Pseudo-religiosity

The past continues to haunt the Congress. Otherwise, an innocuous resolution which states that “Hinduism is the most effective guarantor of secularism in India” would not have merited much attention. The Rashtriya Loktantrik Morcha uses it to expose what it calls Congress’ pseudo-secularism. By welcoming the CWC resolution, the BJP has given the RLM one more stick to beat the Congress with. What is undeniable in all this is the Congress’ proclivity to compromise on its secular credentials. By amending the Constitution to accommodate the Muslim demand on Shah Bano, Rajiv Gandhi sought to placate the minorities. Later, when the coveted Hindu vote looked as if it would elude him, he did not hesitate to open the locks of the disputed structure at Ayodhya and allow Shilanyas to take place there. While launching the Congress’ election campaign from Ayodhya in 1989, he even roped in Arun Govil, dressed as the Lord Ram in the TV serial Ramayana. But despite all this, the Congress lost the support of a vastsection of both Muslims and Hindus. Obviously, the party did not realise that it could not compete with the BJP, at least as far as championing Hindutva was concerned. By the time this realisation sank in, the Congress had lost its base in the populous states of UP and Bihar.

Successive elections have shown how difficult it is to regain these lost vote banks. The present signs of recovery in UP are too feeble to give the party much comfort. Besides, it has come at a price. For instance, it is the fear that some sections of the Muslims are gravitating towards the Congress in UP that the RLM has all of a sudden stepped up its attack on the party which, until the other day, it was egging on to take the initiative to bring the Vajpayee government down. The RLM knows well that without the support of the Muslims, it loses much of its electoral clout. It is, therefore, in the RLM’s interest to portray the Congress as just another version of the BJP and thereby keep the Muslims away from it. Needless to say, theBJP too would not like the Congress to regain its status as an umbrella organisation that accommodates every section of society. The emergence of Sonia Gandhi has made the party increasingly vulnerable to attacks. At another time and under another leadership, the party president would not have faced charges of meeting only Christians during her recent visit to Gujarat. Small wonder then that this resolution has received so much public attention.

The Congress clarification that when the party speaks about religion, be it on Hinduism, Islam or Christianity, it only means to further the idea of tolerance and respect for all, does not carry conviction. The worst incidents of communal riots — Bhiwandi, Meerut, Bhagalpur, to name just a few — happened when the Congress was in power at the Centre and in the states concerned. Post-independence history is replete with instances when the party showed little hesitation in pandering to sectional and communal interests to subserve its own petty electoral interests.Thus when, all of a sudden, the party pays a tribute to Hinduism for keeping India a secular nation, it causes widespread cynicism. And if many see in it the motive of projecting the party president as more Hindu than the Hindus, they cannot be faulted. Credibility is no longer the hallmark of the Congress.