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The roads from Chitrakoot

Venkitesh Ramakrishnan

The Bharat Suraksha Yatras may not have the full backing of the rest of the sangh parivar.

YATRAS HAVE been effective instruments of political campaigning for the Bharatiya Janata Party for more than a decade and a half but as the party gets ready to launch the Bharat Suraksha Yatras, its leadership is confronted by an unprecedented organisational problem. This is the overt opposition to the yatras from sections of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh-led sangh parivar, to which the BJP also belongs. The Vishwa Hindu Parishad, self-professed ideological sword arm of the sangh parivar, repeatedly criticised the initiative as an "exercise in political opportunism mooted by BJP leader L.K. Advani" and predicted that "it is bound to fail since Mr. Advani has no credibility among the Hindu masses." Indications are that sections of the RSS too are in agreement with the VHP perspective, though they have not been as vocal.

The BJP had launched seven yatras in the past 16 years, starting with the 1990 Ram Rath Yatra under Mr. Advani's leadership, and each was backed by sangh parivar outfits in a united manner. The last major one was the Tiranga Yatra led by the former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister, Uma Bharti, who has since been expelled from the party. This yatra, in September 2004, too was formally supported by all organisations of the Hindutva combine though a clutch of second-rung BJP leaders — Ms. Bharti's peers — apparently conspired to minimise its impact.

It could be argued that the new, explicit division in the approach of various sangh parivar outfits to the Bharat Suraksha Yatras is a natural consequence of the power play that manifested during the Tiranga Yatra and the ideological, political, and organisational struggles that dominated the Hindutva combine all through 2005. Such reasoning, however, would not satisfy large sections of the sangh parivar, especially those belonging to the RSS. The sangh had designated 2006 as the period to firm up "its course correction plans" leading to a resolute and cohesive advancement of the Hindutva ideology and its political agenda with new thrusts in various spheres of society and politics. The idea, as asserted in a number of RSS circulars and documents, was to leave behind the internal struggles of 2005 and go ahead with programmes that would highlight "ideological purity and collective functioning in sangh parivar organisations."

In fact, when the RSS met for its first important conclave this year (the Akhil Bharatiya Prathinidhi Sabha — All India General Council) from February 24 to 26 at Nagpur, its leadership had evaluated that there was some concrete progress in this "positive" direction. It was specially mentioned at the Prathinidhi Sabha that a number of directives given to various sangh parivar outfits between an earlier conclave (the Akhil Bharatiya Karyakari Mandal — national executive) held in October 2005 at Chitrakoot in Uttar Pradesh and the present one had been carried out to satisfaction.

The deliberations at Chitrakoot had formed the basis for many of these directives and their implementation had manifested in different ways. The first manifestation, and the most important from the organisational perspective of the RSS, had come in the form of the "stepping down" of Mr. Advani as BJP president and the elevation of the "more faithful" Rajnath Singh. Other steps had to follow to "re-emphasise ideological purity and collective functioning."

A major premise in a number of deliberations at Chitrakoot was that the BJP had drifted from "ideological purity" and succumbed to "personality cult driven leadership," during its years in power at the Centre because other sangh parivar organisations were not provided an active role in the political sphere. So, the Chitrakoot conclave had also indicated that the RSS would make concerted efforts to boost the importance of other organisations in its fold such as the VHP, the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh (BMS), and the Swadeshi Jagran Manch (SJM), irrespective of the state of power play in the BJP. A series of happenings in early 2006 made it clear that the RSS was pursuing this percept assiduously, even though its primary "course correction" vis-à-vis the BJP had taken place through Mr. Rajnath Singh's elevation as party president.

These happenings had included the formulation of plans to evolve a Hindu vote bank through a VHP initiative and the launch of a part social, part religious campaign on the "demographic shift caused in India by the machinations and growth of [minority] Muslim and Christian population." Both the plans were widely discussed at the VHP-sponsored Dharam Sansad held in early February at Prayag in Uttar Pradesh.

The VHP concept note on this asserted that the block of Hindutva volunteers it was planning to create as part of the Hindu vote bank would support any candidate who gave in to their demands and that the formation of this massive pressure group would create a situation where no single party would have monopoly over the vote of the Hindu community. The emphasis was clear. The VHP's block of Hindu voters need not necessarily respond to the BJP's calls or accept it as a pro-Hindu party.

All these developments broadly fit in with the multifaceted Chitrakoot organisation plan and this was the reason for the "satisfactory evaluation" at the RSS Prathinidhi Sabha. But all that changed in early March with the Varanasi blasts. Mr. Advani announced twin yatras under the leaderships of Mr. Rajnath Singh and himself. By all indications, Mr. Advani had not consulted the top brass of the sangh parivar before making the announcement. The RSS itself was apparently taken aback initially by the announcement and hence slow to formally declare support to the yatra.

But as far as the VHP is concerned, the unilateral announcement of the new yatras is in clear violation of the Chitrakoot guidelines. Its leadership is of the view that Mr. Advani has jumped the gun in hastily announcing the yatras. It is also of the view that the potential damage of this initiative would be aggravated through the reassertion of a personality cult around Mr. Advani, something the RSS has been steadfastly trying to eradicate.

Indeed, the RSS has been put in a quandary of sorts. On its part, it has responded by bringing in more forces in the ambit of its endorsement. The praise showered on Congress president Sonia Gandhi by RSS ideologue M.G. Vaidya for resigning from "offices of profit" and the statement of the former RSS spokesperson, Ram Madhav, that the sangh would support expelled BJP leaders Uma Bharti and Madan Lal Khurana in all the "patriotic and people oriented causes they advance" is seen in this light. Clearly, the roads from Chitrakoot are broadening and diversifying even as the original Rath Yatri tries yet another hand at cementing his place in the realm of Hindutva politics.

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