Opinion Out of my mind: A self goal?

It used to be said that the BJP is a disciplined party since the RSS has military pretensions. But its various components — the ABVP, MLAs, MPs and assorted camp followers — have all succeeded in getting the party in trouble. There seems to be no one in control unless one assumes that this anarchy is actually intended.

Whichever way the JNU episode ends, it will not bring any credit to the BJP. For a brief moment, it seemed like the party had achieved its long-held dream of exposing JNU, its least favourite university, for what it thought it always was — an un-Indian, anti-Indian mob of left-wingers. But within the next minutes, the ABVP went into an overdrive (as it did on Hyderabad Central University) and raised the cry of sedition. The Delhi Police, rivalling Keystone Cops, followed by arresting the one person they could, because he was not resisting . In a way that could have been scripted by its worst enemy, Cabinet ministers began flying flags and making a general national crisis out of a small event.

Student revolts are endemic and even healthy for a democracy. The US had anti-Vietnam movements on campuses for 10 years from 1965 onwards till it scuttled out defeated. Yet no one was charged with sedition. There was an intense partisan debate but no recourse to the law.

Paris student rebellion of 1968 led to change of government. My years at LSE have seen a similar history of student rebellion, most often against the government. People expect young students to be rebellious.

If students did shout slogans about azaadi for Kashmir leading to barbadi for Hindustan, it is unlikely that either would come about. The PDP, the BJP’s coalition partner, is sympathetic to the Afzal Guru issue and not hostile to separatists. Kashmir is that anomaly which is and is not an integral part of India. Why otherwise would the separatists be meeting with the Pakistani High Commissioner? People have strong views about the Kashmir question. Otherwise the BJP would not go on about Article 370. The UPA sent a team of interlocutors to go to Kashmir. Would they send it anywhere else in India? Where else are mobiles disabled because the Prime Minister is visiting?

It is convenient for the BJP super patriots to pretend that even slogan-shouting about Kashmir is treason. But a party in power has to forbear with those who disagree with its views and not swing the big stick at the smallest provocation. The consequence of giving in to ABVP hotheads is that the government has lost whatever goodwill it had garnered. The Budget session is as good as lost.

A self goal.