The history of democracy tells you that nationalism and (majority) religion are an unbeatable combination. What is the result of Delhi?
Let us expand the argument. If you too can throw cleverly into socialism, it makes for a motion cast in Titanium. Nothing can challenge or hurt it. We have been going through this reality since 2014 from the era of Narendra Modi-Amit Shah.
This has awakened the Pandits everywhere. Arun Shourie famously called BJP, Congress, and Cow. Another noted friend of mine in Kolkata, who has followed closely the politics of the Left for decades, suggests a rewrite after the latest budget. Now, they say, Narendra Modi is nothing but Prakash Karat plus CAA or Citizenship (Amendment) Act.
Now you can see that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has a record success of 92% (seats won in May 2019) against Congress, with a lead of 23% votes. When Rahul Gandhi visits the temple, it looks a spectacle, unconnected and worse, defensive. As if to say, see, I am also a Hindu. This is the reason why leftists died in West Bengal. Then, Congress leaders, seeking evidence of surgical strikes and Balakot, have emerged on Article 370, triple talaq and Sabarimala and called Modi a “thief”.
Mamata Banerjee stripped of her socio-populism, and unlike her, she is happy to dress in the colors of any religion – even the hijab – at her festivals and as nationalistic as Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose. The old parties of India are either not getting this change, or they are not ready to accept this reality.
A small and young party like the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) then avoids these hurdles, to prevent its second clean-sweep in Delhi, within nine months of staying one-third away from the BJP and Congress in the May 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The
Because, while nationalism plus religion and socialism is a killer combination, none of these are out of reach of any of your rivals. No party has a copyright on Bharat Mata, Lord Ram, Ram Charit Manas or socialism/welfare/populism. Watch the victory speech by Kejriwal and his prominent leaders today. Bharat Mata ki Jai, Vande Mataram, praises of Lord Hanuman and temple visits with much pomp and band baaje have been plenty.
For months now, Kejriwal and his party were condemned for their silence on Jawaharlal Nehru University (which visited Rahul Gandhi in 2016), Jamia Millia Islamia, Shaheen Bagh, Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) and other such issues. has suffered. Also, his “pilgrimage”, pilgrimage-type plans. His success lies in the fact that he held his nerve. Had he succumbed to this pressure to live up to the standards set for liberalism/secularism on Twitter, Amit Shah would have sent him to a whole confectionery, not just a box of sweets.
They then lost both the deity and the nation and made them a monopoly of the BJP. Not only this, he did not do so, Kejriwal himself sang Hanuman Chalisa on TV, instead of the two-member ruling Pantyhon, the Hindus and Hindus.
If you are a non-fundamentalist, God-fearing Hindu who is a big part of Hindus, this is a more assertive expression of righteousness and belief in menstruation or anger and resentment than “Jai Shri Ram”. Furthermore, it does not commit any crime to other religions including Islam. Just as a Muslim cannot be “judged” for looking, praying, praying like a Muslim, it is simply a mirror image of a Hindu publicly expressing his or her righteousness. No one is establishing a code of conduct for the other and urges that it be followed, one who knows even the danger of citizenship.
And on nationalism, please remember that the Kejriwal government announced pre-payment to the families of soldiers killed in action on an unprecedented scale in India during the first steps. It voted with the BJP government on Article 370, welcoming the surgical strike and Balakot rather than expressing any doubt about the Armed Forces claims.
On welfare, he, like Modi and his Ujjwala and other schemes, ensured their own cheap and ready-made, efficient and leak-proof delivery. A combination of nationalism-vulgarism-religion was established. The most important strategic approach is not to attack either of them on Modi or BJP.
The big meaning of this election is that the larger the Modi-Shah method, the more it can affect it. No one can distance Modi from the BJP. No leader seems to have arisen anywhere at this point who could have challenged Modi even in 2024. But you can definitely deny exclusivity on their winning formula, and greatly reduce the competition
Shekhar Gupta
