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Journalism of Courage
NEW DELHI/NAGPUR, OCT 23: Aware that any adverse reaction to Pope John Paul’s November 5 visit can severely embarrass New Delhi’s image, a major damage-limitation exercise is on within the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allied organisation, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad.
Moreover, some of the constituents of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) are also putting increasing pressure on the Government to rein in the VHP which has launched a strident campaign against the Pope’s visit.
The first warning was sounded by Trinamool Congress chief and Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee who took up the issue at a Cabinet meeting two days ago. Among other things, that meeting also approved the draft of the President’s address to the joint session of Parliament slated for Monday.
Other NDA members like Vaiko of the MDMK have also been speaking out against the VHP’s aggressive campaign and so has Telugu Desam Party (TDP) leader and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu. Slamming VHP’s opposition as“unwarranted” Naidu had even said that he would speak to the Prime Minister about it.
Within the BJP, senior party leader and Gujarat Chief Minister Keshubhai Patel rushed to Nagpur on Saturday to meet RSS leaders Rajendra Singh and H V Seshadri. His mission is apparently to seek the RSS’s help in restraining the VHP whose attacks against Christian missionaries in Gujarat last year had tarnished his government’s image. A clear indication that this pressure has worked was evident in Home Minister L K Advani’s statement in Ahmedabad on Saturday in which he disapproved of the campaign against the Pope. The VHP, too, abandoned its earlier aggressive stance by saying that it had decided to keep its protest only at the ideological level.
A senior VHP leader told The Indian Express here that the organisation had decided not to create problems for the Vajpayee government and save it from any embarrassment.
Despite this, VHP units continued to speak in different voices. Its national committee memberMohan Joshi dubbed the Pope a “big dictator” and said that his visit to India would only encourage conversion activity in the country.
Trying to distance himself from the VHP, Advani said: “Such opposition is improper, it is not appropriate if somebody is a state guest, and Pope John Paul II is visiting India as a state guest.” Asked about the VHP’s Goa-Delhi rally to demand an apology from the Pope, Advani said: “I do not know who is organising this yatra.”
VHP leader Ashok Singhal had recently suggested that the Pope should apologise to Indians for the killings during inquisitions in Goa and other places, and for propagating that Christianity was the only mode through which one could achieve salvation.
Another BJP ally, the Lok Shakti, also said that the campaign against the Pontiff would send out wrong signals to the world. All religions should be allowed to preach and practice in a respectable atmosphere, its spokesman M Raghupathy said on Saturday.
Meanwhile, a multi-religious initiative inthe Capital decried the protests being carried out against the Papal visit, saying that it went against the country’s cherished ethos. At a seminar, religious leaders passed a resolution welcoming the Pope’s visit and hoped that this would begin a new phase in the relationships between religions.
Among the speakers were Delhi Archbishop Alan de Lastic, Sankaracharya Madhavnand Saraswati, Maulana Wahiddudin Khan, Jathedar Bhai Manjit Singh and Agnivesh besides Supreme Court judge K T Thomas.
