BackThe inherent paradox of the Indian Right
The BJP has never grappled with the main conflict of its politics
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The US has its creationists who do not want innocent young minds exposed to Darwinian lies. India has Dinanath Batra who is fighting a brave battle against modern Macaulays who refuse to accept that the first use of stem cell research was when Gandhari gave birth to her children. That such piffle will be made supplementary reading for school children in Gujarat is ridiculous.
There is a graver issue here for the Indian Right, if it is not to be identified with obscurantism. The Bharatiya Janata Party has never seriously grappled with what is the main paradox of its politics.
The party wants to make India a powerful player on the global stage while it continues to pander to social obscurantism. Why is it a paradox? The party knows that India cannot gain more global heft unless it grows its economy rapidly, embraces modern technology and opens out to new ideas from across the world. But it fails to recognize the true implications. Each of these ingredients of economic advance will necessarily undermine traditional social arrangements as well as beliefs that sections of the party so strongly endorse.
This creative tension between economic dynamism and social traditions has been noted by social thinkers as diverse as the conservative philosopher Michael Oakeshott to Karl Marx. The challenge was less acute for the old Jana Sangh given the nature of the Indian economy then as well as the social base of the party of Deendayal Upadhyaya. Its successor has a more complicated task: we are in a global, urban and aspirational world.
The Indian Right has to realize that its two dominant objectives are often in conflict. Some of this ideological tension could be seen in India before independence as well, in the clashes between the modernist Jawaharlal Nehru and the traditionalist M.K. Gandhi on one side, as well as the differences of opinion between the modernist V.D. Savarkar and the traditionalist M.S. Golwalkar on the other.
Every nation state has a dominant narrative that provides a common ground for discourse; that is why history writing is such a contested arena. The nationalist era was accompanied by robust challenges to the dominant colonial narrative on Indian history.
The point is not whether Indians should be proud of their heritage; cultural nationalism is part of any modern nation state. It is about which elements of the great banyan tree to embrace. It is sometimes convenient for the Indian Right to forget that India has a rich tradition of scientific enquiry, mathematics, philosophy and rationalism. There is more to our heritage than wooly mysticism.
Most of what goes under the guise of cultural pride these days is unsubstantiated nonsense. The urge to make exaggerated claims about our past shows a lack of confidence to confront the present. Batra is a good case in point. That a state government should actually tell school children to read him is a sign that Jurassic sensibilities lurk under the surface of our modern nation state.
These are the issues that the Indian Right needs to confront, especially its modern wing that worked so hard to win Narendra Modi the top job in New Delhi. The prime minister should also take a stand on this issue, especially since it involves the state he led for more than a decade. Atal Bihari Vajpayee did a stellar job when he was prime minister by taking on both the proponents of voodoo economics as well as the cultural obscurantists who tried to bully him.
It is easy to dismiss Batra as a quixotic culture warrior. However, there are deeper issues involved here that the Indian Right—and indeed other political groups as well—has to confront with utter seriousness.
Will Modi tackle obscurantists within his party? Tell us at views@livemint.com
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