The mouthpiece of the RSS, The Organiser reported that on March 13,
199 l, 'a galaxy of leaders
and intellectuals remembered Savarkar on a "never before scale". The
'galaxy' comprised, among
others, of L. K. Advani, M.L. Sondhi, Ram Jethmalani, V.K. Malhotra,
Vijaya Raje Scindia, and
Balarao Savarkar. The report summed up Advani's contribution in a sentence:
'Advaniji described
his writing power [sic] and patriotism.' It will be recalled that at
Port Blair, Advani had claimed that
he had idolized Savarkar from his youth. But the 1991 report makes
no mention of it. But the
idolization was hermetically sealed in his bosom, for disclosure at
a convenient moment.
This belated justice to Savarkar is typical of the stealth and deceit
by which the BJP has been
advancing towards its goal of Hindu Rashtra as advocated by its mentor,
the RSS, as well as its
hero, Savarkar.
When the Jan Sangh members of the Janata Party resigned in April 1980
on the issue of their dual
membership of the RSS, there was but one honest course before them:
revive the Jan Sangh. They
did not, because they knew its name was mud. They chose, instead, to
sail under the false colours if
the Janata Party founded by Jayaprakash Narayan. Five years later,
at Bhopal on June 20, 1985,
Vajpayee denied that there was any crisis of identity: When did we
get away from the Jan Sangh?'
he asked rhetorically.
However, only five years ago, in a revealing interview to Debonair,
Vajpayee had said the BJP was
different from the Jan Sangh:
The Jan Sangh was functioning more or less as an opposition group...with
a Hindu bias. Nothing
wrong in that because the legitimate interests of all sections of the
Indian society are to be preserved
and promoted. But the JS got a certain image. Because it was foundedthe
legitimate interests of all
sections of the Indian society are to be preserved and promoted. But
the JS got a certain image.
Because it was founded in 1951, because Dr Mookerjee was its founder,
because immediately after
the [P]artition we took up the abolition of article 370 [of the Constitution,
conferring special status
on Kashmir].
One factor was 'the connection with the RSS to some extent'. The magazine
asked the obvious
question:
Debonair: Gandhiji's murder?
Vajpayee: Yes, all that old background.
When asked, 'To what extent are you more acceptable to the minorities?'
Vajpayee replied: 'It is not
a question of being more acceptable to the minorities. It is a question
of being more acceptable to
the majority'. Like the Jan Sangh, the BJP was out to woo the Hindu
vote. If Hindutva and Savarkar
were not mentioned, one reason was 'Gandhiji's murder' and 'all that
old background', S.P.
Mookerjee included.
Mark the landmarks on the route of the rake's progress. The BJP's first
plenary convention in
Mumbai on December 28, 1980 declared 'Gandhian socialism to be one
of its five commitments
along with 'positive secularism' and value-based politics. Hindutva
did not figure in the discourse. In
1985 the BJP's National Executive abandoned 'Gandhian Socialism'. The
National Council restored
it but combined it with the Jan Sangh President Deen Dayal Upadhyaya's
'Integral Humanism'. Even
its Palampur Resolution of June 11, 1989 on the Babri Masjid did not
mention Hindutva. Advani
said on September 24, 1990, the day before he launched his Rath Yatra
from the Somnath temple to
Ayodhya: 'Ideologically, I am ranged against all the political parties
because of this issue. All political
parties think alike.' The issue was clearly defined. It was not the
Ram Janmabhoomi issue. It was 'a
crusade in defence of Hindutva and a crusade against pseudo secularism.'
Its goal was to break from
the Gandhi-Nehru ethos, itself a culmination of the Congress ideology,,
since its birth in 1885, and to
evolve an alternative ethos.
Even so, neither the 1989 nor the 1991 Election Manifesto of the BJP
mentioned Hindutva. That
was done first in 1996 and again in 1998. And its author Savarkar was
lauded only in 2002. Now
that Savarkar has finally come to the fore, can his acolyte Nathuram
Vinayak Godse - Gandhi's
assassin - be very far behind? When will the Sangh parivar (family)
laud him? When it has
established Hindu Rashtra? This is not as implausible as it may appear.
The Hindu reported that
'Britain's Sangh Parivar celebrated India's Independence Day today
by resolving to "advocate
Godse's outlook and action" and challenge every anti-national Mulla-Commie',
a short hand for
Muslims and Communists. In an email to parivar members, Bipin Patel,
a hard-core Hindutva activist
and believed to be close to the Deputy Prime Minister, L.K. Advani,
warned that 'every drop of
blood needs to be avenged. And we are ready at any cost.' It added
'we see the merit in Gandhi's
[sic] but only after all theology inspired terrorists are reduced to
dead meat. Till that goal is not
achieved, we advocate Godse's outlook and action. And if in the meantime,
a Gandhi comes to
create hurdles in the way, then that Gandhi would need to be put out
of the way.' This was attributed
to a 'discussion board'.
The Sangh parivar has always been ambivalent about Gandhi and felt embarrassed
if asked to
denounce Godse. The sin is denounced, but the sinner is spared. The
BJP's then Vice-President
Ram Jethmalani said at Cochin on April 13, 1981 that Godse and Gandhi
'shared the same political
philosophy of a united India'. In the first place, Gandhi's and Godse's
'political philosophy' was very
different from each other. But even if Jethmalani meant only belief
in a united India (and not a shared
political philosophy), then surely, millions shared this. Why single
out Godse? The answer is simple:
to belittle the gravity of his crime and, indeed, to cast him in a
favourable light. Others are less
candid. Nine years earlier, the RSS mouthpiece Organiser remembered
Godse in these revealing
terms: 'It was in support of Nehru's pro-Pakistan stand that Gandhiji
went on fast and, in the
process, turned the people's wrath on himself. So Godse represented
'the people' and the murder he
perpetrated was an expression of 'the people's wrath'. In 1961 Deen
Dayal Upadhyaya said: 'With
all respect for Gandhiji let us cease to call him Father of the Nation.
If we understand the old basis of
nationalism, then it will be clear that it is nothing but Hinduism'.
When the BJP prevaricates, its ally, Shiv Sena's supremo Bal Thackeray,
is characteristically blunt
and crude. On May 16, 1991, he said in Pune: 'We are proud of Nathuram.
He saved the country
from a second partition'. He added, 'Nathuram was not a hired assassin.
He was genuinely infuriated
by Mahatma Gandhi's betrayal of the nation'. The killing of any person
'was an evil act and it should
be condemned'. But 'we must find out the reason behind such incidents.
The policy of Hindutva
alone can save the country from further deterioration'. This
was said at an election meeting. Since
the BJP was in alliance with the Shiv Sena, four days later the BJP
General Secretary Pramod
Mahajan was asked at Mumbai to explain his party's stand on this. He
'refused to condemn' the
utterances. His party 'does not condemn or support Thackeray's statement.
Violence is unjustifiable.'
Advani, likewise, called the murder a 'heinous sin' but refused to
condemn Thackeray's remarks. No
wonder: Thackeray had challenged the BJP to break the alliance if they
disapproved of the remarks.
The Times of lndia was not impressed. 'Since Mr Thackeray's statement
was made from a BJP
election platform, it is necessary for the BJP to go much further in
its rejoinder to the comments.' The
paper need not have been surprised at the party's equivocation. Two
years earlier, it had editorially
noted: 'Mr Advani while holding forth on "Bharat Mata", now goes so
far as to deny that Mahatma
Gandhi was the Father of the Nation'.