Afia Ambreen
The 2019 Indian general election is scheduled to be held in seven phases from 11 April to 19 May 2019 to constitute the 17th Lok Sabha. The counting of votes will be conducted on 23 May, and on the same day the results will be declared. Ironically, Narendra Modi, the prime minister of India, is leading the campaign for his governing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. He remains the focus of much of the campaign for his party as well as for the opposition parties challenging his re-election bid.
Mr. Modi is not seeking to persuade the Indian voters to vote for him and his party on the basis of his record while governing India for the past five years or by presenting compelling ideas for India’s future. Mr. Modi is seeking votes by doing what he does best: raising and stoking fear among the Hindu majority of the potential dangers posed by the presence of a large Muslim minority in India.
Since he first consolidated power and built his political capital on the back of religious violence against Muslims in Gujarat in 2002 under his watch as chief minister, Mr. Modi has mastered the art of linking the threat of terrorism, Muslims and Pakistan. His strategy has worked in every election he has deployed it in. His current campaign is taking place in the wake of the Feb. 14 suicide attack in Pulwama district of Indian-administered Kashmir, which killed 40 Indian paramilitary soldiers. The attack was followed by a few weeks of intense escalation and cross-border airstrikes by India and Pakistan.
Mr. Modi has made the Pulwama attack the basis of his most recent recasting of the theme of a terrorism-Pakistan-Muslim threat. On April 9, at a campaign rally, Mr. Modi directed his attention toward young Indians voting for the first time: “Can your first vote be dedicated to the valiant soldiers who carried out the airstrike in Pakistan? Can your first vote be dedicated to the brave martyrs of Pulwama?” Mr. Modi proceeded to blame the Indian National Congress, the leading opposition party, for the creation of Pakistan in 1947 and claimed that the Congress party’s electoral manifesto speaks the same language as Pakistan. More than 70 years after independence, Indian governments mostly led by the Congress party and now by the BJP have refused to repeal several draconian laws introduced by British colonial rulers, including a particularly egregious law that defines what constitutes sedition or treason.
From the very outset of this election campaign, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has single-mindedly raked up Hindu majoritarian sentiment and targeted Muslims. Deliberately deploying a language of fear and hatred, the BJP has, without respite, targeted ‘Bangladeshis’, who, it appears, have come to stand in for the Muslim community as a whole. Describing all Bangladeshi immigrants as “infiltrators,” the top BJP leadership have gone all out to deepen the atmosphere of anxiety hanging over Assam and the rest of India. That such hate mongering is spurring vigilante mobs to continue with their random attacks often fatally on innocent Muslim citizens across the country seems to matter little to the ruling party at the centre.
There is no denying the fact that after PM Modi’s coming to power discriminatory policies of BJP towards Indian Muslims have alarmed the international community though the world at large has turned a blind eye on India due to their own interests. The BJP policies originate from RSS ideology of Hindutva or Hindu nationalism with an idea to form Akhand Bharat, or undivided Indian state, which is true representative of Hindu culture and religion. The BJP’s extremist actions and discriminatory policies are not new as the world witnessed India’s nuclear explosions, violence against Christians, Gujarat carnage and strengthening of Indo-Israel ties during their first tenure in government. Currently, as their second term in office, the BJP government since its election campaign has used anti-Pakistan and anti-Muslim sentiments as a tool to gain the vote bank. Likewise, Love Jihad, Ghar Wapsi, Bahu Lao Beti Bachao programmes, compulsory education of Geeta, Maha Bharat and Hindu literature in educational institutes, ban on cow slaughter and beef in Maharashtra and killing many Muslims in the name of religion or false allegations of eating beef are the actions intended to promote cultural violence in the all segments of Indian society.
Moreover, underlying the BJP’s campaign is its commitment to an aggressive, chauvinist nationalism, the creed defining the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. The BJP’s recently launched manifesto, Sankalpit Bharat Sashakt Bharat, declaring “nationalism” to be its “inspiration,” has promised to abrogate Articles 370 and 35A in Jammu and Kashmir, pass the communal Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, construct the Ram temple at Ayodhya – each one of these promises loaded with potential conflict and strife, especially against India’s Muslims.
It is high time for the Modi administration to review its extremist’s policies and the international community to break the mum and take concrete measures to put a halt to growing Hindu extremism in the region. The UN along with other major powers of the world should pressurize India to protect rights of minorities in India and people of Kashmir as well. Modi administration must review its hardliner and hawkish policies and work to create a balanced, peaceful and co-existent environment at home and abroad. A non-discriminatory, conciliatory and tolerant approach must be adopted towards all factions of Indian society and across.
