Intolerance is for Real

Their fears are indeed real. They are not lying for sure. But sadly, it is all nothing but their hallucination and that is arguably their self creation. For no fault of theirs, they have been made to believe since independence that RSS is out and out an extremist organization with a single mission of driving minorities out of India. The secular brigade led by the left-liberal ‘extra-nationals’ have worked over-excessively all through to somehow construct a perception that has no real foundation, strangely. Just notice the recent comparison that an eminent secular made between ISIS and RSS. The ISIS with only about 50000 members has kept the entire militarily-developed west on their toes with their mindless showcasing of terror incidents. But it goes only to the credit of our skewed-seculars who can still believe that an organization with 50 lac members having its presence at 50000 places as Shakha units in this country can also be as irrational as the ISIS. Surprisingly, they fail to notice the glaring contrast between the two. Only if someone in his senses would extrapolate the situation assuming the presence of 50 lac alleged ‘Hindu ISIS’ in India, even a counter argument would lose its worth. It is not difficult to recall their desperation during the built-up before the last Loksabha election. I remember several of these making chest-beating appeals to the voters not to support BJP. They were apparently more than convinced that their hate-campaign that they had carried out for the past more than half a decade would never allow an RSS supported BJP to come to the power. They thought that they have been successfully able to convince the peace-loving and inherently secular majority of India to identify RSS with the communal tag.

We must now realize that this left-liberal extra-national brigade did not want the BJP to come to the power not because they feared a regime of intolerance towards minorities but – they actually feared even worse. They feared that with this government at the centre, their more than half a century propaganda for branding RSS as a rabid communal organization would get thoroughly exposed. The source of their strength to keep on maligning RSS came only from a well-executed mis-campaign. They were losing their sleep on the thought of the voters accepting BJP finally as a truly-secular party. All hell broke for them when the inevitable happened. Modi became the PM. All fears that they had been spreading to the voters were suddenly put to test. The propagandists had no option left but to create a scenario to prove that whatever they had been warning us for was never hypothetical or imaginary. They went overboard by picking up each single case that had a potential to be blown out of proportion. They started filtering the news with their skewed-magnifying lenses. Initially all negative news on the churches were reported with only single flavor. The investigation results unfortunately failed their campaign completely. They looked for another spate of incidents and finally they got one – the barbaric lynching of a human being. They only wanted a single streak to swim the tide – and they got that. Even though the immediate responsibility was of another ‘secular’ government, ‘seciulars’ did not have the luxury to care for this contradiction. They could have hardly afforded to miss this glimmer-opportunity. They kept on pushing the ventilator of award-returning ‘oxygen’ to keep the issue fat and alive. A scientific analysis based on the available statistical-data would refuse to hint at any conclusion that can justify this ‘intolerance-hype’ bult-up, but when did they bother themselves to engage in an honest discussion on such serious issues. They have a habit of using situations, accidents and emotions as tools to fool and bluff us.

And I pity for Amir Khan and Kiran – for getting counted as the latest victims of this ‘manufactured’ fear campaign carried out by the left-congress-secular trio.

True Colour of Terror

Is there a way to arrest the alarming spread of terror? Undeniably, ‘terror’ has acquired a dangerous proportion worldwide and has posed a challenge before the civilized world.

We must come out of the state of denial first. We have wasted enough resources, intelligence, time and energy in proving somehow that there is nothing unusual about terrorism and it is merely a law and order problem. A construct however, coined by the ‘sane’ world that ‘terror has no religion’ has only helped us in fooling ourselves. Even cancer can be cured but for that at least those who are treating you must be unanimous about the nature of the disease, its extent and the area affected with the disease. Asking the family of the patient to believe that all diseases are bad for health will only make the patient complacent and that would only help aggravate the problem further. The first step to treat this menace would be to accept that this disease finds its strength in a particular religion ‘Islam’. Unless we dig out our head from the sand of our virtual and idealized surroundings, we would not be able to make effective strategies to tackle this problem that exists unfortunately in our real world.

It must be realized that the genesis of the problem rests in some construct of the Islamic theology. At the same time, fortunately for us, the solution also lies in several other constructs that are part of the same theology. After all, isn’t it a fact that ‘Sufism’ that is widely owned by the Indian Muslims and appreciated equally by other believers, also have originated from the same theological concepts? That a plural thought such as ‘Sufism’ can find its root in Islam is an evidence enough to prove that Islamic theology also has a scope of being as accommodative and as plural as any of our Bharatiya religions. Unfortunately, our country has been following a policy that is even more repulsive than those adopted in the west. Indian intelligentsia and strategists, over the years, have been working overtime to prove that terror has no religion. What is worst is that they have also been investing enough time, energy and thought to prove that terror also has other colors. This approach in the name of ‘Secularism’ has worked negatively for our country on two accounts. Those who could have otherwise worked to find a theological solution of the ‘real terror’ were made to feel complacent while on the other hand this approach also provided enough reasons to instigate counter-terrorism. It is as if a cancer patient is advised that one should worry about the cancerous wounds only as much as one pays attention to scratches as both are primarily wounds but only of different verities.

There are umpteen verses that exist in Ancient Vedas, Ramayana, several instances reported in Mahabharata and Manusmriti that are neither owned nor followed now because they have lost all relevance today even if they were being owned and followed religiously historically. Old traditions such as Sati-pratha, Child-marriage, Denial of education to the Girls, Caste-discrimination, Denial of Equal opportunity and Animal sacrifice find no support today only because the progressive and reformist thoughts are traditionally being appreciated and encouraged in the same society. On the contrary, Islam needs such reformers immediately, not to disown irrelevant verses of holy ‘Koran’ or ‘Hadith’ or ‘Sharia’ but to pick up the right verses that can find relevance and encouragement in the present context. We must understand that reforms are accepted easily only when the reformers belong to the same society. Reforms imposed from outside have often proven to be counterproductive.

We only need to identify potential reformers within the Islamic society and back them to carry out the desired transformation. Is it difficult to understand that – what USA could have achieved through Saddam Hussain, they have actually achieved just its opposite till now after eliminating him? But for that we must begin with acknowledging the true color of ‘terror’ that is nothing but ‘Islam’.

A supporter’s analysis of - Bihar Election Results

(Published in the Millennium post in the issue of 13 november 2015, http://millenniumpost.in/NewsContent.aspx?NID=166146 )
      Delhi and then in Bihar, election results have thrown the biggest challenge to the BJP since Modi became its driving force. The high-energy election campaign that worked for Amit Shah and Modi in recent times, failed to yield similar results in Delhi and Bihar. Modi is however, known for converting challenges into opportunities; infusing hopes during adverse circumstances; transforming despair and despondency into hope; injecting energy into dejected admirers; turning adversaries into admirers and successfully reversing the opposition strategies into his own advantage. I am sure, his admirers including me are feeling dejected at Bihar Election results, but not him.

     Statistically speaking, the strategy of Shah and Modi has worked even during these elections very well in retaining the loyal voters with them. They have been successfully maintaining the vote-shares despite going through these trying circumstances. The extreme ‘intolerant’ opposition of BJP and especially Modi, has provided enough reasons to keep BJP supporters on their edges, completely alert and active. Due to all this, votes in favour of BJP could never decrease any significantly even in these landslide and one-sided results. This is also the reason that even in these elections, feedback received by the leaders were identical to those when BJP reported landslide victories.

     So, where have they gone wrong? 

    There are more than many theories on offer even within BJP. RSS trying to cut Modi to his size; Advani supporters engineering these debacles; Modi’s diminishing popularity or his supporters getting disillusioned – but none of these would be able to explain how he has been able to retain the voters with him. These results, not surprisingly, give an opportunity to certain elements within BJP, to vent out their frustrations even on those issues that only remotely be considered as one of the reasons for the loss. Besides this, BJP has been ‘fortunate’ enough that even their adversaries do not shy away from advising Modi to ‘correct’ himself. After all they must have never gone through such a fear of extinction as they would have felt this time whenever this government displayed any success potentials.

    In my analysis, more than the problems within, in fact BJP lost these elections only because their aggressive style of campaigning forced its opposition to unite and huddle. BJP must realize that in the present circumstances, they are bound to lose against a united opposition. Statistically, if votes were shared between AAP and Congress in Delhi elections or if Nitish and Lalu were not united in Bihar, BJP would have swept these elections with the existing share of votes. In fact one of the prime reasons of the success of Modi in the general elections 2014 has been that his opposition never believed that Modi would ever be able to cross the mark. Statistically it can never be denied that in 2014 elections, historically, BJP got the highest number of seats with smallest percentage share of votes only because the opposition never felt any reason to get united. Even in Gujarat, only in the last assembly elections, BJP was in a position of taking on a united opposition.

     Now, to turn the tide in their favour, BJP needs to convince their voters that they can deliver on their promises. Once the voters are convinced, only then as per the Gujarat model, even a united opposition would fail to make any impact. Till then, instead of following the recent short-term impact style campaigns, BJP needs to work on twin long term strategies. Firstly, they must direct their aggression to display enough examples and hints that they would be able to deliver on their promises and secondly they must try to identify potential local leaders having clean images and help them build their images on issues of common interest following a long term plan. A loss in Bihar has saved BJP from raising the expectations of the voters further that would have burdened the leadership unnecessarily. And just as Modi had controlled the lunatic elements present on his side during his Gujarat tenure, he must stop everyone from interacting with media who would keep him engaged in explanations and other damage control exercises and would derail him from his single and winning plank of development.