|
PM In Waiting. Next?
The
answer to After-Advani-Who will be Narendra Modi.
India’s
curses are really big ones.
WSN Bureau
 Look who all are
sponsoring Narendra Modi for Prime Ministership. After top honchos
of Indian business, including men like Ratan Nano Tata, Sunil Airtel
Bharti Mittal, Anil Reliance Ambani and company, it is Arun Shourie,
Arun Jaitley, Ravi Shanker Prasad, Yashwant Sinha and company.
The Gujarat
Chief Minister whose top achievement has been a genocide of the
Muslims under his watch in 2002, a consistent anti-Muslim hatred
agenda and a glory thrust upon him by Indian Inc. for being
best-for-business has himself been helping his cause.
He has found a
new Lord Ram. R-A-M, he recently told an election rally, stands for
Rajnath Singh, Advani and Modi. That is R-A-M for you, take it or
leave it.
India's Hindutva
inspired lobby has been screaming for too long that it wants Modi to
rule. Narendra Modi for national role has been a loud cry, and
increasingly being found acceptable in sections of the right wing
intelligentia.
As Vir Sanghvi
wrote in the Hindustan Times, the BJP had every opportunity to stem
the speculation by saying something like “Advaniji is our leader.
And as for the future, the party has many young leaders and when the
time comes, we will choose between them.” Instead, it has taken the
decision to encourage the speculation. BJP leaders have been falling
over themselves to sing Modi’s praises.
The killer of
2002 is being projected as the Lion of Gujarat. Modi, meanwhile,
openly chides the civil society, makes fun of human rights wallahs,
continues with his hate propaganda, but inspiring many in the Indian
media to write that he is trying to have a mellow image now and is
discarding the hardliner hawkish statements.
No one is
writing that Modi is changing. That will be the end of Modi.
Instead, they are satisfied with Modi using a few mellow words. Or
at least Modi not abusing the Muslims when he is behind a
microphone, which is all too often these days.
The man has been
termed by the BJP as its Star Pracharak. It is wonder the RSS
terminology of a pracharak has been married to some peculiar kind of
stardom that comes from shedding blood. Of Muslims, we mean.
Clearly, the
BJP's poll strategy of projecting Manmohan Singh as weak is not
working. Manmohan Singh is coming out to be stronger than Advani any
day even on the aspects that Advani and company love -- terrorism
for example. Kandhahar is sinking Advani every day, and some adept
handlig of 26/11 and the pressure on Pakistan is not convincing
people that Manmohan Singh was being weak when it came to the
crunch.
The BJP has no
answer to, "After Advani, who?" while the Congress has a line up of
the Gandhis. Both are a curse on any people. But the Advani curse
seems to be even weaker. So the BJP needed to add to the force of
Advani in order to carry on with its "we are strong, they are weak"
strategy of fighting this election.
| |
These leections have forced the BJP to show its real colours.
Throughout the campaign, it is Narendra Modi’s face that
dominates after Advani. If Advani becomes the PM, he will be
replaced by Modi in a couple of years. And have no doubt that in
two years under saffron rule, Modi would have become acceptable
to large sections. Do not go by the noise over killers Tytler or
Sajjan Kumar. India’s civil society did not squeak when the two
fought Lok Sabha elections last time, or when Tytler was made a
federal minister. It will accept Modi timidly. The time to stop
him is now. Prakash Singh Badal will not do that. You can. |
The idea that an
Advani plus Modi combination will help sell the line that BJP is
stronger than Congress on nationalist issues has made BJP push up
Modi several notches. Now the problem with supping with the monsters
is that they are not very good guests, and often refuse to leave.
Advani is 87.
His savvyness is not working. And then there is the Rajnath Singh
factor. But Rajnath is unimpressive on the campaign trail. It helps
to project Modi as the Next PM In Waiting since it helps making
Rajnath Singh even more irrelevant.
So, the message
is clear. Be ready for the triply-filtered Hindutva avataar of the
BJP once again. Mandir will be back. You will be told Muslims cannot
be patriots. Varun Gandhi will be a favourite brat kid of Indian
politics. If Advani become the PM, there will be Modi breathing down
his neck, and ready to push him out after a year, or two. There will
be no one to remind Modi of Raj Dharam, and in his world, the only
Dharma is the dharma of self. He is the only cause he knows. And he
has demostrated he can kill for it. Ask anyone with names that Varun
Gandhi finds "barre khatarnaak."
A vote for
Advani will be a vote for next avtaar of Advani. Right now, it is
called Narendra Modi.
29
April 2009
|
Read Also