While awaiting the outcome of the elections to Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat Assemblies and the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, it is instructive to take a close look at the campaign the BJP ran in these elections.
Faced with considerable internal dissension in Himachal Pradesh, Modi openly asked the electorate to ignore candidates and just vote for him. In Delhi, the MCD elections became a brazen power game of the Modi regime. The centralised restructuring of the Municipal Corporation by clubbing the three erstwhile corporations into one, the calculated delimitation of wards and the sudden announcement of the election schedule to coincide with the Gujarat elections – the entire election exercise bore signs of the BJP's sinister game plan. And in Gujarat, the BJP's election discourse resembled the 2002 post-genocide polls when Narendra Modi had turned the post-Godhra Gujarat genocide into a matter of 'Gujarat Gaurav' or glory of Gujarat.
Two decades after the 2002 Gujarat genocide, we had Amit Shah, now Union Minister for Home Affairs, justifying the genocide in his campaign speech. The rioters were taught a befitting lesson and this has led to 'lasting peace' in Gujarat, said Shah. The speech came in the wake of a series of judicial decisions, administrative steps and political signals that already seriously undermined the cause of justice. Zakia Jafri's petition was dismissed; Teesta Setalvad and RB Sreekumar were sent to jail for their attempts to uphold truth and seek justice; rape and murder convicts in the Bilkis Bano case were released and felicitated on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of India's independence; a family member of a genocide convict was made the BJP candidate for Naroda Assembly constituency, and Supreme Court has closed proceedings related to 2002 Gujarat riots in which it had appointed a Special Investigation Team for conducting investigation and prosecution in nine major cases related to 2002 Gujarat genocide.
Amit Shah's claim of establishing 'lasting peace' in Gujarat through genocide cannot however be seen only as 'celebration of a past achievement', it should also be read in the current context. Just as the Sangh brigade wants to replicate Ayodhya 1992 across India, we should be clear that the Gujarat formula of 'lasting peace' is also being invoked for the 'benefit of the whole country'! The likes of Narasimhanand issue genocidal calls bluntly, senior BJP leaders and Modi ministers do it in their own ways.
Shah uses the word 'rioters' for riot victims while 'teaching a befitting lesson to rioters' refers to the perpetration of cold-blooded massacre and rapes, and 'lasting peace' is the Sanghspeak codeword for fearful silence, the eerie calm of graveyards. And by now it is more than clear that this silence is being prescribed for every voice of dissent, to intimidate and persecute every seeker of truth and justice.
No less revealing than Shah's 'lasting peace' formula has been the 'cooking fish' dog whistle used by film actor and former BJP MP Paresh Rawal in his Gujarat poll campaign. Gujaratis can tolerate rising prices and lack of jobs, but they will never be cooking fish for Bengalis, said Rawal in an election speech. Following protests from various quarters, Rawal 'clarified' that by Bengalis he actually meant Rohingyas and Bangladeshis!
This gives us a typical illustration of the Sangh-BJP narrative to counter the people's anger against inflation and unemployment by instigating hate and prejudices on the basis of all possible differences among the people, be it religion, food habits, language or culture. In today's Gujarat where the Morbi bridge collapse has become a shocking symbol of the BJP's corrupt and callous model of governance, Shah and Rawal clearly show us that hate, violence and publicity gimmicks are all that the BJP can offer to the people.
And then there is the relentless propaganda blitzkrieg around the Modi cult. Whether in Himachal or Gujarat, the BJP campaign has been all about seeking votes in the name of Modi. Even the Morbi bridge collapse was turned into a propaganda event by the BJP government around Modi's overhyped Morbi visit. Modi also turned his own vote-casting into a road-show propaganda event making complete mockery of the poll code of conduct. And in order that the BJP can get away with every such subversion and mockery of election norms, the regime wants to reduce the Election Commission to a silent spectator packed with hand-picked loyal bureaucrats dubiously appointed as Election Commissioners.
These elections should thus be seen as a clear warning about the growing desperation of the Modi regime to manipulate the election processes and reduce them to a total farce. We will have to turn elections themselves into a powerful people's movement, as is happening in Latin America, to end this reign of repression and plunder.
