to muzzle liberals, artists, and civil society.
Section 124(A), a draconian law left behind by the British, originated with the aim to stifle dissent against freedom fighters. It has been revoked in the UK.
The law applied to those who intended to “excite disaffection against His Majesty”. Who is the ‘majesty’ in the context of India - a non-radical, free thinker, or the imperious state?
If the CBI was the “caged parrot” of the UPA to torment the Opposition, and tax-terrorism was the hallmark of its regime, then oppressive vigilantism and sedition charges are becoming the BJP’s signature method of scaring student movements or agitators into submission.
Mahatma Gandhi said in 1922 when facing trial for sedition: "We desire to show that the government exists to serve the people, not the government. No empire intoxicated with the red wine of power has yet lived long enough in this world.”
Midway into its term, the BJP has a chance to course-correct by reining in extremists before the 2019 elections.
Voters will reward Modi for how hard he tried to mitigate the injustices of 60 years of inequitable growth, striving to deliver jobs and prosperity.
But we the people will be unforgiving if freedom of expression is curtailed, and we cannot exercise our rights in a mature democracy.
The creeping fascism of Hindu evangelists is undermining the idea of nationalism
By Bindu Dalmia23:43, 29 Aug 2016, updated 23:43, 29 Aug 2016
+4
+4
PM Modi must rein in rabid Hindu ideologists keen to bully people who don't share their views
Nationality is an accident by birth.
In my deepest prayers I have wished to re-incarnate again as a Hindu-Indian, despite the flaws in inequity of caste, gender, or economic disparity within my country.
Yes, flaws abound, but are my sentiments seditious or secessionist in their expression for change?
Were I to fly to Rome for Mother Teresa’s canonisation, would Modi-bhakts troll me for being a ‘sickular’\anti-nationalist?
India was once an amalgam of states and is now a federation, embracing multi-cultural diversity and respecting plurality.
How can the multitude be bullied into conformity? Which party or individual holds the patent or propriety to ‘Indutva’?
There is a growing untenable position adopted on sedition by those in power, reminiscent of the British who punished natives fighting for freedom from oppression.
Neither holding a flag nor chanting ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’ would sanctify me as a nationalist. This is just symbolic cultural nationalism. As a patriot, my sentiments go much beyond tokenism.
Threat
The creeping fascism being introduced into the BJP by right-wing Hindu evangelists threatens to condemn as a traitor anyone who is a beef-eater, pro-Pakistan, or does not hail the chant of Bharat Mata. This is nationalism as viewed through a rabid prism.
Whether it’s vigilantism or extending the seditious arm of the law to muzzle student or social movements that are in conflict with the government or RSS, they will try to bully anyone whose position is contrary to their ‘Idea of India’.
+4
A creeping fascism is being introduced into the BJP by right-wing Hindu evangelists. (File picture of Kashmiri protesters)
The fact is that the BJP rose to power on the back of a social coalition of the Hindutva Parivar’s cadres, and the Sangh and the saffron party need each other to expand their social and political footprint.
The PM can neither silence the hardliners or dispense with them at will by sending them back to their ‘shakhas’, because of the diarchical structure of governance.
We experienced dyarchy, meant to be a symbiotic sharing of responsibilities, during the UPA, when Sonia Gandhi managed party affairs and the PM functioned as the administrative head.
In an ideal division of labour, shared power between two vertical heads works for the greater good of the citizenry. But when the two function as polar opposites with separate agendas, it works to the detriment of the populace.
Ram Mandir, the hyper-nationalistic symbol of the last century that unified Hindus, cannot be replayed by the BJP in 2016 to unite the majority community and isolate as seditious anyone at variance with the Parivar ideology.
Modi the futurist is a progressive with an incremental economic agenda, yet he is unable to control culturally and socially the tyranny of dogma that is drowning the voice of reason. An orchestrated fear is beginning to silence the voice of innocence.
When RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat appeals to Hindus to procreate more to counter the “imaginary rise” in Muslim demographics, or when Dalits are flogged by Hindu gau rakshaks in Una, it reveals the underbelly of Hindu radicalism at its worst.
It is the same Parivar Modi has to rely on, as the crucial UP polls near, to help the saffron cause.
Sedition
How does actor Ramya’s pleasantry, "Pakistan is not hell, people there are like us", come within the ambit of sedition?
Even in the victimization of cartoonist Aseem Trivedi, the Bombay High Court opined “expressing disapproval of government by lawful means without violence” cannot come under Section 124(A).
Activism to rectify the perceived injustices of an errant state is reformist, and cannot be deemed seditious by intent.
+4
RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat appeals to Hindus to procreate more to counter the “imaginary rise” in Muslim demographics.
Hardik Patel’s agitation demanding reservations for Patidars, or JNU students union president Kanhaiya Kumar’s activism are an extension of the same challenges, where status quoism and the official line of thinking chain any liberated thinker.
Agitation
Campus life is about critical thinking, activism for creative disruptions in politics, and democratic dissent. Sedition claims cannot be unleashed on a whim to muzzle liberals, artists, and civil society.
Section 124(A), a draconian law left behind by the British, originated with the aim to stifle dissent against freedom fighters. It has been revoked in the UK.
The law applied to those who intended to “excite disaffection against His Majesty”. Who is the ‘majesty’ in the context of India - a non-radical, free thinker, or the imperious state?
If the CBI was the “caged parrot” of the UPA to torment the Opposition, and tax-terrorism was the hallmark of its regime, then oppressive vigilantism and sedition charges are becoming the BJP’s signature method of scaring student movements or agitators into submission.
Mahatma Gandhi said in 1922 when facing trial for sedition: "We desire to show that the government exists to serve the people, not the government. No empire intoxicated with the red wine of power has yet lived long enough in this world.”
Midway into its term, the BJP has a chance to course-correct by reining in extremists before the 2019 elections.
Voters will reward Modi for how hard he tried to mitigate the injustices of 60 years of inequitable growth, striving to deliver jobs and prosperity.
But we the people will be unforgiving if freedom of expression is curtailed, and we cannot exercise our rights in a mature democracy.
