RAJDEEP SARDESAI On BJP’s radar: Kerala and Bengal
nance in parts of the state.
A similar process has been witnessed in the Muslim-dominated districts of Kerala with money from West Asia being poured into local mosques and madrasas.
The rise of the BJP in these two states only exposes the failure of the self-styled secular class to offer a credible challenge to communal politics. A Mamata Banerjee, for example, maybe Bengal’s unquestioned neta number one, but her political insecurities have made her vulnerable enough to pursue a rather short-sighted agenda where she has wooed the local imams and muezzins with the sole intent of cementing a large 27%-plus Muslim vote-bank. In Kerala too, the Congress and Left have competed to cultivate more extreme Muslim and Christian group leaderships to consolidate their hold over power.
That the politics of so-called appeasement has principally benefitted only a ‘creamy layer’ among the minorities reveals the hollowness of secular politics. In Bengal, for example, per capita incomes of the average Muslim remain well below the national average, statistics which suggest that acute problems of social and economic backwardness have scarcely been addressed. In Kerala, education has helped build a more egalitarian society but without necessarily creating more employable opportunities.
By building on local antagonisms, the BJP is playing with fire. Rather than provide a healing touch, the party seems keen to polarise communities further. Expecting the BJP to pull back from Hindutva is improbable; seeking a course correction from the ‘secular’ leadership remains a last hope.
Post-script: Nupur Sharma is not the first BJP leader to put out ‘mistaken’ riot pictures. During the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots, BJP MLA Sangeet Som allegedly circulated images from Afghanistan’s conflict to incite violence. Far from being reprimanded, he is now a senior minister in the Uttar Pradesh government.