Tags:
Journalism of Courage
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sanghs supreme leader,Mohan Bhagwat,has so far said all the right things by which it can be inferred he has said practically nothing,if at great length. The RSS,we are told,does not intend to fix the Bharatiya Janata Party,its errant progeny; but the BJP had better shape up. The RSS will not mandate who fills which role in the partys structure; but the party had better get end its unseemly infighting now. Whether that message has hit home is not certain; but the flurry of meeting between the partys and the Sanghs top brass does seem to indicate that something is about to give.
The Sanghs holier-than-thou attitude about BJP infighting,of course,may not be as universally supportable as it woiuld like. There have been enough well-substantiated incidents of second-rung RSS functionaries taking more than a neutral,observers stance in the BJPs state-level decision-making the people expelled dissident Jaswant Singh called suvidhabhogis,addicted to convenience. But if the RSS national-level leadership wishes to set a different,distanced tone,that could be welcome. What is certainly still open to question is how much that tone continues behind closed doors and how much elements within the BJP will use the RSS approval or disapproval in their internal manoeuvring. But that will not remain a secret for long. One way or another,we will know soon: for the BJP and the RSS have come to a fork in the road,and how the RSS handles the BJP,and the BJP handles the RSS in this transition,will decide what sort of relationship they enjoy going forward.
