The BJP seems to have fallen for the widespread left-liberal propaganda following Lok Sabha MP Sadhvi Pragya Thakur’s remarks about Nathuram Godse in the Lok Sabha. Following opposition’s meltdown, the BJP surprisingly got into defensive mode and expelled her from the Defence panel that she was recently incorporated in and has also been barred from attending all Parliamentary panel meetings of the BJP MPs during the winter session.
The left-liberals have been trying to corner Sadhvi Pragya for quite some time. Freedom of speech is clearly not for a Bhagwa clad politician. What is disheartening, however, is how an apologetic BJP has fallen for it, abandoning the enriching debate and censuring Sadhvi Pragya for asserting that Nathuram Godse was a ‘Deshbhakt’.
PM Modi came into power because he was seen as an unapologetic leader committed to his ideology. This is also the reason why the liberal brigade hates him so much. They know Modi is no Vajpayee and he will not fall for the futile idea of taking along the Lutyens’ elites, elites who have been ruthlessly killing contentious but crucial political debates and ideologies, and preventing them from getting mainstreamed, for the political discourse, weaved by them, comes under threat by a new wave of nationalists dictating terms.
In 2004, one of the reasons behind BJP’s unexpected exit from power was the mildness of the Vajpayee regime. In 2019 Lok Sabha polls, its core supporters felt that the Modi government which has been backed by a humungous mandate would stick to its ideology. PM Modi became the voice of the average Indian citizen, an exceptional Prime Minister who came from Gujarat and seemingly changed Delhi’s power structure forever. Now, it would be a disastrous twist, if it is the BJP which is actually getting affected by the Lutyens’ instead of dismantling the old power structure.
Over several decades, the liberal brigade has made Godse an untouchable ‘terrorist’ who cannot be emulated. Leftists have traditionally idolised controversial heroes and even mass murderers like Che Guevera, Mao, Stalin, Lenin, and even people like Rajiv Gandhi, who oversaw the mass killings of several Sikhs. It has even been sympathetic and apologetic about brutal terrorists like Afzal Guru and Yakub Memon. If the followers of such mass murderers and terrorists have an issue with somebody hailing Godse as a ‘deshbhakt’, then BJP need not really worry about it.
Sadhvi fought those who wanted to impose the superficial idea of “Saffron terrorism” upon the country. She suffered at the hands of the arch enemies of the Hindutva. The BJP seemed to have given her necessary support by fielding her from Bhopal. She also won with a historic margin. Now, the BJP cannot afford to desert her just to assuage the feelings of the left-liberals. There won’t be much to differentiate between the BJP and the saffron-hating liberals who had tortured the Bhopal MP.
The liberals can hate Godse as much as they want. They can label him a terrorist if they want to do. The fact remains that he was not a terrorist, but just an ideology-driven assassin. He never intended to be the enemy of the State. He never took up arms against the nation, rather he intended to do what he felt was in the better interest of his country at a time when millions were being butchered on account of partition- an unprecedented disaster which the Congress had led the country into.
Sadhvi Pragya has every right to profess what she believes in a country where people like Mani Shankar Aiyar can get away with praising someone like Jinnah whose call for Direction Action Day had resulted in a mass murder. If someone in the BJP wants to criticise Godse/ praise Gandhi including PM Modi, it is their choice. No one, absolutely no one can tell Sadhvi Pragya whom to idolise and whom to criticise. The BJP has been elected to free the country to dismantle the norms imposed on the county by the Lutyens’ elites. Now, it would be a betrayal of the electoral mandate if the BJP falters under pressure to the same power brokers.