A potent mix: Big talk, false piety

Nalin Verma

Serenaded by damru (twoheaded drum) players, clad in ceremonial saffron, the paste of sandalwood smeared across his forehead, Prime Minister Narendra Modi slowly descended the steps of the ghat and waded into the River Ganga, marking the inauguration of the Kashi Vishwanath Corridor. Then, he performed a puja at the sanctum sanctorum of the Kashi Vishwanath temple. It was a grand spectacle - and, for the more parsimonious among us, a ludicrous waste of public money. The PM did not hold back - his public relations team came with state-of-the-art equipment - audio and video cameras and voice recorders, creating a two-and-a-half hour long documentary that many TV channels played. The film, which channels tried to pass off as ‘reportage’ was centred around one man and one man only - Narendra Modi.

On the fringes, away from the beat of the damrus, was the Chief Minister, in his spartan saffron robes. Mere mortals must know their place and resign ourselves to the periphery. Even if we are the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, leading the fight to retain power in the state. Everybody is second to the Prime Minister, who stood alone, reveling in the pomp and circumstance. Despite being relegated to the sidelines, Yogi stood his own. But one thing was made abundantly clear. When UP’s election season rolls around early next year, Modi, the MP from Varanasi, will spearhead the BJP vanguard.

During his inaugural address, made in the heavily-illuminated Kashi Vishwanath Dhaam, Modi mentioned the 18th century Maratha queen, Ahilyabai Holkar. Ahilyabai is remembered for being a great constructor of temples, which she worked to preserve during her lifetime. The BJP has found what it has deemed the perfect parallel to the Prime Minister, in the empathetic, erudite and much-adored Queen Ahilyabai. The facts were engineered to suit the occasion. While Ahilyabai Holkar’s piety was greatly lauded - she considered it her religious duty to rebuild and rejuvenate shrines, Narendra Modi is an elected Prime Minister of “Socialist, Secular” India. He has no mandate to turn public money into an extravaganza promoting a particular religion.

These are the early indications of what’s on the saffron agenda, as the BJP campaign gathers momentum with every passing day. The manner in which Modi has begun the proceedings has left nothing to the imagination - the BJP will carry forth its Hindutva campaign and continue to polarise the people along religious lines. And at Kashi Vishwanath Dhaam, we got an inkling of how brazen they are in doing so.

Despite the attempts at partisanship, it was the ill-conceived and hurriedly formulated farm laws from September 20 that still threaten to be his undoing. They are, arguably, one of the biggest strategic failures of the Prime Minister. By announcing the withdrawal of the contentious laws in November, the PM hoped that the anger of farmers, who spent a year agitating against them, would dissipate. He was wrong on that and one more count - the laws, despite the widespread unrest, served as a sort of communal glue, uniting farmers from Hindu, Muslim and Sikh communities in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand.

Far from backing down, the farmers continue to lengthen their list of demands. Apart from the Minimum Support Price, farmers have extended their wishlist to include the unprecedented rise in diesel and petrol prices, fertilisers, sugarcane dues and providing employment to the unemployed. They are also angrily demanding the dismissal of the state’s gangster-turned-union Home Minister, Ajay Mishra Teni, whose son, Ashish drove his car into a group of protesting farmers, mowing down four. To the farmers, Modi’s withdrawal of the three laws ia “hard fought victory against him.” They are currently enjoying the perception that they have dented his image of omnipotence. They have learned to treasure their unity, which has enabled them to bring this man and his need to be seen as greater than human, down from his high horse.

This farmer unity has, naturally, shifted the political goalposts in the state. Akhilesh Yadav, president of the Samajwadi Party and Jayant Choudhary, President, Rashtriya Lok Dal, to bury the hatchet and enter a political alliance in western U.P. The SP chief, who was on a Vijaya Yatra, or victory march, as part of his election campaign, has been emphasising social unity and harping on issues like the caste-census, unemployment and price rise. Akhilesh, having aligned himself with the RLD in the West and smaller parties across the central and easter parts of the state, is trying to make the assembly polls out to be a bipolar contest, fought between the BJP and his own Samajwadi Party.

The BJP’s rallying cry, ‘vikas’ is being challenged. The unity of Hindu-Muslim-Sikh farmers, coupled with