Parties need dose of vision, ideas

TNN Bureau. Updated: 3/28/2017 12:25:48 AM Edit and Opinion

After having lost election after elections, the Congress and the regional parties are now accusing the BJP of doing politics on religion. These allegations are not entirely without basis but how is the Congress going to BJP’s is politics –at least not by mere slogans. The opposition parties need vision and creative ideas to regain their space so that the democracy becomes really competitive. The Congress came to power after independence on the strength of its image as being instrumental in freeing India from British rule. That brought the whole country under its sway for the first three decades after freedom. But, its claim of being the party to overthrow the yoke of foreign rule became blunted over the years as it became a fountainhead of corruption. The series of scams during the Congress-led UPA government surpassed all previous records of loot and thuggery. The party’s ideology has now degenerated into slavish worship of the Nehru-Gandhi family. What is galling to the people of the country is that the Congress has become so spineless that takes orders from a relative political infant named Rahul Gandhi. The party has forgotten that even the Indira Gandhi served as a junior minister after her father died. She learnt the ropes the hard way and became an astute politician over the years. When the Congress was using its contribution to the country’s independence as its main ideological tool, the Left which at one stage became the second largest bloc in Parliament ~ was sharpening its Marxist-Leninist ideology to first capture the hearts of people and then power. Using ideology imported first from the USSR and then from China, they could strike a chord in the hearts of people effectively only in three states ~ Bengal, Kerala and Tripura ~, while they had pockets of influence in a few other states. But once in power, the Leftists indulged in corruption and control of the state machinery to further the interests of party leaders and functionaries. As a result, it is almost a spent force in Bengal with virtually no credibility, while it manages to cling to power every alternate term in Kerala and continues to stay in power in tiny Tripura. Among the other strong regional parties opposed to the BJP, the SP and BSP are in tatters because of their ideological bankruptcy, corruption and sickening personality cult. By contrast the BJP has both an ideological weapon and an organisation the RSS that has over the years been throwing up one leader after another, the latest being Mr Modi. The ideology is what is called Hindutva or an unabashed manipulation of the majority Hindu psyche warped by antipathy to the Muslims for historical, political and geographical reasons. This has become far too deeply ingrained in the outlook of the dominant group. The policy of appeasement to Muslims for garnering votes needed for capturing power followed by almost all non-BJP parties over the years has only accentuated the communal divide. So BJP alone couldn’t be accused for communalising the politics –the foundation was laid by the Congress and regional parties.


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