EDITORIAL
The Nation Seeks
Salvation
from Saffron Suffering
Six months ago, the BJP used to project itself as a party with a difference. It used to plead with the electorate to give it a single chance to govern. Today it is mortally scared of being singled out by the people while the latter have no difficulty in endorsing the BJP’s claim. Yes, it is a party with a difference. No other party could have possibly gifted the nation a government worse than Mr. Vajpayee’s.
Six months ago, the BJP thought it could bask permanently in the aura of Atal Behari. Today, the man has become the butt of political jokes. Party managers and RSS spin doctors would in fact be happy to find a reliever for the tired PM. But then the image problem is not confined to Vajpayee alone. The party may go on dumping a Sahib Singh Verma here and installing a Sushma Swaraj there, but at this rate very soon it will run out of scapegoats. After all, when real life begins to tear asunder the smokescreen of slogans, when onions become the ultimate epitome of upward mobility in a country, when saffron becomes synonymous with suffering, the supply of alibis and excuses is bound to dry up as carefully cultivated images fall like nine pins by the wayside.
The fact is, the entire saffron brigade today stands mercilessly exposed. And with every passing day, the exposure is becoming more and more explosive and comprehensive. On December 6 this year, millions of Indians will denounce the saffron brigade not just for the unpardonable crime it committed six years ago, but more so for the living nightmare into which it has cast the nation. Unprecedented rise in the prices of almost all edible items and essential commodities of mass consumption, blatant bids to saffronise the entire education system, more rewarding and lucrative accommodation for crime in politics, record decline in the rupee’s external value and in national dignity — the second innings of the Vajpayee government has already earned notoriety on all these counts and many more.
No wonder, then, that the public mood in November 1998 looked much more indignant towards the saffron brigade than it was receptive a year or even six months ago. The entire country today is desperately looking for a way out of the saffron suffering. Contrary to the preachings of fatalistic philosophy, intense suffering also intensifies the desire for change. In 1975-77, reeling under the iron curtain of the Emergency, the people of India had expressed a similar yearning for salvation. The slogan of "total revolution" then did reflect the intensity and sweep of that popular aspiration, but in the event everything ended with a whimper.
Once again the country seems poised for a major shake-up. The oppressed rural labourers and marginalised workers fighting for survival with dignity, the women campaigning for freedom from saffron obscurantism and patriarchal oppression, the students and youth yearning for a better tomorrow, the democratic intelligentsia dauntlessly defending their hard-won freedom of knowledge and expression - the ranks of resistance are daily expanding. The battle lines are becoming more clearly drawn. The forces of real progress and genuine democracy must urgently consolidate and energise themselves. This time round, we must aim at a bigger and more meaningful victory. We must prevent a second miscarriage of the collective will of the working people.