On the verge of the 2014 elections, I was a nascent undergrad, who rarely cared about politics. Even still I understood the importance of the BJP coming to power, defeating the incumbent UPA government (United Progressive Alliance) led by Sonia Gandhi, I mean Man Mohan Singh. To be honest, Indians were fed up with corruption and scams that robbed the economy of thousands of crores, and the thunderous silence of the then 'silent, accidental' prime minister. To be honest, MM Singh was an able administrator. He was the tour de force behind India's economic reforms and good relations with the US government. In many ways, the INC was seen as an oligarchy rather than a democratic party where the top few controlled the entire party's policies. All of these contributed to the party's debilitating defeat in 2014. On the other hand, we have a prime minister, who was once a chai-walla (a tea-selling person), almost in forced similarity with Abraham Lincoln, who is the figurehead of a cobbler-turned-president to most Indians. The underlying histories are debatable but the idea is that the masses love a leader from humble origins as they identify themselves with them.
While all seemed well, it all started to become clear in less than two years. There was a rise in the lynchings of people of particular religions. There were attempts to rewrite Indian history. The press started to sing praises of the ruling party, especially its leader. The debates were so one-sided that the representative from the ruling party didn't even have to talk.
Nobody, least of all BJP expected it. In the 2024 elections, the people of India gave a resounding mandate to the ruling BJP party that they are tired of Hindutva politics and vote-mongering in the name of religion. Unemployment and the economy were the two main issues people voted for. I will briefly overview the main reasons behind this mandate.
Rahul Gandhi was often and relentlessly mocked by the BJP and the so-called 'Godi' media as 'Pappu', meaning that he is incapable, inept, and unskillful. Despite this barrage of attacks on him, he took on the 'Bharat Jodo Yatra' (Join India Tour), in which he toured the entire country from North to South and from East to West. While he was defeated by Amethi in the previous elections by Smriti Irani, he contested this time from Wayanad in Kerala and Rai Bareilly in Uttar Pradesh and won both seats with a majority of almost 4 lakh votes. In contrast PM Modi barely won in his constituency by only 80k votes. While we cannot compare the vote majority share in two constituencies, given that the constituency was considered to be a stranglehold for Hindutva politics is a cause for concern for the ruling party.
---
Cut to the present
The opposition gave fiery speeches in the parliament primarily bashing the consolidation of power over executive bodies such as CBI, ED, and judiciary, the capture of the election commission (EC), the NEET exam crisis, the incendiary remarks made by the prime minister against a religious minority, the center's handling of the Manipur's civil war, among others. Here, I will briefly talk about two speeches from the opposition that I found to be impressive.
The first was by the Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi (RaGa). Previously, the notion of Hindutva has been drummed up by the ruling party extracting little to no resistance from the opposition possibly from the fear of losing the Hindu vote. However, in this parliament session, it looks like Congress decided to take the narrative into their own hands. In this speech, RaGa differentiated Hindus from Hindutva, saying that Shiv Ji and all other religions preach nonviolence, tolerance, and empathy, whereas the ruling party only prescribed violence. A recurring theme of his speech was 'Daro mat, Darao mat'. I must say this is a new RaGa that India is witnessing. Trying to twist this speech into Hindu hatred, the ruling party failed badly and played right into Congress's hands. Note that in the past they played a similar gimmick that required RaGa to apologize to Hindus in Kerala. This is definitely a moral victory. He also brought up the matter of the BJP losing in Ayodhya and said that they ignored the poor and therefore paid the price.
Another interesting speech was from the Tamil Nadu MP, A. Raja's speech on the president's remarks. The interesting point of his speech was that of the 'caste census' which was also brought up by RaGa in his rallies. And he mentioned that the caste system was created for the "division of labour", but it turned into a "division of labourers" and that a caste census is the only way to ensure social justice. I found the idea of a caste census intriguing. Although, at first, I thought this could be discriminatory to the downtrodden people. It looks like identifying the lower-income clusters and the factors that influence people to stay in poverty is the way to ensure social justice and an overwhelming majority of respected journalists and social workers seem to agree on this.
I might write up a specific blog post for caste-based census and will provide more references if I can! Until next time!
No comments:
Post a Comment