No Difference, Just Look in the Mirror


Santosh Desai wrote that BJP chief, Amit Shah, horrified him when he declared that the BJP would “act against all infiltrators who were not Hindu, Sikh or Buddhist”. Why not just all infiltrators, why base it on religion, asks Desai.

A valid question, no doubt. Desai worries most about the BJP supporters who don’t support any religion based actions and laws. Why? Because if you bring up topics like lynching or Shah’s comment with them, it’s like water off a duck:
“If the subject is forced upon them, it is either made little of (you know how media today pounces on any and every little incident), dismissed as marginal (every party has lunatics, can’t take them seriously), presented as the norm (these things have always happened in the country, but now people with agendas amplify them), attributed to electoral compulsions (in order to win elections, they have to say all kinds of things, they don’t really mean it), sidestepped (after all every option comes with a downside- we don’t live in a perfect world, and anyway what option do we have), or justified(you can’t deny that Islam is the source of so much terrorism in the world today, or they did conquer and persecute us, you know)).”
Desai ends his lament with a very atypical the-end-is-near call:
“Whether one acknowledges it or not, today one’s vote is a sign of whether one supports overt discrimination in the name of religion or is standing against it.”

But one could ask these questions to the supporters of the UPA: Why do they support only dynastic parties/leaders, from Rahul to Akhilesh to Kumaraswamy to Stalin? Why are they so against meritocracy? Why do they want Hindus to be apologetic for being the majority? Why do they only care about the poor, not the tax paying middle class? Why do they support Nyay like schemes given Congress’ track record of corruption for decades (remember Rajiv Gandhi’s admission that barely 5-15% made it to intended recipients?) and even worse, Congress’ opposition to an identity/transfer-to-account system like Aadhar that would make such schemes better today?

Sure, many UPA supporters would privately acknowledge many of the above points. But wouldn’t they still vote for the UPA anyway? How then are they any different than the non-rabid BJP supporters?

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