Arise, Awake and Stop not till the Goal is Reached
by S. Sundararaman
Two out of 130 fortnights available for Battle 2014 is gone. The Blogs, Articles, Columns of all those disappointed at 2009 hustings pour out frustrations and lamentations. There are conspiracy galores, thread bare analyses of the defeat and sane advices for future, of which some are for party and some party neutral advices - probably doubting the ability of the party to recover. This is the time to go back to scriptures or writings of great leaders. There are striking parallels between the thinking of the nationalists termed extremists of the Congress of late 19th and early 20th century and the Hindutva movement of late 20th and early 21st century.
Shri Aurobindo, one of the foremost thinkers of nationalism during the intersection of 19th and 20th centuries in his article “A Task Unaccomplished” in Karma Yogin (exactly a hundred years ago on 3rd July 1909) says: “No policy can be successful which does not take into view the end to be attained and the amount and nature of the effort needed to effect it…To place before himself a great object and then to shrink in the name of expediency from the expenditure and sacrifice called for in its pursuit is not prudence but ineptitude. If you will be prudent, be prudent from the beginning. Fix your object low and creep towards it. But if you fix your object in the skies, it will not do to crawl on the ground and because your eyes are sometimes lifted towards the ideal imagine you are progressing while you murmur to those behind, “Yes, yes, our ideal is in the skies because that is the place for ideals, but we are on the ground and the ground is our proper place of motion. Let us creep, let us creep.” Such inconsistency will only dishearten the nation, unnerve its strength and confuse its intelligence. You must either bring down your ideal to the ground or find wings or aeroplane to lift you to the skies. There is no middle course.” (page 92 and 93 of “The complete works of Sri Aurobindo Volume VIII”)
This nicely sums up the predicament of BJP today. Having set out on ideals which enthralled the whole set of people who attained youth during the period 1989 (Starting with the Palampur resolution) till 1999, the compromises made thereafter towards its ideological pursuits neither thrilled those who were enamoured by its ideology nor those who were enamoured by its idealism. There was not only disillusionment amongst its core followers but also amongst those who though were ideologically opposed but who were favourably disposed on account of its honest articulation. What is the need of the hour?
1. Restore credibility on what you stand for. Synthesise ideology with issues of governance.
2. Do not discard any of the basic issues forming the core of the ideology
3. Counter media biases by institutional mechanisms
4. There shall be a tireless striving for stretching the Arm towards perfection
5. Know that your USP is being different and not in being perceived different - because perceptions can change when the mask goes off.
6. Connecting to people is different from connecting to communities.
7. Consensus should be evolved to take decisions and not to postpone decisions.
8. Democratic functioning is not an antithesis to discipline.
9. Those who ride on the shoulders of the workers, supporters should think that those who carry them are pall bearers and not palanquin bearers.
10. There is more to politics than power, there is more to power than elections, there is more to elections than psephology and there is more to psephology than statistics.
Each of these require elaboration and over the weeks, fortnights, months and years these are to be deliberated and discussed thoroughly because the future of BJP is too serious to be left to politicians alone.
(The author blogs at http://dharmism.blogspot.com)
Comments
14 Responses to “Arise, Awake and Stop not till the Goal is Reached”
The main reason of our failure is due to the fact that we have given much more importance to the aspect of good governance over our own ideology. To say, governance is not needed is wrong and unscientific. But relying and competing only on governance with a government that was seen by urban voters as governance friendly is the first mistake we have committed. Not much time has elapsed between 1999 and 2009 when we won 181 seats both on governance and ideology. We have deliberately distanced ourselves from ideology. This has cost us dearly. We should have presented a combination of both these to attract voters who will think twice to replace an existing government only on the basis of first issue. We tried to imitate inclusive politics of congress to corner muslim votes and failed miserably. We had also failed in the same task in 2004 but did not take any lessons. We must understand that we are a hindu cadre based party and will remain the same. No body is going to believe us even if we reach on top of everest and say that we have become secular. The inherent contradiction between two stands of Sh. L.K.Advani - before and after his visit to Pakistan saying Jinnah is secular is one of the main reasons of the common electorate and RSS cadre not working for the BJP. We should also understand that hindus by nature are religious, intelligent and fragmented. Therefore they are perceived as a weak community who can not vote tactically like other minorities. Hindus also know their this characteristic and that is precisely why when Advani ji started with his famous Ram rath yatra, hindus fanatically supported him due to the simple reason that through this yatra meant for a special cause, a common hindu discovered something which he was not able to implement practically in his daily life due to his religious and accomodative psyche. The yatra ignited the agression and fanaticism of a common hindu. That quest of a religious hindu is not fulfilled in the last one decade, rather it was given the least priority.
Narendra Modi ji in 2002 and 2007 was seen as a leader who is able to accomodate both - hindutva and good governance together. So he became successful in winning elections after elections. He was most sought after person - perhaps even more than Advani ji in these elections. He has proved beyond doubt that the concept of hindutva and good governance are not mutually exclusive. Unfortunately, the BJP leaders belonging to the lobby of Advani ji have also started believing that the two aspects are ofcourse mutually exclusive. This perception is also complimented and supported by media who in their press conferences repeatedly asked the question that whether the new government under the BJP leadership will run in temples. English media has a definite objective and they are playing their role very intelligently. That is to confuse the BJP leaders and to make BJP a B party of congress seeking only good governance as an electoral agenda. For them, when congress fails to provide governance, let BJP function - an ideal situation in which only a two party rule should flourish. Unfortunately, we have fallen in the trap of the english media and so called secularists. Since Modi ji talks of both the issues, he is a victim of media houses. But this is the only winning formula.
Other issues - youthful leadership, attracting new leaders to the party and ideology, expanding the base of the party to other states like Andhra pradesh, Kerala, West Bengal and Tamilnadu and not depending over the existing BJP setup of north indian states are also important issues. But these solutions are allopathic remedies which will temporarily provide relief to the party. At present, a more deep and comprehensive treatment is required which will establish a permanent kick to secularists and that is possible only through a combination of ideology and good governance. More importantly it should not be perceived by us as a retrograde step but a step to move the organisation forward.
The need of the hour is to re-vitalise BJP organisation. For that we will have to establish a dynamic leadership who is clear in his objectives and roles without indulging in infighting for the top positions due to identity crisis as that had happened during 2004 to 2007.
Sundaraman - good one, happy to see so many voices. On your observation on advise being party neutral I thought these words attributed to Bill Buckley a doyen of conservatism in USA said it best
“The party must serve the movement and not the other way around”.
I hope that puts the Shveta Chhatra into perspective.
bjp did not get votes in 1999 because of governance: it couldnt be because the people of india had never seen the bjp govern before that.They got those votes because india placed a belief in the bjp leaders that they would provide good governance.
i feel the party leadership, especially advani etc badly let us all down. and for this the electorate punished us in 2004 and then again now.
bjp leaders are only seen in tv and never seen working with people. this is not politics but entertainment. people may enjoy entertainment but when they go to vote they will vote for people who do work. bjp leaders like jaitley, sushma swaraj and advani are only seen on tv.
second thing is the modi factor. he may be a good leader but i think it is very clear that modi is a very dividing force. people clearly have a dislike for him just like they have dislike for advani. we lost in 2009 despite being a good party because people did not want advani. just like that people dislike modi and will not vote for bjp.
the bjp should respect the wishes of the people and remove modi, varun gandhi etc. that will help the bjp win support of people who are supportive of bjp but dont like modi advani etc.
please put up clean and effective leaders like rajnath singhji or Raman Singhji
Thanks Aniketh for the advice. It is because of advisors like you that bjp is really in a mess now. Over a period of time grass root workers & leaders are being neglected against coterie and advisors.
Dear Sh Sundararaman, Thank you for a succinct piece and for the kind words about my analysis.
I hope these voices are being heard.
Thank you especially for the quote from Shri Aurobindo - very apt.
Jai Hind, Jai Bharat!
Shantanu
The main issue is not what happened after 2004 defeat or now. The issue is what happened when we were in power during 1998 - 2004. We put the idea in back seat and fought only on development. Result is there for everyone to see. Did BJP do anything for Kashmiri Pandits ? Did it fence the borders ? Did it do anything about Bangladeshi Immigration. They could have taken these issues even in coalition. No body would have objected as they are not anti minority like article 370 or UCC.
The need of the hour is to define the ideology once again and reach out to people that Hindutva is not a wrong concept and bring out a situation like early 1990s. We must appear to be different and taking up issues that no other party seems to be interested in.
We must create more core vote bank and not try to convert the fence sitters every time because fence sitters will sway away when some isolated incidents like Varun gandhi occurs.
Look at Karnataka. Its not just that the government is in its Honeymoon perios. Its a combination of ideology and development. This is how you develop the organization. Eventhough there are lot of differences among the leaders, the results did not disappoint. Ironically, the largest number of MPs had come from a southern state.
Modi as such is not an issue. He’s projected as a dirty guy by the media. He should put all these Budiya talks asided and talk about development and Gujarat and nothing else. he should not even give a single incident to the media to target him. His interviews are good and other BJP spoke persons should learn from him.
Also, why dont we boycoott the media for sometime. just give the news and nothing else. What do we gain by sitting in their studios and get bullied all the time ?
Also, the Uttarkhand bypoll results show that all is not lost.
I just get a feeling that people go for BJP for state elections and to congress on central elections ? We need to analyse from this point also. This could give a clear picture. I may be wrong but just another view…
Good one! Keep it up Sir.
Your blog is on my reading list already
All: Pl. do read this (from a party member):
“BJP and The Art of Lie-Cycle Maintenance”
http://satyameva-jayate.org/2009/06/02/bjp-lie-cycle-maintenance/
It is hard-hitting but very true. Pl. circulate widely.
Sir,
After a long time I am seeing a good post. All these points needs clear explanation to all supporters of BJP so that they could spread the word.
“Politics is like battlefield, a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies.”
People make maximum errors when they are Overconfident. Congress’s condition is same. This is the time to build party. Let’s all do that from day one, “Two out of 130 fortnights available for Battle 2014 is gone.” Please device strategies how we/FOB can help.
PS: BJP’s electronic campaning was great, we pioneered it, we should not stop it rather enhance it.
Regards,
S.Chatterjee
BJP has to institutionalise the pro BJP media strands one of which is the Internet medium. This can be done by creating an online news site carrying all the Pro Nationalist websites and blogs in its fold. The party could popularise the site by ads etc and draw a lot of youngsters into this medium.
PEHLEY JUTA PHIR SATTA
When an aggrieved sikh journo flung shoes at Chidambaram, we thought it sounded the death-knell for the UPA at the hustings in Punjab and sikh majority areas of Delhi. After a cosmetic damage control, the Congress was back to its confident self knowing fully well the psyche of punjabi voters. Well, our friends of Punjab, chose personality over issues. They voted for Congress in good measure perhaps due to its PM nominee being a sikh oblivious of the fact that the Congress has conveniently bailed out the perpetratora of sikh-massacre(post Indira assasination) with active connivance of CBI(Congress Bureau of Investigation). India can never have a healthy democracy with such callous, indifferent gullible electorate.
Valli
One fails to understand WHY BJP IS NOT SERIOUS IN BUILDING ITS OWN TV NEWS CHANNEL?
ooops,
another arm chair theoretician! what silly stuff this is…
“the future of BJP is too serious to be left to politicians alone” - wtf? work backwards from that line and you see the RSS all over again.
And why pull poor Aurobindo into it. The guy was already a failure at getting enlightenment, why not let him live his next life in peace?
Come on yaar, you cannot be a Hindu and be a Hindutvite too. The former is lofty, the latter is the gutter, why mix the two and spoil the taste?
When will guys like these learn? And arent the guys here sick of stuff like these?
Guys no one is hearing the voice from this web site..BJP is still facing infighting…everyone wants to become leader. or want to downgrade others…no one BJP seem to be committed to the party or to the grass root people or to the country..do not waste your time writing here…