When the economy crashed after demonetization amid sudden hostility between communities, no one expected PM Modi to win 2019, but he did!
Going back in time, the terror attacks in Mumbai in 2008 held everyone on the edge of their seats when 10 members of Lashkar-e-Taiba, an Islamist terrorist organization from Pakistan, conducted 12 coordinated shooting and bombing strikes lasting four days across Mumbai killing 174 people, including nine attackers, with more than 300 wounded.
On 12 March 1993. there were 13 correlated bomb explosions that killed 257 people and injured 700 and in between these two explosive events, there were a series of terrorist attacks in India over the years with bomb blasts, timebomb parcels deposited in trains, bus stops, and public market places. The number of people that were killed in India from terror attacks far exceeded the USA 09/11 attack, and a lot of terror attacks were attributed to the Indian Mujahideen banned as a terrorist organization on 4 June 2010 with the leader arrested in 2010. There has been a lot of hard work to nab links thanks to the hard work of the Intelligence and police over the decades and with finer technology, things have gotten far easier to trace calls and locations and CCTV cameras enable catching criminals speedily.
The Three Cards the Prime Minister Plays
Prime Minister Modi came to the throne with three cards on the table, terrorism, nationalism, and polarization, and all played well for him and occasionally, he knew how to trump. He also made no bones to show his leanings to a Hindu Rashtra.
Terrorism:
Before the Prime Minister was elected, people were infiltrating fabricated lie-spun literature to the public through WhatsApp and other Social Media that were spinning a frightening narrative that India was totally unsafe, in the hands of terrorists, while constantly stressing the incompetency of the Congress to protect the nation. They also shared manipulated videos to show Muslim violence to Hindus. No one knew anything but they blindly believed whatever they saw.
This built up a fear psychosis in the minds of the people. Swirling in paranoia, the Hindus who fell under this deluge started to fret about Muslims secretly suspecting terror links to nearly every Muslim. The divide was happening insidiously, slowly, and stealthy and none paid heed and the Congress gloriously wrapped in higher ideals was unaware of the malicious literature strewn around Social Media or chose to ignore it, thinking it would pass.
When Narendra Modi became Prime Minister, he rose up to occasion giving an image of an iron-clad 56-inch chest powerful “chowkidar” of the nation who would crush his opponents to obscurity and scared Indians fell for the bait especially after the massive terror attacks.
He kept focusing on the 2008 attack, going back even to 1947 when India was ripped apart in the partition which spurred on a bloody battle between Hindus against Muslims with terrible outcomes. The Prime Minister through his clever rhetoric directed his attacks on Congress’ “weakness” with their “lack” of a more powerful response to those attacks.
Nationalism:
Narendra Modi got his first feel of power over terrorism when the militant Islamic group in Pakistan with links to the Pakistan Army orchestrated the February attack on a convoy that killed 40 Indian paramilitary troops in Kashmir; the subsequent attack on Pakistan 12 days later; and the Easter Sunday attacks in Sri Lanka. He was projected as the power of the nation standing with the Army to fend off all anti-national forces, and combined nationalism with BJP in a new potent form. The project was so comprehensive that a certain rant started out, unless you are with BJP, you are not an Indian national. Under PM Modi’s government, playing the nationalist card means playing the religious community card.
New poison arsenal phrases started hitting the crowds from the BJP IT cells. During the initial days, people were targeted with death threats if they dared to criticize the government, and some even got arrested for statements they made on Facebook. However, due to Social Media protection laws, death threats are taken very seriously, and thus, these did become muted, but still occasionally occur.
Namecalling such as anti-national, urban Naxal, terrorist, Pakistani, ‘Tukde Tukde gang’, Jihadis, rice bags grew in rising decibels with jeering and mocking increasing. These in reality were intimidation tactics to make anyone who disagreed with them limb back in subjection and bow to them. Out of fear, most people kept silent while some others slowly started to learn to fight back and this was how the online battles started, something that never happened before.
While the abuses ran high, PM Modi’s message to the nation never ran dry that he was the tallest, toughest, and mightiest man of India, who solely could keep the country safe from terrorists, Pakistan, and “dangerous” Muslims. Unfortunately, due to the terror attacks executed by a few terrorist groups, an entire community was being marked off and the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 revealed the new state of affairs in India where Muslims were left out.
No one seemed to notice that the fabric of the nation was getting more fragile and ready to tear apart. The people were so divided within that they just did not need an external enemy because the nation was already heading on a path to destruction. But of course, the party was doing what it can only survive on, dividing, because they would get the 80% Hindu votes which actually made them a superpower on the Floor of the House.
In the meantime, the terrorist attacks have not stopped, but no one has noticed, and just recently 22 jawans were killed in a gunfight Maoists in Chattisgarh and attacks are rampant in Kashmir despite being the most militarized zone in the world. Crime and fights are still erupting wildly and India is definitely not living at the peak of peace.
Polarization: It has been studied by experts that the Bharatiya Janata Party would cease to exist without polarization. The whole ideology of polarization is to divide and rule. The promise of a Hindu Rashtra is the majority would be promised greater care, benefits, while the minorities would be made second-rate citizens. In this personalized unequal care, great divisions would stir up making the nation less secure. Equality is the only pathway to freedom.
If one browses through the RSS literature and websites, it is evident that their dream of a Hindu Rashtra is to even take away the voting rights of the minorities and the new Rasthra would be ruled by the saints. In some BJP-ruled states, they are already passing laws stating that Muslims with more than 2 children would not be allowed to vote.
Ram temple crowned PM Modi as first Hindu Hriday Samrat (King of Hindu’s Heart)”· chorusing ‘Gandhi’s Ram is my Ram’ · ‘Entire Ayodhya is bathed in Ram’s bhakti’, because he has kept his manifesto promise of building the Ram Mandir, abrogated Article 370 in a sweeping draconian manner while the world remained silent because he had already prepared the ground for the act and had a high stake in blaming terrorism thus he could infiltrate the state with the Army making it the most militarized zone in the world
All in all, a sort of Hindu Rashtra is already beginning to form in India with history books being redefined, massive beef ban over most of the nation, whipping people blue and breaking their legs if they are converting to another religion, and new slogans raised to prove one’s nationalism and a new ferociousness is rising among the safronised Sangh because most of the devout Hindus were falling under the sway of the new propaganda.
India is proudly known as the world’s largest democracy as China fell with Red Communism and while India may imagine such an autocratic Rashtra will work, our demography, infrastructure, diversities, and ethnicities are so vast and deep that we would never function successfully other than in a richly-textured secular framework. While PM Modi might have won hearts by keeping a few of his election promises such as building the Ram Mandir, those hearts will turn bitter if the secular Constitution is diluted bringing about drastic complications in India socially, mentally, economically, and globally.
The economy has already sunk and the gaps between the rich and poor have widened, millions have been pushed below the poverty line and even before the pandemic, the jobless crisis had escalated and many financial experts have analyzed that the demonization strike led to the economic slowdown.
In the atmosphere of a polarized India, rape and brutal murders of Dalit girls in Uttar Pradesh became rampant and it all boiled down to a new polarized India which won elections by divide and rule, as the British did. The only thing it did was unify the secular closer together, the right-wing clung together, and communities huddled closer to feel safe in comfort zones, but on the whole, India was totally fragmented, suspicious, and utterly paranoid.
Crushing the big press would ensure that the Prime Minister’s regime ran smoothly without question and over the last year alone, 67 journalists were arrested, detained, questioned in India for their work. Seventy-three of the 154 cases against journalists documented in the last 10 years are reported from BJP-ruled states and many of the detained are still not released.
Shadows of the Past:
Narendra Modi’s favored officials, bureaucrats, and law officers with diverse histories have been placed in the highest offices in New Delhi. PM Modi’s association with Asthana tracks back to the latter’s investigation of the burning of a train at the Godhra railway station in 2002, which killed 59 people, most of whom were karsevaks. Asthana’s investigation concluded that the incident was a pre-planned conspiracy by a Muslim mob, which led to the conviction of 31 people, in March 2011—though several media reports have disputed the official claim and argued that the burning was an accident.
PM Modi’s career is characterized by many skeletons that dwell in his hidden closet put to rest with the intervention of trusted aides. Many of those appointed to high-profile posts have been involved in whitewashing PM Modi and Amit Shah’s tainted pasts.
In August 2013, the year preceding the general elections, both Narendra Modi and Amit Shah found themselves in the middle of a controversy that included some of the top cops, bureaucrats, law officers from Gujarat along with ministers in the government. In an incriminating sting operation, senior Gujarat government and police officials were heard at a meeting, allegedly attempting to derail a CBI investigation into the staged encounter killing of Ishrat Jahan, Javed Shaikh, Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar. All these cases have been squashed and no one talks about it.
The Reason for PM Modi Wins is Strategy:
So while the country is reeling backward with economic crashes, sky-rocketing fuel prices, the highest in the world, with exorbitantly high taxes, milk turning into a luxury far too expensive for the common crowd, PM Modi is still winning states, except for the huge loss in Bengal.
The down trending GDP, a badly managed pandemic that raised a raging COVID storm with the heavy rallies, the horrifying sights of dead bodies floating in the Ganga and Yamuna Rivers during the pandemic did not seem to have made a difference to the people.
The people in UP did not have money to cremate their dead, scarcity of oxygen, lack of medicines and no vaccines presently, with no personal outreach from the government, but this did not make a dent in the people it seems. There are many NGOs, and other party workers such as the Congress and others too reaching out with medicine, oxygen, plasma, and spending sleepiness night to serve the people. Despite all the failures of the government, Uttar Pradesh under BJP rule just won the local panchayat elections in a massive swoop.
The Congress held of reigns of rule for over 60 years and was perhaps so sure of continually securing their seat, so it never crossed their minds that when the new BJP under Modi would win elections, they would face the toughest war to get back to the ruling chair. Watching BJP is like reading Sydney Sheldon’s “Master of the Game” book, a party that is as cunning as a snake and as crafty as a fox, with sharp clever moves, moving with precision, speed, quick to reorganize cabinets, reach out to opposition leaders even with huge sums of money and able to negotiate instantly with enemies and promote their hard-working party workers almost immediately.
While today, the Opposition parties spend hours each day diligently exposing the misdeeds of the ruling party, BJP still seems to be at the forefront, and nothing will shift unless the Opposition learns a new strategy to take on the BJP government because the present tactics do not seem to be working.
Gandhi Dandi marches will not work anymore nor street protests, nor fasts like Anna Hazare, nothing will stir the government because they will keep doing as they want. In fact, they are quick to impose section 144 during protests and then start arresting the peacefully protesting people and even seizing them under UAPA!
Long-drawn fasts, protests, and marches worked with the British, but the present BJP government is indifferent and hard. We saw hundreds of farmers die during their laborious year protests with lakhs marching on the roads and camping in the outskirts of Delhi in the subzero freezing winter, we saw the CAA protests which brought the nation out on the streets, but the government didn’t turn a hair and didn’t seem to care. The strategy has to change.
I thank Om on Twitter for his input and content for this article which enabled me to write it. Here is the link to his thread…Om thanks!
The dark side of Modi's election victory 29-05-19
Modi's message that he was the strong man of India, the only one who could keep the country safe from a threat that came not just from Pakistan but from Muslims generally, was doubly effective. https://t.co/RrA7pt6XgC
— Om (@ItsYourOm) February 21, 2021