Anand K. Sahay: The idea behind capturing power in any kind of way: fair or foul

By Dilip -

NB: This article is a clear-headed analysis of the crucial change wrought in the Indian polity by the current government. Sahay is also forthright about the axial role of the RSS, the patron-in-chief of the BJP. For all their talk of moral purity and 'maryada' it clear that this band of ideological fanatics has only one aim - viz; power at any price. Moreover, power is no longer sought for a larger aim - it accumulates for the sake of itself. In the process the RSS and its fronts have emerged as the delivery vehicle of choice for global corporate totalitarianism. This is why they admire the tyrannical style of the Chinese Communist Party; and are engaged with singular determination upon the process of dismantling the Indian constitution. This is an argument placed squarely in front of his readers by the author of this piece. DS

The BJP may or may not win the Assembly elections in Assam. In West Bengal, its chances may be considered to be less bright than in Assam on account of the structural makeup of the state, notwithstanding the pre-Partition communal politics rampant in undivided Bengal. But winning a poll fair and square is not the metric any longer. We have seen popular verdicts being overturned in state after state to the BJP’s benefit.

Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his principal operative, Union home minister Amit Shah, the saffron party’s new sutra is to form a government in a state through any means. The capture of power is evidently crucial for erecting a scaffolding -- a formal platform -- for the systematic spread of ideas in the public realm through unrestrained heavy-duty propaganda, the rapid dissemination of communal politics through enabling instruments of State power (the police and the bureaucracy), and the unleashing of policy with a communal slant.

The last indubitably means going out of the way to disadvantage and “other” those who are not the majority, leading to the making of such patently unjust policies -- which defy the idea of equality before the law -- the new normal in a sharp deviation from the political tradition whose roots were laid over 70 years ago. The Westminster system of party politics, which is enshrined in our Constitution, has been stood on its head in the post-Atal Behari Vajpayee BJP. When the BJP fails to bag the numbers in an election, it simply sets up a trade mart in which MLAs become the commodity. The gomashtas, or middlemen, and auctioneers are out in strength….

https://www.asianage.com/opinion/columnists/180421/anand-k-sahay-the-idea-behind-capturing-power-in-any-kind-of-way-fair-or-foul.html

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