Have the results of UP assembly elections taken away the dignity of Muslims? Will the possible rise of twin leadership – Modi and Yogi – generate crisis within the BJP?
India Tomorrow
NEW DELHI—What is the impact of UP assembly election results on Muslims after the Samajwadi Party, supported by them, decimated? What is the way forward for Muslims in UP now?
Political analyst and author Suhas Palshikar says that it has “trampled upon the dignity of Muslims.” He commented while responding to questions at a programme hosted by the Indian Express.
“This is a troubling question. What do the UP election results mean to a Muslim? What does it mean to a Muslim in UP now? Either a poor Muslim or middle-class Muslim? Their dignity has been trampled upon,” Palshikar said.
“Once your dignity has been taken away, what option do you have? One option is: As Muslims, they go back to their cocoon of religiosity; become more religious, orthodox Muslims, not reformists. So, it means the rise of orthodoxy among Muslims. The other possibility is acquiescence and settling as second-class citizens and living as much as they find space within the system. The third possibility is a long-time effort to align with non-sectarian forces in different states, not an electoral alliance. Still, an arrangement in terms of daily politics as happened during anti-CAA agitation when both the communities that wanted CAA to be taken away came together,”, he remarked.
“Similarly, there was an inkling of it during farmers’ agitation. Hence, things will not be easy for minorities because they are continuously under suspicion. Whatever you do will be suspected as having some malignant intention by the majority,” he stated.
Interpreting UP results in the context of global corrosion or downfall of democracy like that in Brazil, Philippines, Russia, and Poland, he felt that India could face a similar crisis of democracy in which the majority would claim that it owns the country. But this is not specific to India alone. For example, Spain is undergoing the same crisis. And France may anytime face a similar problem.
Will the rise of twin leadership – Modi and Yogi – generate crisis within the BJP?
With Yogi Adityanath emerging as a hero after BJP’s overwhelming victory in UP elections, the questions are being asked from various quarters if the BJP will have twin leaders – Prime Minister Narendra Modi and UP CM Yogi Adityanath? So far, there was only one leader – Modi – whose persona has acquired a cult status in the party. There is complete political devotion towards Modi. Several BJP chief ministers to central ministers feel obligated to him for their rise in politics and the party.
But Yogi’s rise after the just concluded UP elections in which he led a massive victory for the party has generated debates of twin leadership within the party. Will the new phenomenon change politics of the BJP? Will it affect the BJP politics in the 2024 Parliamentary elections?
Palshikar said that the twinning of leadership during UP assembly elections was done for political advantages only.
He opined that there would be “tension and crisis” within the party if twin leadership became a durable feature because the party in the current situation is not used to sharing leadership and credits.
“This cannot happen. They cannot have two leaders of the same psychological make-up, both of whom want to focus limelight on themselves only,” he said.
“The co-existence of the twin leadership is going to be a very tough call for the BJP,” he elaborated.
One of the best political analysts in the current period, Palshikar, said “It is unlike the jugalbandi of Atal (Bihari Vajpayee) and (L K) Advani. Advani accepted Vajpayee as the latter was a vote-catcher. And Vajpayee accepted Advani because Advani controlled the party. But that kind of arrangement does not exist in BJP today. Here are two strands of the same nature in BJP at present. Suppose there is going to be a twining of two leaders. There will be a very tough tussle in the party because there is a leader (Yogi) who is very young, second term leader of the country’s largest state, and has ambitions. The second is a PM who thinks of himself as “Bharat Bhagya Vidhata,” protecting India’s destiny. So they can’t co-exist.”
The assembly election results in five states, four of which were won by BJP, have changed the entire political scenario in the country. It has changed the public’s mind about politics and how one can do politics in the country. “If you want to oppose the BJP, then you would have to talk the language of the BJP, or soft Hindutva and operate within the framework in which BJP is operating. The second option is to counter the BJP narrative through a more aggressive posture through street protests. But that opportunity is no longer available. The only alternative available is to have coalition politics and blocking the BJP electorally with the help of smaller parties and civil societies’ resistance movement,” Palshikar pointed out.
No counter to BJP’s “emotional nationalism”
Palshikar said there was no counter to BJP’s “emotional nationalism,” no matter how bad it might be. “TMC, Biju Janata Dal, and TRS are all feeling threatened from BJP’s rise and its emotional nationalism. So they are trying to counter it by raising the centre-state relations and funding for the states. But how much they can counter the BJP in this way is very difficult to say,” Palshikar observed in the programme.
He said that the non-BJP parties would make 2024 general elections a cakewalk for the BJP if they do not form a united front to challenge the BJP and remain a divided force like they were in UP.
Speaking about the difference between the dominance of Congress and the BJP in national politics, Palshikar pointed out that though the Congress also took cynical advantage of the Hindu-Muslim faultlines, it never turned itself into a “majoritarian mouthpiece or a majoritarian political instrument. “While the structure of dominance is the same in both the parties, the BJP’s dominance system is less democratic than the Congress dominance system,” he commented.
Nehru-Gandhi family’s leadership failed to deliver
He also said that the leadership of the Nehru-Gandhi family had not been able to deliver anything for the party now. However, he said that such a conversation might begin within the party.
Stating why the opposition failed in UP elections, he said that one of the reasons was that BJP is a 24×7 party, opposition parties like SP and Congress started politics around elections only, and BSP had gone into hibernation. Lack of resources on the part of opposition parties, media black-out of their programmes, slapping of cases against political opponents by police, and lack of political narrative like that of BJP was primarily responsible for the defeat of the opposition in the state.
