Opinion BJP’s Rakesh Sinha writes: After Gujarat win, BJP must reckon with challenges that success brings

India’s diversities in all aspects of life require a party to remain free from an isolationist outlook and the practice of “political untouchability”. The BJP has consolidated itself by co-opting leaders and forces from multiple sources to acquire a broad-based social-cultural identity. For instance, in the Northeastern states, where the party had a symbolic presence, it made a great leap through this avenue. The party is privileged to have the rigorous ideological-organisational activities of the RSS, which give its expansion stability and an ideological flavour. No social or geographical space is beyond the reach of the party.

In this expansion phase, the relationship between the core and periphery of a party commonly becomes dichotomous. The core’s claim of purity creates hierarchies inside the party – something that was witnessed in Congress in the pre-Independence period. Socialists receiving secondary status before the Gandhians led to the formation of the Congress Socialist Party. This dichotomy has been meticulously avoided in the BJP. The circulation of leadership is no longer confined to the core. Homogenisation of party workers and opportunities for them within the party has levelled the playing field.

Organisational socialisation and opportunity are not new. They were present in the Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS) as well as BJP. The difference is that it has moved from a top-down to a bottom-up approach. At least four political actors belonging to different streams — Syama Prasad Mookerjee (Hindu Mahasabha), Prem Nath Dogra (Praja Parishad), Mauli Chandra Sharma ( Arya Samaj) and Bhai Raghu Vira (who left Congress over Nehru’s China policy) were party presidents in the BJS. However, things had not moved at the grass roots. After the split in the Janata party in 1980, when the BJP was formed, relatively fewer RSS workers found space in the party. However, the party has made great advancements in the inclusion and integration of both political elites and the grass roots.

Big changes need thought and action beyond the traditional limits drawn by politics. Modi as prime minister demolished the Nehruvian reticence towards Indian culture. He rediscovered India’s identity. In foreign lands, people find in him a representative of India’s culture. He presented the Bhagavad Gita to his counterparts and used traditional idioms to explain India’s perspective. His vision and actions become the basis of new narratives, primarily on culture and the economy. For him, Hindu culture, philosophy and modes of worship are creatively blended and the three never found such a powerful and unbroken expression in leadership before domestic and international audiences. This has given Modi unmatched popularity among the people whose identity remained contested or suppressed.

The BJP has also transcended the left-right division. Economic policies are dedicated to time-bound development. While India’s corporate strength is increasing, welfarism has also made a great leap. Governance today is an amalgamation of both the Swatantra Party and Socialists’ programmes. The Latin American experiment vindicates India’s third way. The pink revolution, which gave the Latin American left parties a popular mandate to liberate their nations from poverty failed. Political leaders who ascended to power denouncing “American hegemony” or new imperialism got discredited. Therefore, the Indian experiment in the Neoliberal age becomes very challenging. Neoliberalism is a resurrection of a laissez-faire political economy. However, the BJP’s economic-political nuances acknowledge the importance of the public sector and institutions essential for the stability of a society.

It is also important, however, to acknowledge that the party’s success also throws up challenges. One of them is developing intellectual rigour to counter the tremendous intellectual resources of anti-Hindutva forces, who now have global allies. For instance, while Indian leaders succeeded in soliciting the support of the international community for yoga, it still faces resistance in India for allegedly being a “majoritarian” idea.

Modi has obliterated the feudal hierarchies between office bearers and common workers within the BJP and new party programmes make them interdependent. Mao tried to do this in China through the Cultural Revolution but failed abysmally due to his authoritarian perspective.

But the party’s quest for inclusiveness needs to be guarded as well. In many African countries, such endeavours provided opportunities to the mediocre and those with sectarian tendencies to take over parties and governments. This was also seen in US politics in the mid-980s. The BJP leadership is well aware that the party’s horizontal expansion is not free from such danger. When Modi calls for “Congress mukt” politics, he means the political culture institutionalised by the Congress in the form of dynasty, nepotism, corruption, corporatism and individualism.

The current leadership of the BJP has roots in the politics of the 1970s — they learnt political acumen through ideological and political struggles. The new generation is being groomed in relative comfort and ease. For a party that has a long road ahead to achieve its ideological objectives, it becomes essential for them to pass through a more rigorous training process. It is here that the “melting pot” formula of the BJP will come into play.

The writer is a BJP Rajya Sabha member