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India That is Bharat
Bharatiyata and Hindutva, it´s politics, chaps!
AS always, Satiricus is confused. Is he a barber, or is he a hair-stylist? Is he an undertaker, or is he a mortician? Is he a journalist, or is he a wordsmith? Jokes apart, is he a Hindu, or is he a Bharatiya? The retarded simpleton that he is, he had simply assumed that ?Hindutva´ and ?Bharatiyata´ are one and the same. Well, they are not. Why else would his august friend, the Prime Minister, have thought it necessary to clarify publicly that he preferred the term ?Bharatiyata´ to Hindutva? Then again, why was it deemed necessary to define the difference at this particular time? To that, the answer is easily understandable.
The voter needs to be assured that in voting for the Prime Minister, his party, and his partners, he would not be voting for a bunch of communalists. It needs to be explained to him that a believer in Bharatiyata is safely secular, while an advocate of Hindutva could be a convert communalist. So, from now on Swayamsevak Satiricus, like Swayamsevak Prime Minister, must remember to refer to himself as a Bharatiya, and not prefer to call himself a Hindu.
Some people hold that in the national interest, some alternative to ?Hindu´ should be used. But whichever way we twist it and turn it, it would still mean what ?Hindu´ means.
Talking about what Swayamsevaks should say, what did a Sarsanghchalak have to say? Satiricus recalls that the RSS had held a special week-long camp at Thane in Maharashtra from October 28 to November 3, 1972, in which Sarsanghchalak Shri Guruji, cancer-ridden and counting his last days, had made his last speech. The theme of the talk was ?What is a ?Hindu´?´ In this speech, which was made more than thirty years ago but could have been made less than thirty days ago, Shri Guruji had said, ?A question often raised is, why should we always chant ?Hindu´? In view of the prevailing situation in the country, why not give up this term? Why should we not adopt ?Bharatiya´? If we do so, we would not be charged with communalism. As people are often heard calling us narrow-minded and communal, this doubt is in everybody´s mind. It is true that all sorts of misconceptions are sought to be spread about the ?Hindu´. Various vested interests are propagating that the ?Hindu´ is anti-Muslim, anti-Christian... Had those who indulge in its studied religion, culture and history, they would not have resorted to such false terms? Hindu philosophy and the Hindu way of life have existed in this country before. Islam and Christianity were born. Then how can the Hindu be anti-Muslim?... Some people hold that in the national interest, some alternative to ?Hindu´ should be used. Suppose some equivalent term is found, will the basic meaning of ?Hindu´ change? Some people say ?Bharatiya´ should be used. But whichever way we twist it and turn it, it would still mean what ?Hindu´ means. Then why not be unambiguous and use ?Hindu´?... If we give up the term ?Hindu´, there would be no nation, no national identity. Our society would then become just a group of biped animals.?
Now what does Satiricus have to say? He can only say that this speech made him speechless. He should really not have indulged in the perversity of digging up this long quote. Why? Because it is just not relevant for a number of reasons. In the first place, when Guruji talked of the ?prevailing situation in the country´, ignoramuses like Satiricus may well be tempted to say that the situation that prevailed three decades ago and the one that prevails today are exactly the same, but there is a vital difference. It is that the political party that Guruji fashioned virtually with his own hands has now converted itself from Hinduism to secularism, as in its infinite wisdom it has revised that kissa kursi ka calls for sum conversion.
Secondly, times change, and when times change, meanings of words change, but Guruji did not have to fight an election; so he did not have to change with changing meanings in changing times. Then again, Guruji said if and when Bharatiya cannot but mean Hindu, why not be unambiguous and stick to Hindu? But that is precisely the point. Ambiguity is the soul of politics, and clarity its curse. Then how could a 22-party coalition be saddled with such a curse? And finally, Guruji said if we give up ?Hindu´, there would be no nation. Maybe so, but what does politics have to do with the nation? It has to do with the state, and the more the states, the merrier the politics, no? So come on, voters, be Bharatiya, vote Bharatiya, don´t be Hindu, don´t vote Hindu.
Discretion is the better part of secular valour. At least so says painter-poet M.F. Hussain. When he painted a lewd, nude Saraswati and Hindu mice squeaked in anger, he just said ?sorry´, and that was the end of it so far as he was concerned. But when, in his film Meenaxi, he applied to his heroine a phrase that Muslims reserve exclusively for the Prophet and some offended Muslims asked him to delete it, what did he do? He chose to crawl when he was asked to bend. That is, he very secularly put his tail between his hind legs and withdrew the whole film from the whole of India.
For Hindus, M.F. Hussain says ?sorry´ but for Muslims he ?crawls´. After all, a painter needs different strokes for different occasions.
Well, now, Satiricus is not surprised. After all, a painter needs different strokes for different occasions, no? Hussain knows that even if he trashed the whole Hindu pantheon, he need not fear reprisal, but could he dare defy Muslims?his own Umma?after committing the blasphemy of lifting a phrase from the Quran and using it in a film-script? Naturally not, because no sensible Muslim wants to be another Rushdie, right?
Hussain said he withdrew the film because ?I don´t wish to hurt anybody´s sentiments?? Now, is there some fine print in this apology that myopic Satiricus cannot see? For where are the ifs and buts? In the case of the Hindu Saraswati, Hussain´s apology started with ?If I have hurt Hindu feelings??which he doubted. But there is no such doubt now about hurting Muslim feelings. And he also has no doubt about the distinction between men and mice. So why tempt the fates and the fatwas?
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