Opinion Fiftyh Column: Modi’s secret helper

The difference between older Congress leaders and young Rahul is that while they manipulated Muslim opinion surreptitiously,he does it with refreshing openness. So he did not hesitate slightly before announcing in the speech that got him into trouble that he knew from intelligence sources that some Muslims in Muzaffarnagar were in touch with the ISI. The point he was making was that this was the fault of the BJP’s kind of politics. They spread “anger”,he said,without thinking of the consequences. Clearly neither had Rahul when he made his speech,so he ended up infuriating the Muslim victims of the violence,giving the BJP cause for complaint,and arousing widespread anger in that section of the Hindu community that believes all Muslims are traitors. An impressive number of things to achieve in one fell swoop.

With his speech,Rahul managed to draw attention to yet another thing that Modi has been trying so hard to point out: the falseness of Congress secularism. And,he did this as we approach a Diwali that brings memories of the days following that other Diwali in 1984,when his father as prime minister allowed the streets of Delhi to fill with the bodies of Sikhs murdered by mobs led by Congress party workers and leaders after his grandmother was assassinated by her two Sikh bodyguards. Proof that these pogroms had the approval of Rajiv Gandhi’s government came when he justified them on the grounds that “when a big tree falls,the earth shakes”.

Not a subtle or secular justification,but subtle when compared with his son’s recent speeches. Unfortunately for the Congress,these speeches are being made at a time when the BJP is led by Modi,who has made it abundantly clear that he has no time for the kind of secularism that makes someone like Rahul tell an American ambassador that India is more threatened by Hindu terrorism than the jehadi kind. A complete untruth and of no help to Indian Muslims. Every time there is an act of terror perpetrated by jehadi terrorists,the lives of ordinary Muslims get disturbed in a country in which they are usually safer than almost anywhere else in this post 9/11 world.

The only BJP leader who has tried to draw attention to this is the man currently ruining Rahul’s chances of becoming India’s next prime minister,or,like his Mummy,India’s proxy prime minister. Sadly,not even Modi appears to fully understand where he should go beyond slogans like ‘India first’ and the assertion that he believes in Sardar Patel’s kind of secularism. He needs to go much,much further and assure India’s Muslims that if he does become prime minister,he will guarantee them the same rights and the same security that Hindus,Sikhs,Buddhists and Jains enjoy,but no special rights or false security. His speech in Patna — in which he mentioned proudly that more Gujarati Muslims manage to go on Haj than Bihari Muslims — indicates that he is trying to walk down the same ‘secular’ path that Congress leaders have walked. He needs to be careful.

Meanwhile,instead of registering complaints against poor little Rahul to the Election Commission,Modi should seek an appointment with him when he is in Delhi next and go express his deepest gratitude. Recent polls indicate a surge in his popularity in the four states in which elections will be held in the coming weeks. If these polls are accurate,then twice as many people want him to be prime minister than those who want Rahul to be given this job. For this sudden surge in popularity he has one man to thank,one man alone,and his name is Rahul Gandhi. What a very interesting election we have before us next year and what very interesting times we live in.

Follow Tavleen Singh on Twitter @tavleen_singh