Statue power in UP

When as Uttar Pradesh chief minister, BSP supremo Mayawati went on a spree to make statues of the elephant, her party’s election symbol, and of her party founder, late Kanshi Ram, she was mocked by civil society and savvy analysts, not just political opponents. The criticism was that taxpayers’ money was being squandered while the state was crying out for expenditure on development. The BJP had been among the biggest critics.

But the saffron party seems to be singing a different tune now. A massive statue of Lord Ram in warrior pose (not even in the soft likeness of “maryada purushottam”) is to be installed on the Saryu river banks in Ayodhya. As CM Yogi Adityanath is at the forefront of the initiative, all the paperwork is being readied super-quick. Formally speaking, the National Green Tribunal’s clearance is awaited. We can be sure this will be a mere formality.

Lord Ram lives in the heart of his devotees and has done so for millennia. A statue is hardly needed. We may, therefore, deduce that the purpose behind this is expressly electoral and political, with a focus on communal politics.

But it’s not the coming Assembly polls in Gujarat that seems to be behind the statue idea. It’s the wider concern with the inability of the Narendra Modi government to not be able to deliver on the BJP’s longstanding promise of building a Ram temple at the disputed site in Ayodhya — where the destroyed Babri Masjid stood — if the saffron party had a majority of its own in Parliament.