Sangh Parivar: Imaginary Past, Medieval Barbarity, Short-Sighted and Dangerous Idea of a Hindu Nation, Current affairs, NewAgeIslam.com

Current affairs

Sangh Parivar: Imaginary Past, Medieval Barbarity, Short-Sighted and Dangerous Idea of a Hindu Nation

Sinners In Disguise

By Jyotirmaya Sharma

There are hidden facets to the sorry episode of the Babri Masjid that also implicate others

THE LIBERHAN Report can be excused for its longwinded vacuity as also the time it took to see the light of day. But the more hilarious aspect of the aftermath of the tabling of the report is the manner in which politicians of various persuasions have reacted to it. All of them have come up with their own version of the truth. In Indian politics, truth never prevails, but all that prevails is true.

In a mature democracy, it would have been the norm for the BJP to accept that they participated in a criminal act that vitiated public life and divided people.

Equally so, the Congress ought to have apologised to the country for P. V. Narasimha Rao’s inept handling of the entire situation.

Mulayam Singh ought to have kept silent in Parliament, if only because he was, until recently, extolling the virtues of a certain Kalyan Singh. The Left too ought to have toned down its self- righteous bluster, especially after their cosy understanding with the BJP recently in trying to bring down the UPA government over the issue of the nuclear deal. “ In the congregation of the righteous”, said a poet, “ the sinners are well- disguised: do not seek to count them”.

http://newageislam.com/sangh-parivar--imaginary-past,-medieval-barbarity,-short-sighted-and-dangerous-idea-of-a-hindu-nation/current-affairs/d/2209

India: Secularism has to come to stay, Current affairs, NewAgeIslam.com

Current affairs

India: Secularism has to come to stay

Barking up the wrong tree

By Jyotirmaya Sharma

May 19, 2009

The turbulence in the BJP and the RSS after the results of the Lok Sabha elections on May 16 have little to do with just a bad strategy and campaign having misfired. The RSS has long wanted to put in place a swayamsevak as the leader of the BJP. The model they have in the mind is that of Deendayal Upadhyaya, who was uncharismatic, but cerebral and a devout organisational man. The rise of A.B. Vajpayee and L.K. Advani, first as initiators of the Ramjanmabhoomi movement and subsequently as leaders running a government for six years, altered the equation between the parent organisation and its political wing. Vajpayee and Advani ignored the pressures and advice of the RSS in the name of running a coalition government. The RSS was a mute spectator: for instance, the RSS suggested trifurcation of Jammu & Kashmir but the BJP-led NDA government rejected the proposal. Its warning against disinvestment in strategic sectors of the economy fell on deaf ears.

The RSS chose to call it the ascendency of the personality cult, vyaktiwad, in the BJP. This was anathema to the ideologically driven organisation, where ideology and organisation have unchallenged primacy over individuals. After the 2004 elections and the loss of power for the NDA, the top RSS leaders systematically poured scorn on Vajpayee and Advani and called for a generational change in the leadership. The RSS was particularly unhappy with Advani’s remarks on M.A. Jinnah. Advani’s folly, the RSS felt, lay not merely in issuing a secular certificate for Jinnah, but writing words to the effect that he honoured Jinnah for single-handedly creating Pakistan. Worse still, Advani has said that the demolition of the Babri Masjid was the saddest day in his life, a perception the RSS does not share.

http://newageislam.com/india---secularism-has-to-come-to-stay--/current-affairs/d/1416

The Taliban is already amidst us in India, Current affairs, NewAgeIslam.com

Current affairs

The Taliban is already amidst us in India

by Jyotirmaya Sharma

There is, then, little difference between the two Aruns, Shourie and Jaitley, and Ambani, Mittal and Tata: they feel emboldened enough to suggest who the next prime minister ought to be without a care in the world for the democratic process to decide on such weighty issues. The message from them is: we know what is good for you. We represent the country because we produce wealth or facilitate in its production.

Apart from the cheerleaders for Modi, it would be instructive to look at the man himself in terms of three statements made recently. In the absurd debate regarding whether Manmohan Singh is a weak prime minister, Modi came up with a priceless statement. He dared the prime minister to hang Afzal Guru in order to prove his strength and establish his machismo.

There was a time when Gandhi shook a mighty empire through nonviolence and yet never abandoned fundamental moral principles in order to take on the British. He broke laws that were unjust, but understood the importance of laws as a guiding framework for any civilised society. Killing someone just to prove an imaginary idea of strength had no place in his moral universe.

Modi represents an alternative ‘morality’, which seeks to justify, albeit covertly, encounter killings in the name of swiftness and expediency.

http://newageislam.com/the-taliban-is-already-amidst-us-in-india--/current-affairs/d/1363