Desperate to in any way discredit the Gujarat Chief Minister, the Congress stops at nothing
Whenever Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi is feted by corporates, Western emissaries or business schools, his opponents rake up his alleged complicity in instigating the post-Godhra violence. Or fanciful surmises about BJP infighting over precedence and one-upmanship among senior leaders grab space on the front pages of newspapers. When party president Rajnath Singh is not reported to be secretly hostile to the Gujarat leader, acting to nix his prime ministerial ambition, stalwarts lK Advani and Sushma Swaraj, survivors of many political battles, are shown to be upstaging rivals. The focus also shifts to Mr Modi's supposed face-off with VHP leader Praveen Togadia and some State-level RSS functionaries. Yet, the BJP and other Parivar constituents are known to be quite democratic in their functioning, in contrast to the Congress, which became a family sinecure after India attained freedom. PV Narasimha Rao's tenure as Prime Minister was a brief interlude in this sorry saga of dynastic politics.
Misinformation is the old divide-and-rule tactic, patented by the British and inherited by the Congress and its acolytes. The ploy is intended to deflect attention from Mr Modi's growing stature and acceptance by the corporate world as well as powerful caucuses here and in the West. While it may be true that the BJP is still undecided on its prime ministerial nominee, since the party has several stalwarts, Mr Modi's popularity in his home State is in no doubt. After succeeding Mr Keshubhai Patel as Chief Minister in October 2001, he has led the BJP to three successive electoral victories in the State. When he became Chief Minister for a fourth time last December, speculation was rife that he would graduate to the Centre. There was a spurt in frenzied criticism of Mr Modi, and analyses of the BJP and the Sangh Parivar's inner workings.
The sum result of concerted attempts to demonise Mr Modi over the past decade has been to turn him into a larger-than-life figure, Colossus-like dominating his State but poised for a national role. Anti-Modi diatribes, juxtaposed with dispassionate appraisals of Gujarat's economic growth and stability under his leadership, have failed to detract from his acumen as an administrator, or sully his reputation for honesty. The last, in particular, being a rare virtue in politicos, is all the more prized. Recent attempts by Western emissaries at a rapprochement with the leader have clearly been spurred by the congenial investment climate in Gujarat as much as by the high rating given by top Indian corporates such as the Tatas, the Ambanis and the Adani Group. Modi-baiters' sabotage of his Wharton India Economic Forum speech via video conferencing had Adani Group chairman Gautam Adani make public his decision not to attend the event, and senior Shiv Sena leader Suresh Prabhu to boycott it in solidarity with Mr Modi.
His Government's dealings with religious minorities have been free of rant and populist vote-garnering stunts alike. So far as the February 27, 2002, post-Godhra violence is concerned, his culpability is yet to be established by investigators or courts. The mayhem that resulted in an estimated 1,200 casualties, largely Muslim, reportedly occurred in reprisal for the burning alive of 59 kar sevaks, returning from Ayodhya by Sabarmati Express. Since Mr Modi had assumed the office of Chief Minister in October 2001, he was blamed for not doing enough to halt the carnage. The Congress predictably makes it a point to raise the issue whenever Mr Modi's prospects as Prime Minister are debated by the media or at public fora, vis-à-vis Nehru-Gandhi scion Rahul Gandhi, while it forgets its own dismal track record in maintaining communal harmony. Hindu-Muslim clashes were frequent in Uttar Pradesh under Congress rule, and even in Delhi till the late 1980s, before the advent of prying 24-hour satellite news channels. Such clashes erupted in Hyderabad, capital of Congress-ruled Andhra Pradesh, just last October.
The biggest blot on the Congress is the November 1984 anti-Sikh riots in Delhi, which overshadows the post-Godhra carnage in terms of victims' numbers and magnitude. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's assassination by her Sikh bodyguards triggered the massacre of innocent Sikhs by political goons, with eye witnesses reporting that senior Congress leaders goaded them on. They are yet to be punished. About 3,000 Sikhs were killed. Inexplicably, this gruesome episode has stirred fewer human rights proponents than the Godhra riots, while the Sabarmati burning case never figures in their campaigns.
lest we forget, thousands of Sikhs marched last November to Parliament and submitted a memorandum to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and demanded that the perpetrators of the mayhem be punished. This would require re-opening cases closed by the police against the accused.
The Congress-led ruling coalition has been raising the bogey of Hindu terror in a bid to frighten people into voting the UPA back to power. However, a Hindu-majority electorate is unlikely to fall into this clumsily laid trap, especially after the Islamist attack in Hyderabad last month.