Gauri lankesh was a secular-minded crusader columnist and political commentator, a well-known critic of the right wing and communal forces. They shot her dead at her Bengaluru house. She had been getting threat calls for long, but she wouldn’t care. She had always imagined most threat calls are made by cowardly crooks only when vested interests and communal entities felt badly threatened. The most worrying factor is that Bengaluru is no more a safe place. Gauri never once bothered to seek security cover despite nonstop spewing venom at the communal rightist outfits and individuals. She had exposed a number of them and only due to scathing, head-on attack she was constantly facing defamation charges and damage demands.
Only a couple of days ago, at a heated television debate on political patronage given to so-called godmen and women of India, a BJP spokesperson never admitted once that the saffron party had promoted or stuck to any. The Sirsa-based Ram Rahim superhero has been well-known for grave political links only in return for assured vote banks. The Hooda Government had done so much earlier; the BJP did the same during the last general elections. Khattar team members had heavily banked on the imposter for the votes they needed so badly. They would visit him, pay respects and cash and go overboard to ensure that the crook remained secure and immune to any state scrutiny no matter what sinful activities he remained engaged in. When the doomsday arrived with the CBI court sending him to jail, Khattar and most of his colleagues felt embarrassed and frightened to condemn the imposter. The story has now become stale and boring.
The more shocking fact was that internationally-acclaimed yoga guru ‘Sri Sri’ too kept the BJP bosses mesmerised and managed to defy the highest environment protection court’s order to cough up Rs 5 crore in penalty for going ahead of a culture event despite riotous public cry against polluting the banks of river Yamuna indiscriminately. Sri Sri, a unique godman name he has given himself, simply didn’t care a damn about the NGT ruling, and much against will dished out only Rs 25 lakh under oath to pay the rest a little later after the mega event was over. The disturbing fact ignored or pushed under the carpet is that the executive comprising top political representatives kept revelling in the extravaganza instead of sending law enforcement agencies to stop the event from happening at all. Shockingly, they did brazenly stand by Sri Sri and his defiance of the superior court order and displayed scantiest respect to the Rule of law. Not one minister or bureaucrat did raise even the feeblest voice against the gross crime. Believably, the pending Rs 4.75 crore shall never be paid as the politically elected executive is backing the five-star yoga guru in and out. PM Modi and his huge ministerial mass had lined up at the Yamuna-polluting glitter show without any remorse that the Sri Sri team had paid scant regards to the rule of law, which is the legal principle that law should govern a nation as opposed to being governed by decisions of individual government officials. Rule of law implies that every person is subject to the law including people who are lawmakers, law-enforcement officials and judges. But after the big show by the yoga guru, everybody including the so-called upright and secular Arvind Kejriwal forgot about the penalty slapped on Sri Sri for making the Yamuna banks filthy. The court too hasn’t been harsh about the violation and not much is heard about the penalty and defiance of the order. Sri Sri is essentially a Hindu spiritual guru though he teaches general physical fitness tricks for a fat price. He does not preach Hindu fundamentalism but has religiously avoided the beautiful tenets of other religious faiths.
Similarly when Ram Rahim was nabbed, the Khattar administration chose remain soft; his Additional Advocate General conducted as a coolie to the imposter. The previous Congress regime had availed the vote bank benefits from Gurmeet; and when times turned difficult, the fraud guru chose to back BJP leaders who virtually bee-lined at his majestic structure to get assurance of support for he could persuade the huge number of gullible devotees to cast votes as per his wish.
Not surprisingly, at a television debate show the other day, the anchor was keen to know if the BJP did avoid Baba organisations and several communal outfits for votes. The BJP guy roared, “BJP hates communal entities of any kind; on the contrary, the BJD in Odisha ties up slyly with communal outfits for votes. A Minister had got Sura Baba ashram formally declared a place of tourist interest. Further, the Sarathi Baba group was protected by the local SP who chased revolting locals and beat them up injuring them gravely.” What this learned BJP talker had pretended not to know was the fact that Sarathi Baba was arrested within 24 hours and the SP who behaved like a supporter was instantly suspended and his personal property too was confiscated. Similarly, Sura Baba and another one called Bana Baba were crushed within days, the latter’s multi-million-rupee structure pulled down before people could figure out what was happening. BJP pundits never talked of the long 15 years the courts took to convict Gurmeet. Two brave girls had lodged complaints with the highest authorities of the country. But only due to lack of timely and willing support, Gurmeet had a gala time on end for half a decade before conviction came his way. Congress leaders had promoted ‘Dhiren Brahmacharies’, ‘Chandraswamis’ and ‘Ram Rahims’; BJP leaders virtually worshipped Ram Rahim by paying incalculable cash and surrendering loyalty.
Most political parties are deeply enamoured by godmen and women only to keep vote banks swelling and a few for superstitious reasons. The Amma-Bhagwan duo in Tamil Nadu and Radha Ma in the north are all star category-godpeople politicians surround with heads hanging in obeisance.
Radha Ma, heavily made up with gaudy paint and with enormous loads of gold on body, is just into trouble with law for having destroyed happy homes.
Thus, BJP and Congress leaders have been exposed as foolish and non-secular on several fronts including siding with and tilting towards godmen and godwomen. Even the overrated UP Chief Minister Aditya Yogi promoted cow vigilante outfits and was on the verge of making laws to modify food habits of people as per faiths he thought was best. As the nation rose against him on his communal moves, he cowered down and changed colour.
All the same, the BJD led by Naveen Patnaik has not committed one silly error on the secular front. As most opponents and detractors are at a complete loss in figuring out what makes the reticent CM so popular, they did attempt to sling some stain and taint on him on silliest of issues like he buys over national awards and takes credit for what is truly due to the Centre. Unfortunately, some headless creatures have failed to appreciate the fact that Naveen is a thoroughbred rationalist and perfectly secular in spirit when it comes to political administration like his illustrious father, the legendary Biju Patnaik. What most bitter opponents do not want to know is the simplest fact that Naveen believes in ‘quality field delivery anyway’, which can never happen without good governance. Whether or not the politicians in the executive do understand basics of governance, he delegates critical tasks of decision making and implementation to the fittest available. The assignee could be a brainy politician or a super sharp bureaucrat. He knows too well that the end is invariably important; means is only the machinery. By all parameters and assessments, this fact has been proven too well.
Amit Shah and Modi seem to have lost appetite and sound sleep over Naveen’s intriguing popularity so much as to make any attempt, good or wicked, to capture Odisha.
The fear factor became clear the moment they put Dharmendra at the head of the oath-taking row. Some headless fellow has told them that by projecting Dharmendra as a very high-stature politician of Odisha, the masses there would espouse the BJP by writing off Naveen, who is still flowing in their system even at this moment. Experts say that by trying to malign Naveen, the disorganised Odisha BJP will only suffer badly in 2019.
(The writer is a core member of Transparency International, Odisha)