Letter to the Readers, Mainstream, April 6, 2024

Letter to the readers, Mainstream, April 6, 2024

Not long ago Prime Minister Narendra Modi said at a public event that there is much too much insistence on rights and not on duties which has weakened India [1] The message reflected the ideological make-up of the man for whom fundamental rights and democratic liberties can be held back in larger interest. As the 2024 elections are in the air, people must rethink their unflinching admiration for their Prime Minister. Mr Modi was a full time activist of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) —the mothership of Hindutva nationalism a secretive organisation that promotes collective regimentation with a culture of obedience, hard-work, sacrifice, and discipline, inculcated with the objective to serve and build a strong state [2]. Sounds a social project to train ‘sheep who follow’. RSS trained Modi who was a three term chief minister of the state of Gujarat had a very authoritarian style of governance, had some of his own colleagues from the BJP silenced, opposition politicians in Gujarat felt unsafe; Bajrang Dal a militia of the Hindutva right was given a long rope to exert social pressure during Mr Modi’s days in Gujarat. His ‘chosen’ police officers were ‘encounter specialists’; constitutionally guaranteed labour rights were put in abeyance in the industrial estates of Gujarat. He has reproduced some of those Gujarat ways in his in his two terms as the Prime Minister starting 2014. A cult of personality has been cultivated around Mr Modi and he likes to demonstrate that he calls the shots. The authoritarian Modi was on full display in the secretive, sudden manner in which demonetisation was announced in November 2016 or the way National Lockdown of March 2020 was imposed (without consulting Government ministries and states) comparable to declaration of the State of Emergency by Prime minister Indira Gandhi in 1975. [3] Do not forget Mr Modi’s photo on our Covid 19 vaccination certificates issued by Government of India (Giving the North Koreans a run for their money). The Prime minister fully believes he is not answerable to anyone. Under his second term during covid-19 days a very controversial PM Cares Fund was set up but has become one of the most unaccountable entities. [4], [5]. Since January 2023 the state of Manipur has been in the grip of ethic violence and the Prime Minister of India has not bothered to visit the state nor answer questions in the Parliament, in total breach of convention. While the Prime Minister Modi holds immense power he has allowed the men of his church —i.e. the RSS to gain influence in the apparatus of the state including universities. The RSS already runs over 12000 schools across India. ’Militarise Hinduism and Militarise Hindu Polity’ has long been a moto for Hindutva’s founding ideologues, and they have been at it with or without being in power; Military styled arms training camps have long been organised by Hindutva outfits. An investigative report just released to the media by the reporters collective reveals that nearly 62 percent of the Sainik schools the main recruitment space of India’s Armed forces are now run by RSS outfits or people close to the BJP [6]. Mr Modi will one day be out of office but the prospect of the Indian Armed Forces falling under greater influence of Hindutva right is a big danger to the future of parliamentary democracy.

April 6, 2024 —HK