Ayodhya: Politicization is inevitable(My Views:3):

Posted on Friday, July 8, 2005 at - Post Comment

Debate amongst the political circles going on now a days is whether to politicize terrorist attack on Ram Janma Bhumi in Ayodhya or not. On one hand the BJP as political party and RSS,VHP and the Bajrang Dal as  social organizations, claiming to be advocates of Hindu sentiments and interest in the country are hell bent on politicization of the issue. The other side of the political spectrum represented by Congress and Left are totally against politicization of the same. The stream of most of the western educated intellectuals of the country are also in favour of non-politicization of the issue.

Yesterday, terrorist attacks in London killed 37 and injured about 700. Observers say that it is the biggest attack on the innocent civilians in London since world war II, even bigger than the IRA attack in 1972 in which about 28 persons were killed. The British polity is unanimous in opinion and the opinion is to focus on the incident and its cause, without maligning the government on the issue at this juncture even if there are points to attack.

The argument given in India esp. by Congress is that neither it is time to criticize the government nor is there any scope as even the congress didn’t criticize beyond an extent the then government of Atal Bihari Bajpeyi when the Parliament or Akshardham or JK assembly or Chittisinghpura was attacked.

There is a sound logic in this plea. But the issue is will some of the political parties or organizations agree to this plea. The answer is NO and the cause of saying NO is following:

The politics of a society is done either on social issues or on economic  issues or a combination of both. Mostly the political parties operate with a combination of both sets of issues, social and economic, depending on what type of issues are thrown at what time. The more the society is developed the more is the chance that economic issues are at the center stage. However, high development and growth don’t mean that the social issues loose their relevance, more so in a diverse country. For example, whatever efforts are made in England today by all shades of the political spectrum the schism created between Islamic and the non Islamic followers after the bomb attack has widened. Similarly 9/11 has definitely created more suspicion about the muslims in US than ever.

Now seen from the genealogical point of view the origin of Congress in India lies in freedom struggle which has both social and economic dimensions.

 After the independence however the basic social conditions, of how the society should live, were settled and they got reflected in the preamble of our constitution. The preamble became the fundamental guiding principle for the centrist parties like Congress.

Left, on the other hand, is rooted in the economic interpretation of society and therefore has primarily concentrated on the economic issues and so the first  premises of the social existence in a democratic India is totally accepted by them except the fact that the secularism means for them distancing of polity from religion whereas the constitution interprets it as sarva dharma sambhav.

It is the parties like BJP, Samajwadi Party, BSP,RJD,LJP,DMK,AIDMK,Shiv Sena,etc which have their origin in the social issues. If BJP  is the political face of RSS which primarily is the advocate of Hinduism overlapping  Indian Nationalism then the other parties(except ShivSena) derive their political strength from different castes or castes groups and are based on different permutations like M Y, Dalits, DY and other combinations of backward catses etc.

 The effort of Vajpeyi to take the political debate along the economic issues failed as neither it was supported by the ideological conviction from within nor did his economic policies bear the fruits so early so that the voters could support the party.  Rather it furthered the ideological contradictions within so much so that it seems that Advani will have to resign in the last. Ultimately, Vajpei may also have realized, after this experiment, that the level of economic development in India is not to the extent so that the economy could guide the polity. On the contrary India is still having the conditions where the religion and castes govern the polity of the day.

Thus, it means that those parties whose origin are primarily rooted in the social causes i.e. either religion or caste, will have to politicize issues of such nature or else their survival will be in jeopardy. Furthher the political leadership of such parties are not enlightened enough which could give a push to the polity for a more elevated platform.i.e. with absolute majority CM Madhya Pradesh is in the news either for asking his bureaucracy to sing Vande Matram on daily basis in the office or in shifting the location of schools on the basis of the Hindu /Muslim domination in the area or in appointing his daughter in law as MD of MP tourism. There is hardly any time for him to work for the economic upliftment of the society.

 And lastly in the context of BJP, the Left has not left any space for criticism of the government on economic issues as  none of the parties can have the expertise in criticizing the government of the day on economic lines as left is doing.And so BJP has failed to play an effective role of opposition on economic issues. May be BJP  tend to agree with the government on basic direction of the present economic policy.

But the credit for creating the importance of the religion or caste issues in the polity of the country also equally goes to those who boast themselves to be advocate of secular polity in the country. They are adept in highlighting each and every issue under the sky as either secular or communal. The railway accident in Gujrat was more known for politicization on secular and communal lines rather than an accident which needed the attention of the government on various front including the treatment to the injured and compensation to the families of those who died. And so there is a pattern to such politicizations where in each and every event under the sky is divided either on secular or communal lines, the advantage going to either the secular party or to the one which is termed as communal. When Paswan ensures that the newly elected Bihar assembly never sees the light of the day simply because of his demand that there should be a muslim CM, a lay man could also understand what his stand will lead to. So lets not talk of ourselves as holier than thou. The fact is that even the pure mundane issues are interpreted on secular and communal lines, the polity of our country has been made to operate only in these two worlds of secular and non secular. Responsible are all in the political crowd, whichever party they belong to. And so when we have sown the seed who will reap. We all only.

Hence my theory is that whether the political parties like or not the issue of Ayodhya is mandatorily  going to be politicized and the country will definitely experience the consequence of any such move. It may be a different issue whether the impact of this is going to be big or small.

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