By Arun Srivastava
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s manouvres failed to ignite the passionate feelings of Bihari women and connect them with the PM and his party’s political ambitions before the ensuing assembly polls.. Modi was miffed at Congress leaders presumably used abusive languages against her mother Hiraben. He ought to be. . Notwithstanding Modi resorting to gimmicks to project her as the victim, Hiraben failed to evoke empathy of Bihari women. They did not trust his wailings. People disliked Modi’s blubbering as for them it was purely a Modi move to market her for his political gains.
Known for his oratory, Modi primarily targeted Congress for hurling expletives at his late mother, calling the incident an insult to all women. He said; “Mother is our world. Mother is our self-respect. I had not even imagined what happened a few days ago in this tradition-rich Bihar. My mother was abused from the stage of RJD-Congress in Bihar. These abuses are not just an insult to my mother. These are insults to the mothers, sisters and daughters of the country. I know how bad all of you, every mother of Bihar, felt after seeing and hearing this. I know, as much pain as I have in my heart, the people of Bihar are also in the same pain”. His narrative was somewhat akin to a dialogue in the Amitabh Bachchan film “ You have world but I have mother”.
The intensity of INDIA bloc’s agitation against the SIR and the massive support it received, particularly amongst the rural people of the state, has unnerved Modi. The Dalit and poor have come to understand his design and its possible fall out. The rebellious attitude of the Dalits and poor is to be seen and believed. PM has lost his charisma, public support and image was clearly manifest in the poor response his road show received in Patna only a week back. At the instruction of PM, state BJP leadership had organised the show to counter, rather erase the impact of Rahul’s 13 day Yatra. But it proved to be a damp squib.
Erosion of his popularity was once again on public display at the five hour bandh call given by BJP to avenge abuse of Modi’s mother. Desperation of Modi to accrue benefit could be understood from five hour Bandh call given by his party BJP on September 4 with the intention to project him as the modern day Shravan Kumar, having immense respect for his mother and motherhood in general and his desire to connect with the mothers of Bihar. But for sheer bad luck of Modi, this move miserably failed to move the emotions of Bihari Mothers. They saw through his design. The bandh called to condemn demeaning of Hiraben did not find favour with the women, especially the dalit and poor.
He along with the top RSS stalwarts have nonetheless come to make out that they have lost the support base in Bihar substantially. Though Modi and his lieutenant Amit Shah are sure of success of their SIR mission, they however are afraid of popular mass upsurge that may happen in Bihar endangering the very existence of the saffron ecosystem in the entire Hindi heartland. The aggressive posture of the RSS and BJP leadership has convinced the people of Bihar that Supreme Court unwilling to initiate steps for course correction and force the ECI to act in accordance with the provision of the legal provisions, ensure that all the voters are able to vote, they will ultimately be denied their right to vote. For asserting their right they would have to be aggressive. And this will only help Modi and BJP to resort to violent repression.
Even seasoned pollsters say that there is a perceptible shift in the attitude of the Dalit, proletariat and minorities towards the Congress. The corporate media has through its opposition to Rahul Gandhi simply helped Rahul Gandhi in emerging as the popular face. In their pursuit the Godi media through their opinion surveys have been projecting as the leader who notwithstanding so much of initiatives and agitation, continues to trail behind Modi. Recently one English television survey claimed that Rahul Gandhi got 25% preferential votes for the Prime Minister’s post and Narendra Modi got 52%. But surprisingly this has not dampened the peoples’ spirit and they say it is creditable for Rahul that in spite of massive state mobilisation for Modi, Rahul continues to march ahead.
People strongly nurse that Rahul’s initiative would bring about basic reforms in the Indian socio-political system, which will do good to the country. People do not look at this Yatra as a tool to have a major role in the electoral politics. His latest Voter Yatra has catapulted him as a mass leader more than Modi, who was not a mass leader till he became the prime minister in 2014. In fact he was seen as Hindu leader for his shoddy handling of the Gujarat riot in which nearly 2000 Muslims were killed. He was seen as communally polarising leader.
Even Congress leaders confide that Rahul is not too keen to come in power. His mission is to replace the BJP government through INDIA bloc government. He intends to reorient his party and create a completely new Congress. This stance of Rahul has not gone unnoticed. People have started looking at Rahul as a genuine secular and a leader with leftist orientation. People recall how he resigned as the president of the party and fought a solo battle for reforming it. How he had faced the challenges from the G-23 group of senior Congress leaders.
Surprisingly even some top BJP leaders have word of appreciation for Rahul for the manner in which he is striving to liberate the party from the control of the feudal and rich leaders who nursed rightist orientation and were responsible for its decline an d give it a new shape and ideology. They even held that Rahul has the basic ingredients of a good mass leader. Inside their drawing rooms, the confess that Modi notwithstanding having the patronage of RSS and huge cadre based cannot counter Rahul. They also say that Rahul would have emerged as a potent leader, a game changer, long back, but could not do as he had to face resistance from the leaders of his own party.
The attack on Rahul or Sonia Gandhi has not been shocking or surprising. Modi was simply implementing the instructions of RSS. The saffron ecosystem was aware of the fact in order to emerge as the most potent political force, it has to erase and finish Congress and to accomplish the mission it was imperative to target Nehru-Gandhi family, as they symbolise the ideology and socio-economic contour of Congress.
True enough RSS has ma nagged to make some inroad by countering Nehru’s political ideological line. It has been attacking the historians and literature only with the mission to dismantle Nehruvian politics. It would b proper to say RSS and rightist philosophy has been busy spearheading a political battle against the ideology of Nehru. Modi attacking Rahul has been the part of this strategy. Rahul being the grandson of Nehru had to face his ire. He had a political journey filled with ups and downs. Modi dismissed him as naive and inexperienced, his leadership was frequently questioned by critics and the opposition alike.
Some of the strong allies of INDIA, like Samajwadi party or RJD or even TMC were initially reluctant to allow Rahul lead the bloc. In Bihar insistence of RJD not to concede desired number seats to Congress owes to this psychosis. The RJD leader is conscious of the fact that a strong Congress would endanger its existence in the state. Tejashvi publicly announcing him as the future chief minister owes to it.
It was the reticent attitude of Tejashvi that made the Congress’s Bihar party observer Krishna Allavaru to assure Tejashvi at a closed door meet that he would be the chief minister in case INDIA wins the assembly polls and Congress will not project any of its state leaders as the future chief minister. Allavaru even told Tejashvi “now it is for you to decide, how you will act”. Of course the Congress will prefer to contest more seats for consolidating its position in the state. It has demanded 70 seats and the RJD has already conceded 35 seats. This is for the first time the RJD leaders is having to test this nature of hard bargaining.
The Congress leadership is keen to provide a pro-people orientation to the programmes and electoral strategy of INDIA bloc. Meanwhile the RJD leadership is scared of Muslims and some Dalit castes shifting their allegiance to Congress. However overall, both Congress , RJD and the CPI(ML) Liberation are closely working together to defeat the NDA in the October/November polls. (IPA Service)
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