Muslim girl scholar completes Ph.D. on PM Narendra Modi

Sami Ahmad

NEW DELHI—A Vishal Bharat Sansthan beneficiary Najma Parveen of Banaras Hindu University’s political science department has done a PhD on Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Her topic for the thesis was “Narendra Modi’s Political Leadership: An Analytical Study In the Context of the Lok Sabha election 2014.” She is considered to be the first Muslim woman to do a PhD on Narendra Modi. She hails from Lallapura of Varanasi.

Vishal Bharat Sansthan (VBS) is said to be a unit of RSS. Indresh Kumar of RSS is the patron of VBS.

This organization is headquartered in Varanasi. It runs a grain bank which is named after Indresh Kumar. It also distributes blankets, saris, and clothes to the needy.

Coming from a weaver’s family she says in a written statement, that many people discouraged her from doing a PhD on Modi. She also claims that people didn’t want her to do a PhD on Modi because she was a Muslim. She says that despite all odds she completed her PhD in eight years. Her guide for the thesis was Professor Sanjay Srivastava and the external for the viva was Professor Jamia Millia Islamia’s Professor Mahtab Alam Rizvi.

She has done her studies living in the Vishal Bharat Sansthan (VBS). As she has lost both of her parents, Rajeev Srivastava, the President of Vishal Bharat Sansthan, arranged the expenditure on her studies. She is the president of the political party – Bharitya Awam Party.

Najma’s research on Narendra Modi is divided into five chapters. The first chapter discusses the political background from 1947 to 2014. The second chapter deals with the introduction of Narendra Modi’s life and his tenure as chief minister. The third part is related to Narendra Modi’s entry into politics and analysis of speeches. The fourth chapter analyses the personality and charisma of Narendra Modi. The fifth and last chapter concludes the research.

It is unclear if the thesis mentions the Gujarat riots of 2002 as it is in the five head of chapters of the paper. Efforts to contact Najma through Vishal Bharat Sansthan were not successful. Professor Sanjay Srivastava, when contacted, said the thesis was submitted six to seven months ago and he did not remember if the episode of the 2002 Gujarat riots was also mentioned in her research.

According to Najma Parveen, she referred to 20 Hindi books and 79 English books, including biographies of PM Modi, to complete her research. She says to have collected materials from 37 newspapers and magazines. She also met PM Modi’s brother Pankaj and RSS leader Indresh to collect important information about Narendra Modi.

Najma has discussed Varanasi in her research. It discusses the unhappiness of the people of Varanasi for Murali Manohar Joshi and the politics of fielding Narendra Modi from Banaras.

Her research includes the movement against Triple Talaq, Muslim women from Kashi sending ‘rakhis’ to PM Modi, and the Bharatiya Awam Party’s support to Modi.

Najma says that she chose Modi as a subject because he, as Chief Minister, made Gujarat a development model. “His popularity increased and he became the Prime Minister in 2014 which changed the entire political scenario”, added Najma. Najma has described Narendra Modi as the megastar of politics.

Rajeev Srivastava of Vishal Bharat Sansthan says that Najma had chosen a very timely and relevant topic for her research.