But what have 15 years done to Advani? Wonder of wonders, it is Advani who now finds himself in a confrontation with the very ideology he once upheld so fiercely. Irony of ironies, it is Advani who finds himself in conflict with the RSS, he who was once one of its most fervent members. And astoundingly, it is Advani who on a visit to Pakistan praised Jinnah's secularism, then called for a debate on the issue within his party and has now questioned the day-to-day interference of the RSS in governance. Did Advani take leave of his senses when he did all this? Did he go mad to do what he did, which has now resulted in his tenure as party president being abruptly cut short?
No, dear readers, Advani has not gone mad. Instead, the noisy, strife torn, traumatic lingering debate within the BJP is not a sign of hopelessness. It is not a sign of confusion, nor is it a sign of decline. Instead, it could signal the faint glimmer of hope. It is this very debate (however weak) that could lead to a light at the end of a dark tunnel. As a millenarian movement, forged in the hearts of paranoid ideologues of a bygone era, now seeks to transform itself, painfully and tortuously, into a modern right wing party, this is the very debate that could have become a symbol of genuine change.
For the last 25 years the BJP has been India's most exciting party. Why is the BJP exciting? Because it is so easy to despise, so delicious to analyse, the outbursts of mad ideology are so seductive, the hate figures are so satisfyingly creepy. Flip through the notepad of a BJP watcher and you'll invariably find a book brewing in the pages. The NDA's dilemmas, the shadowy men of Jhandelwala, the scary utterances on women and minorities, are all very picturesquely eerie, guaranteed to give birth to a thousand seminars and make every media manager rub his hands in glee.
Yet in this particular time, given its past sins, given its frightening rhetoric and views, it is still difficult not to applaud the internal democracy of the Bharatiya Janta Party. Which other party in India has the guts or even the intellectual calibre to engage in a semblance of the debate that we are at the moment witnessing in the BJP? How utterly tragic that Advani's attempt to start the debate has not been immediately seized on by others. This is the time to argue. This is the time to fight. This is the time, for whatever reason, strategic cynical reasons, to find a way in which the Sangh Parivar can become modern, can become normal, can stake a claim to the future, can become a right wing party like the Republicans or the Christian Democrats and shed its image as India's grave diggers, always unearthing skeletons.
Don't stop the thought process, pleaded Vajpayee recently. The second leadership of the BJP, far too timid and ambitious to take the debate to its apogee, have not heeded Vajpayee. Instead, they have done massive harm to their cause and their electoral future by trying to douse the fires lit by Advani, when they should have fanned the flames of ferment. But even this weak debate in the party stands in such stark contrast to the other parties.
Gaze for a while on the Congress. What internal debate is going on there? Almost none. Most of the debate in the Congress is probably about who gets to carry Big Mama's garlands. Where is a healthy debate on the social and economic agenda, on the Rural Employment Guarantee Act, on the disinvestment process or on the continuing challenges the Congress faces from caste and regional politics? Has there been any worthwhile debate in the Congress so far on economic policy? No, no debate.
And what of those regional fiefdoms that bear the mantle of social justice? Where's the debate within Laloo's RJD or Mulayam's Samajwadi Party or even the Bahujan Samaj Party? Most of those parties are one-man feudal empires where ideological debate would probably be as out of place as King Kong at an Iftaar. In almost every political party today, except the two ideological forces-the BJP and Left monarchical families reign supreme with not even a whisper of dissent. And even in the Left, whatever debate there is, all takes place within the four walls of the Politburo, so the public never gets to hear what issues the comrades are grappling with in private. But as far as the BJP is concerned, at this particular time, Advani has thrown open the doors to the future, only to have it pushed slyly half-shut by those too scared to embrace the whirlwind.
Sure, Advani may have made the statements that he did to further his own prime ministerial ambitions. He could be seeking to widen the constituency of the BJP and make it more acceptable to more voters. But so did Tony Blair with the Labour Party and Bill Clinton with the Democrats. Both tried to make their parties more acceptable to a larger constituency, both were probably driven by personal ambition, both were political strategists. Yet in India we wallow in mediocre perceptions. We don't seem to realize that there is nothing morally wrong if a politician takes the liberty of changing his mind or his strategy. Why should Advani not be allowed to engage in process of transformation? What is morally wrong in changing one's views or even one's strategy? Why have the secularists isolated Advani instead of at least expressing some appreciation for what he's trying to do? If we are all united in trying to consolidate a democratic India then shouldn't we all collectively encourage a process by which an anti-democratic force takes its first faltering steps towards normalcy? Advani was the hate figure in 1992. He's the hate figure again today, this time in his own party. And secularists and Sangh are jubilating at his isolation, without any awareness that they have failed, failed terribly, to make the most of a great opportunity.
All may not be lost. At the BJP's Silver Jubilee in December L K Advani has stepped down from presidency of his party urging his flock to raise their moral and spiritual quotient. As the 78-year-old swayamsevak steps down, perhaps as a last favour to his party, he'll whisper a legacy to his successor: 'If Advani could, then maybe I can too.' About the AuthorSagarika Ghose Sagarika Ghose has been a journalist for 20 years, starting her career with The Times of India, then moving to become part of the start-up team...Read Morefirst published:December 31, 2005, 16:06 ISTlast updated:December 31, 2005, 16:06 IST
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Lal Krishna Advani is not your average Mr Nice Guy. He described the Ayodhya movement that led to the demolition of the Babri masjid in 1992, as a mass awakening and since then has almost revelled in his terrifying image. He's cast as someone whom religious minorities have reason to fear. The Lauh Purush was ambivalent on the Gujarat carnage, he supported Modi, has called his opponents "pseudo secularists", and has embarked on divisive rath yatras. L K Advani has disappointed those who know that in our tradition there exist some written Ramayans in which the invocation Om Ganeshaya Namah is immediately followed by the prayer Bismillah-e-Rahman-e-Rahim.
But what have 15 years done to Advani? Wonder of wonders, it is Advani who now finds himself in a confrontation with the very ideology he once upheld so fiercely. Irony of ironies, it is Advani who finds himself in conflict with the RSS, he who was once one of its most fervent members. And astoundingly, it is Advani who on a visit to Pakistan praised Jinnah's secularism, then called for a debate on the issue within his party and has now questioned the day-to-day interference of the RSS in governance. Did Advani take leave of his senses when he did all this? Did he go mad to do what he did, which has now resulted in his tenure as party president being abruptly cut short?
No, dear readers, Advani has not gone mad. Instead, the noisy, strife torn, traumatic lingering debate within the BJP is not a sign of hopelessness. It is not a sign of confusion, nor is it a sign of decline. Instead, it could signal the faint glimmer of hope. It is this very debate (however weak) that could lead to a light at the end of a dark tunnel. As a millenarian movement, forged in the hearts of paranoid ideologues of a bygone era, now seeks to transform itself, painfully and tortuously, into a modern right wing party, this is the very debate that could have become a symbol of genuine change.
For the last 25 years the BJP has been India's most exciting party. Why is the BJP exciting? Because it is so easy to despise, so delicious to analyse, the outbursts of mad ideology are so seductive, the hate figures are so satisfyingly creepy. Flip through the notepad of a BJP watcher and you'll invariably find a book brewing in the pages. The NDA's dilemmas, the shadowy men of Jhandelwala, the scary utterances on women and minorities, are all very picturesquely eerie, guaranteed to give birth to a thousand seminars and make every media manager rub his hands in glee.
Yet in this particular time, given its past sins, given its frightening rhetoric and views, it is still difficult not to applaud the internal democracy of the Bharatiya Janta Party. Which other party in India has the guts or even the intellectual calibre to engage in a semblance of the debate that we are at the moment witnessing in the BJP? How utterly tragic that Advani's attempt to start the debate has not been immediately seized on by others. This is the time to argue. This is the time to fight. This is the time, for whatever reason, strategic cynical reasons, to find a way in which the Sangh Parivar can become modern, can become normal, can stake a claim to the future, can become a right wing party like the Republicans or the Christian Democrats and shed its image as India's grave diggers, always unearthing skeletons.
Don't stop the thought process, pleaded Vajpayee recently. The second leadership of the BJP, far too timid and ambitious to take the debate to its apogee, have not heeded Vajpayee. Instead, they have done massive harm to their cause and their electoral future by trying to douse the fires lit by Advani, when they should have fanned the flames of ferment. But even this weak debate in the party stands in such stark contrast to the other parties.
Gaze for a while on the Congress. What internal debate is going on there? Almost none. Most of the debate in the Congress is probably about who gets to carry Big Mama's garlands. Where is a healthy debate on the social and economic agenda, on the Rural Employment Guarantee Act, on the disinvestment process or on the continuing challenges the Congress faces from caste and regional politics? Has there been any worthwhile debate in the Congress so far on economic policy? No, no debate.
And what of those regional fiefdoms that bear the mantle of social justice? Where's the debate within Laloo's RJD or Mulayam's Samajwadi Party or even the Bahujan Samaj Party? Most of those parties are one-man feudal empires where ideological debate would probably be as out of place as King Kong at an Iftaar. In almost every political party today, except the two ideological forces-the BJP and Left monarchical families reign supreme with not even a whisper of dissent. And even in the Left, whatever debate there is, all takes place within the four walls of the Politburo, so the public never gets to hear what issues the comrades are grappling with in private. But as far as the BJP is concerned, at this particular time, Advani has thrown open the doors to the future, only to have it pushed slyly half-shut by those too scared to embrace the whirlwind.
Sure, Advani may have made the statements that he did to further his own prime ministerial ambitions. He could be seeking to widen the constituency of the BJP and make it more acceptable to more voters. But so did Tony Blair with the Labour Party and Bill Clinton with the Democrats. Both tried to make their parties more acceptable to a larger constituency, both were probably driven by personal ambition, both were political strategists. Yet in India we wallow in mediocre perceptions. We don't seem to realize that there is nothing morally wrong if a politician takes the liberty of changing his mind or his strategy. Why should Advani not be allowed to engage in process of transformation? What is morally wrong in changing one's views or even one's strategy? Why have the secularists isolated Advani instead of at least expressing some appreciation for what he's trying to do? If we are all united in trying to consolidate a democratic India then shouldn't we all collectively encourage a process by which an anti-democratic force takes its first faltering steps towards normalcy? Advani was the hate figure in 1992. He's the hate figure again today, this time in his own party. And secularists and Sangh are jubilating at his isolation, without any awareness that they have failed, failed terribly, to make the most of a great opportunity.
All may not be lost. At the BJP's Silver Jubilee in December L K Advani has stepped down from presidency of his party urging his flock to raise their moral and spiritual quotient. As the 78-year-old swayamsevak steps down, perhaps as a last favour to his party, he'll whisper a legacy to his successor: 'If Advani could, then maybe I can too.'
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