Why leaving out Hamid Ansari of Yoga Day reeks of a Hindutva ploy

Way back in the mid-1970s one of the essay topics in my civil services examination was “Politics is the art of gaining power and the craft of retaining it”. As I grew with the times I found its relevance going up. The other day in the Lok Sabha TV series “A Page From History” anchored by Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay, I was sitting next to the known Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) face JK Bajaj. The discussion was regarding the political impact of the Shah Bano case. I restated the generally perceived Muslim understanding that the Sangh Parivar formalised its activities from 1925, proceeded according to its action plan and gaining power at the centre was found by it to be an instrumentality to carry forward its agenda of a Hindu rashtra. Thus, in the mid-1980s, when Rajiv Gandhi - in the Congress spirit of not doing much worthwhile to restore justice to the Muslims or uplift them economically - made an avoidable mountain of the Shah Bano molehill, the Sangh Parivar caught this opportunity by the forelock to accelerate the implementation of its long-drawn strategy and, since then, there has been no looking back.

The run-up to the 2014 Lok Sabha election was marked by the manifestation of this Sangh strategy in its different hues. Thereafter, there has been a visible dichotomy of patterns and roles of the organisation and the government. In an individual capacity, political representatives, including ministers have been sporadically making anti-Muslim and anti-Christian comments. Attacks on churches and masjids (mosques) are now common occurrences; Ghar Wapsi is a term of common parlance. The social justice minister clearly stated that his government cannot allow the Muslims and Christians to be considered as scheduled castes, thus perpetuating the 65-year-old religion-based discrimination against them at the national level.

Now the softer but more effective strategy includes the emphasis on yoga. Though one must grant that the declaration of International Yoga Day by the United Nations (UN) will surely take India to a higher level in the world’s perception, yet simultaneously, there is no denying that it gives a clearly stated edge to the Hindus over all other communities of India. One can argue that the majority must have its way but that does go against Article 38 of the directive principles of our Constitution mandating that the state shall strive to promote the welfare of the people by securing and protecting, as effectively as it may, a social order in which justice - social, economic and political - shall inform all the institutions of national life. It also goes against the spirit of fundamental duty enshrined in our Constitution to promote harmony and a spirit of common brotherhood amongst all the people of India transcending religious diversities.

Particularly against this backdrop, the central government should have taken care to pre-empt its faux pas of not inviting vice-president Hamid Ansari to the International Yoga Day event at Rajpath, thus compounding doubts in the minds of the Indian and world communities as to why he was left out. Further confounding the delicate omission, one of the chief RSS functionaries hurried to imagine in vacuum and negatively tweet against the vice-president's non-existent commitment to the national event. Surely Prime Minister Narendra Modi, being an astute politician, would now make amends and retrieve the situation in a manner befitting the constitutionally exalted office of the vice-president.