The Politics of Jinnah and Jaswanth Singh
The BJP seems to be in a serious state of confusion after the Lok Sabha poll results. The party is confused whether to stick harder on to the Hindutva ideology or should rather upgrade themselves to a centrist identity. Add to this the internal conflicts and the occassional warnings from the Parivar. And now comes the most embarassing event to the party – a book by it’s senior leader Jaswant Singh, praising Mohammad Ali Jinnah.
Personally, I would like to congratulate Jaswant Singh for he tried to see things through a centrist glass which even the so-called secularists in Congress wouldn’t dare to do. Even though I do not get why Jaswant Singh gives a clean chit to Jinnah (I believe Jinnah is “equally” responsible for partition and can’t be acquitted of that), but some authors have noted that Nehru and Patel (and their hunger for power) were equally responsible for partition and even Gandhi was saddened of their attitude. “Freedom at Midnight”, written by Larry Collins and Dominic Lapiere, has detailed on this and the events lead to partition.
From what I read about the book, this should have been an opportunity for the BJP leaders to attack the Congress party and it’s iconic leaders. An oppportunity to use Jinnah as a political tool to claim that the Congress party was equally responsible for partition. However the saffron masters chose the opposite way and expelled Jaswant Singh from the party.
This decision to expel Jaswant Singh from the party gives us just one message – the usual one – that BJP was, is and always will remain as a fundamentalist party and there is no scope for them to upgrade according to the times. It has been proven that it is the hardliners who have a say in the party. According to the news reports the people who played behind Jaswant Singh’s expel from the party are Murli Manohar Joshi, Vinay Katiyar and Narnedra Modi. For BJP and RSS, who always keep on talking about “Akhanda Bharath”, can’t put two Hindu leaders (even if they are from the rival Congress party) on the same plane as a Muslim to hold responsibility of partition.
But there are some questions we need to raise about Jaswant Singh. Is he playing wise by playing a political victim? Is this book an indication of his future political plans? Did he just become secular and a free-thinker all in a sudden? Where was he when his party and it’s Parivar was spreading hatred and violence in the name of religon? The way I see it is that Jaswanth Singh wanted a break from politics or at least he wanted to separate himself from the party. He played and played it wise. Now his publishers will sell more copies of his book and he can start touring the world with his book.
The remaining question is, what is the Congress party’s stand on this? Why are they silent?
(Image courtesy: Indian Express)
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August 21st, 2009 at 8:45 am
I have been wondering when you were going to write about it. You did justice to the topic. Excellent questions raised and answer to those should clarify issues further.
As far as Jinnah being the separatist, is concerned, being Pakistani my views are totally opposite. I think he did not want to have a separate country but under the circumstances, there was hardly any choice left. Someone said something to me about the partition that I still remember. The question was “Why, when Hindus and Muslims lived together for so long, did they decide to separate and ended up with so much hate and violence”. The answer, I remember to the day, was “the violence and the hatred resulted with the same intensity as their love did”. At the end, the fact remains that it is the nasty politics on both sides that has kept, and still is keeping, the people of the two nations so distant, mentally and emotionally, from each other. Here, in the US, I have always felt otherwise.
August 21st, 2009 at 10:40 am
If my guess is right, He’ll join the Congress pretty soon !!
August 21st, 2009 at 7:11 pm
All I can see is an old man trying hard to sell his latest book somehow…and he has somewat succeeded in that considering the sales reports…
coming to Jinnah, he’s nowhere close to secularist…the one single direct action incident in calcutta when he exhorted his partymen to mass murder Hindus is enough to prove his so called ‘secularist’ credentials…
There’s a superb article in greatbong’s blog regarding Jinnah..do read it..
And I agree to the part that Nehru was also equally responsible for India’s partition..
August 24th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
It wil be funny when we read the initial days of Jinnah politics. He was someone with taste for good English life. He became a political strong man only after he started playing the two nation card. We cannot say that Jinnah is innocent or that Congress is innocent
Surprisingly Gandhi too had a part in it. In the initial days of his entry into politica Gandhi aimed for liberation of the country through Hindu revivalism.
No serious attempts were made to take in to confidence the Muslim population. Congress- Muslim league talks failed at the crucial moments.
Inorder to counter popularity of ML among Muslims, congree projected Azad as a congress leader who didn’t have much root in the community