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The BJP's yin and yang

Let's see what surfing rediff.com this morning before writing my weekly column came up with.

* In an incident that has sent shockwaves through conservative Pune, the cultural capital of Maharashtra, three elderly doctors, including a retired government servant, were arrested by the Kothrud police on charges of blackmailing and raping a married woman over a period of one year.

While Dr Madhukar Wabhle, 74, and Dr Madhav Chintaman Raste, 64, both residents of Karvenagar, were arrested on Saturday, Dr Vinayak Lele, 62, a resident of Sadashiv Peth was taken into custody today. All three have been charged under sections 376(2) and 506(1) of the Indian Penal Code.

* In Bihar violence and the election boycott call of extremists continue to create terror in society. For example, in the 1999 Lok Sabha election, 89 of the 189 booths under Palamu recorded zero polling because of the threat from extremists. Similarly, in Chatra, Panki and Gaya assembly segments 60, 54 and 36 booths, respectively, recorded no polling. The scene at hundreds of booths in over a dozen other constituencies in central Bihar was no different.

* The hostage drama at the S N College in Kollam has placed many, including the district collector, in the dock.

The college principal now says the agreement to settle the three-month-old strike by the Students Federation of India was extracted from him by torturing him mentally.

Several senior officials, including the district superintendent of police, MP P Rajendran and Kundara MLA Mercykutty Amma, were present when the SFI students forced the principal, Professor V K Vijayan, to sign the agreement after holding him hostage for more than 12 hours without food or water.

* Electioneering for the 60-member Manipur assembly -- slated for February 12 and 22 -- is currently overshadowed by the boycott call given by the underground National Socialist Council of Nagaland.

The NSCN-Issac-Muivah faction, regarded as the most powerful of the insurgent groups in the region, has a dominant presence in the five hill districts of Manipur.

The group, currently observing a ceasefire with the Centre, has called for a boycott of elections in the Naga-inhabited areas till the five-decade-old Naga problem is settled. In the 60-member Manipur assembly, 28 seats fall in the five hill districts. These seats are slated to go to the polls on Saturday.

* Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu has directed the crime branch -- criminal investigation department of the state police -- to inquire into the activities of Lakireddi Bali Reddy, a non-resident Indian from Krishna district, who is alleged to have procured innocent girls from the state over a period of time for engaging them in immoral activities in the United States.

Now let us see what the Sangh Parivar and its affiliates have to say about not allowing the shooting of Water to proceed in Varanasi, through such democratic means that has forced the state government to ask the crew to pack up even before a single shot had been canned.

According to Vishwa Hindu Parishad secretary general Ashok Singhal, the film shows India, Varanasi and the Ganges in a poor light and hence he and his organisation will not allow the film to be shot anywhere in the country.

'Deepa Mehta couldn't shoot there and that is why she ran away and then she comes to shoot in our India and insults our culture,' was what Shyamdeo Ramchaudhary, the BJP legislator who led the protests againstWater, told rediff.com last week.

Since the high priests of the Sangh Parivar and the BJP have allowed their goons in Uttar Pradesh to run amok, and to cast themselves in the role of the defenders of Indian culture and faith, I take it that the above incidents quoted from a casual browsing session are what makes India proud.

Or look at any number of incidents that makes an Indian hang its head in shame. Poverty, illiteracy, underdevelopment are the staple, and will be so, 50 or even 500 years after Independence, so let us not waste our time dwelling on them. But look at a sampling of how urban life in India is increasingly being subsumed by unhealthy forces. Area after area serviced by cable networks screen blue films -- and in quite a few places the operators are patrons of political parties. But it will not attract the attention of those zealous guards of culture out on the streets. The collective madness over something unIndian as February 14, which is fast becoming a pan-Indian celebration thanks to aggressive marketing, raises no eyebrows in Varanasi or beyond the Vindhyas.

If the stakes were not so high for you and me, one can take the liberty of laughing away such buffoonery as is being exhibited by the ruling party in Uttar Pradesh. But alas, what these self-styled defenders of public morality -- yours and mine and everyone else's -- are doing is far too grave to be ignored, or mocked.

If today the hordes are allowed to get away with arbitrating what is offensive or not to 'Indian culture', and the public and the various institutions acquiesce in it -- either actively, or through collective silence -- then tomorrow we could all land in a situation where the desi answer to the Taleban could dictate what you and I should do, wear, say...

The prime minister, projected as a person with moderate views, cannot open his mouth, not when his party is testing its strength in a crucial assembly election. Actually, when one looks at it, the division of labour in the BJP between the two stalwarts is quite interesting, and misleading. Vajpayee, considered a dove, the right man in the wrong party, often puts the seal of respectability on controversial issues, while Advani, the hawk, often stokes the fire with his measured, yet provocative, utterances. Since the two views are perceived to be at loggerheads, it is easy to conclude that there is discord between them.

But the reality, however, seems to be that they are the yin and the yang of the saffron brigade.

Saisuresh Sivaswamy