Litmus Test For BJP Prevent pogroms, or quit

Six years after the Babri demolition, four years after the plague, and eight months after Pokharan-II, India has again hit the headlines globally--thanks to the witchhunt against Christians. The BJP has again disgraced this nation in the eyes of the world. There were no fewer than 108 documented attacks on churches and schools in the country in 1998. Fiftyeight occurred in Gujarat alone. Christians have been subjected to insults, social boycott (e.g. no access to village wells), disruption of prayers, torching of churches, burning of the Bible, stripping of priests, and rape of nuns....

Dangs and Nashik have emerged as new flashpoints in the anti- Christian mobilisation by the Hindu Jagaran Manch, Vishal Hindu Sammelan, the VHP and Bajrang Dal. In Dangs, the HJM attacked Christians 17 times--with benign support from the administration. At Peth, the VHS "reconverted" 37 tribals, and issued an ultimatum to Christian missionaries to leave by March 31, or face violent consequences.

The so-called Shankaracharya of Karveer, who presided over the Peth "purification" ceremony, promised: within a month there "won't be a single Christian left reconverted". He threatened: "Hindus have the power to reduce the whole world to ashes." In other words, get out or else... The BJP's response at the highest level to this fascist intimidation has varied from tokenism to turning the tables on the victims. Take tokenism. Under domestic and international pressure, Mr L.K. Advani despatched a Central team to Dangs, but ensured it would only met officials. When the team came back naming the HJM as the culprit, Mr Advani gave the VHP a clean chit. But the HJM is a VHP outfit. Its office-bearers admit this themselves. (Indian Express, Jan 4). Even leaders from the Vajpayee camp, such as the pro-big business operator Pramod Mahajan, have blamed Christians for the the trouble, repeating the shop-worn "rice-bowl conversion" charge. This passes comprehension. The sangh parivar possesses many more "rice bowls" than the church could possibly gather. The VHP (U.S.) admits it transferred $1.25 billion (Rs. 5,250 crores) to India between 1977 and 1993. What about Mr Vajpayee, Hindutva's "liberal" mukhauta (mask)?

In Dangs, he said there must be a "national debate" on religious conversions. Earlier, he said, "there is no place for religious bigotry". Mr Vajpayee's job is not to reflect philosophically on bigotry, but to punish those who terrorise members of other faiths. As for conversions, the Constitution guarantees the freedom to propagate one's faith as a fundamental right. Clearly, Mr Vajpayee has a different agenda. Why else did he give the Keshubhai Patel ministry a clean chit and said (Bangalore, January 4) that the Gujarat incidents were an "attempt to defame the BJP"? Even bureaucrats have started talking the language of evasion. Home secretary B.P. Singh, for instance, said that whoever planned the violence in Gujarat had a very "limited world-view". Mr Singh's job is not to discuss world-views but ensure that the guilty are brought to book. The opposite has happened.

The turn-the-tables-on-them tactic is more pernicious. This is the government's approach to the Jhabua rape of nuns. Mr Advani claimed that 12 out of the 22 accused are themselves Christian. However, the local police have a different story. Of the 17 persons named, they have identified 15. Not one of them is Christian. The victims confirm this. Now, in situations of rape, there is a case for giving the victims a special status: in custodial rape, the onus of proof is on the accused. This puts a BIG question- mark on the official claim, which Mr Vajpayee has himself been parroting. Mr Vajpayee now talks the paranoid language of Hindutva, and uses "Hindus" as an undifferentiated, single, entity. He seems to reject even the possibility that Hindus can be intolerant. He is whitewashing the VHP-HJM-RSS-Bajrang Dal combine's communal sins.

This can only encourage the likes of Messrs Bal Thackeray and Jai Bhagwan Goyal to unleash terror--without fear of prosecution. Why is the sangh parivar targeting Christians, especially in Gujarat? Gujarat is a sort of laboratory. There, the Christians, barely one-half of one per cent of the population, are especially vulnerable to "target practice." The parivar wants to see how far it can brutalise them--and get away. Hindutva's resentment against Christian tribals springs from the fact that the Church is especially active in education and social welfare, which matter to the RSS method of gaining influence. The parivar is reacting against the tribals' growing self-assertion. The RSS has identified 67,000 villages in the country as (anti- Christian) "targets". Under the guise of preventing "conversion", the sangh parivar will continue to brutalise Christians. Apart from prejudice, bigotry and profoundly undemocratic impulses, the sangh parivar may have a special angle to the anti- Christian campaign, captured in its recent slogan, "Saraswati Vandana vs Sonia Vandana".

If the anti-Christian campaign grows and finds acceptance among the middle classes, the RSS-BJP could use it politically: to try to prevent Ms Sonia Gandhi from holding a high office even if the Congress is elected to power on its own or in a coalition. Ms Gandhi's Christian origins could be used to browbeat her. That would be diabolically undemocratic. The sangh parivar must be stopped. The Gujarat and Maharashtra governments must be brought to heel. The Centre has enough powers to order them to take corrective steps. Article 355 of the Constitution casts upon it the duty "to protect every State against external aggression and internal disturbance and to ensure that [governance] is carried on in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution". The opposition must insist that that power be used. Fascist goons are dictating the agenda. Today, they destroy cricket pitches. Tomorrow, they will destroy the Constitutional edifice.