Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants the blessings of Sufi saint Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti. To gain them, he is offering a beautiful red chaadar with the Islamic shahaada embroidered in gold to the saint's dargah in Ajmer.
This usually private act of worship was broadcast enthusiastically to the nation on Wednesday. All morning, TV news channels showed visuals of Union minister, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi dutifully entering the dargah with Modi’s offering. Earlier, the Prime Minister had tweeted to his nearly 12 million followers a photo of himself holding up the chaadar along with Naqvi.
One of them, Shashank, who describes himself as an “#AAPtards, #Congress and #Presstitutes slayer” was mystified. He asked "Sir, aap bhi secular hote jaa rahe ho?” (Sir, you’re turning secular too?)
Shashank’s disappointment is understandable. In September 2011, Narendra Modi had refused to put on a Muslim skull cap offered to him by a Muslim cleric in Ahmedabad. The incident had occurred on stage, in full glare of the cameras and created a fair bit of controversy. Later on, Modi explained his actions: “My job is to respect all communities, respect the values of all communities but I have to accept my own values. I live with my values. Hence, I don't bluff people by wearing a cap, or getting clicked."
Pseudo-secularism
In the 1980s, Bharatiya Janata Party leader LK Advani coined a term to describe this act of bluffing people using minority symbols: pseudo-secularism. As Advani went around on his rath accusing the Congress of “appeasing” Muslims, attacking "pseudo-secularism" (now often shorted to “sickularism" given the character limits of Twitter) was the bedrock of the BJP's politics and remained so until very recently. In 1995, Advani argued: ”Secularism is only a euphemism for vote-bank politics. They are not concerned with the welfare of the so-called minorities. Their only interest is the minority vote."
Advani castigated this pretence of secularism, calling it a sham. To prove his contention, he pointed out measures such as community-based civil laws, the Haj subsidy for Muslims going on pilgrimage to Mecca and Article 370, which gave Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir a constitutional status different from the other states.
Along with the BJP's action of demolishing the Babri Masjid, this strategy paid rich dividends. It propelled the BJP from being a party of two Lok Sabha members in 1984 to one that was able to capture a majority of seats in the lower house of parliament just three decades later.
BJP’s U-turn
Of course, power changes things. It is one thing to go about demanding changes when you’re outside the system, quite another to push those when you are the system.
Even as the Supreme Court struck down the Haj subsidy, the Bharatiya Janata Party government in Madhya Pradesh introduced state support for pilgrims to Ajmer. The Article 370 issue was buried when the BJP entered into a coalition to form a government with the People’s Democratic Party in Jammu and Kashmir earlier this year. As for introducing a uniform civil code – which featured prominently in the BJP’s 2014 election manifesto – Modi’s government seems to have removed it completely from its agenda.
Even the BJP's last anti-secularism bastion, minority photo-ops – shunned by Modi during the skull cap controversy – seems to have been demolished by Modi himself, as he broadcast his chaadar for everyone to see.
It seems that at the end of the day, the BJP has seen the wisdom in the Congress’ strategy of attracting the minority vote. Cheap and low on effort, a photo op here and a chaadar there seems a much easier way to get Muslim votes than actually attempting any substantive change for a community characterised by the Sachar Committee Report as being even more backward than India's Dalits and Adivasis.
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This usually private act of worship was broadcast enthusiastically to the nation on Wednesday. All morning, TV news channels showed visuals of Union minister, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi dutifully entering the dargah with Modi’s offering. Earlier, the Prime Minister had tweeted to his nearly 12 million followers a photo of himself holding up the chaadar along with Naqvi.
One of them, Shashank, who describes himself as an “#AAPtards, #Congress and #Presstitutes slayer” was mystified. He asked "Sir, aap bhi secular hote jaa rahe ho?” (Sir, you’re turning secular too?)
Handed over the Chaadar to be offered at Dargah of Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti. https://t.co/EO6p6Gee7M
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) April 21, 2015Shashank’s disappointment is understandable. In September 2011, Narendra Modi had refused to put on a Muslim skull cap offered to him by a Muslim cleric in Ahmedabad. The incident had occurred on stage, in full glare of the cameras and created a fair bit of controversy. Later on, Modi explained his actions: “My job is to respect all communities, respect the values of all communities but I have to accept my own values. I live with my values. Hence, I don't bluff people by wearing a cap, or getting clicked."
Pseudo-secularism
In the 1980s, Bharatiya Janata Party leader LK Advani coined a term to describe this act of bluffing people using minority symbols: pseudo-secularism. As Advani went around on his rath accusing the Congress of “appeasing” Muslims, attacking "pseudo-secularism" (now often shorted to “sickularism" given the character limits of Twitter) was the bedrock of the BJP's politics and remained so until very recently. In 1995, Advani argued: ”Secularism is only a euphemism for vote-bank politics. They are not concerned with the welfare of the so-called minorities. Their only interest is the minority vote."
Advani castigated this pretence of secularism, calling it a sham. To prove his contention, he pointed out measures such as community-based civil laws, the Haj subsidy for Muslims going on pilgrimage to Mecca and Article 370, which gave Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir a constitutional status different from the other states.
Along with the BJP's action of demolishing the Babri Masjid, this strategy paid rich dividends. It propelled the BJP from being a party of two Lok Sabha members in 1984 to one that was able to capture a majority of seats in the lower house of parliament just three decades later.
BJP’s U-turn
Of course, power changes things. It is one thing to go about demanding changes when you’re outside the system, quite another to push those when you are the system.
Even as the Supreme Court struck down the Haj subsidy, the Bharatiya Janata Party government in Madhya Pradesh introduced state support for pilgrims to Ajmer. The Article 370 issue was buried when the BJP entered into a coalition to form a government with the People’s Democratic Party in Jammu and Kashmir earlier this year. As for introducing a uniform civil code – which featured prominently in the BJP’s 2014 election manifesto – Modi’s government seems to have removed it completely from its agenda.
Even the BJP's last anti-secularism bastion, minority photo-ops – shunned by Modi during the skull cap controversy – seems to have been demolished by Modi himself, as he broadcast his chaadar for everyone to see.
It seems that at the end of the day, the BJP has seen the wisdom in the Congress’ strategy of attracting the minority vote. Cheap and low on effort, a photo op here and a chaadar there seems a much easier way to get Muslim votes than actually attempting any substantive change for a community characterised by the Sachar Committee Report as being even more backward than India's Dalits and Adivasis.