Between Shiv Sena and BJP, who will spill more ink?

There's an Islamic adage - Not out of love for Ali but hatred for Muawiya. Ali was the fourth and the last of the rightly guided Caliphs of the Islamic world. Muawiya was his dissenting Syrian governor. Often Ali found political support not out of love for him but because people hated Muawiya.

Something similar is playing out in Mumbai. It's not that BJP or Shiv Sena is saddled with some new found love for liberalism or tolerance when they go ahead with Mahmud Kasuri's book launch or sell meat during the meat ban respectively; it's just a power tug of war between old allies-turned-holier-than-thou competitors. And sometimes in this naked but risqué display of competitive nationalism, democracy by default ends up being a winner.

Imagine the meat ban during the Shiv Sena regime of 1995-2000 and Congress workers selling meat in Dadar then. Shiv Sena would have beaten the hell out of them. Or imagine some activists or Muslims trying to sell meat in Dadar during even a Congress regime meat ban, Shiv Sena would still have beaten the hell out of them. So why is Shiv Sena defying the ban now? Do we seriously believe that Shiv Sena supports individuals' right to choose their food? Or in fact does Shiv Sena really believe in anyone having any right other than what they deem fit?

Who could have predicted this? The BJP, with their culture of banning everything and anything under the sun that doesn't sit right with their hegemonic Hindutva philosophy, would choose to protect a Pakistani ex-minister's book launch in Mumbai? The Dinanath Batras of the world have gone around scuttling books, articles, voices far less threatening, polemic than Kasuri's in the past. I can bet, though I haven't read Kasuri's book yet, that Kasuri would have far more damning and controversial things to say about the Indian state than an AK Ramanujan or a Wendy Doniger. Pakistan or anything Pakistani is anathemic to BJP. The whole culture of RSS/BJP is based on considering Pakistan an evil state worthy of being erased from the map of the world.

So, what is this new found love for liberalism at the cost of going against your own ideological grain? Part of the genesis for this love lies in the electoral politics of the 2014 Maharashtra state election. We all know that the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance fell apart for the first time in the last 25 years during the pre-2014 state polls. Both parties fought independently, confident that they would secure a majority, but they fell short. BJP's search for other partners was unsuccessful and the two old allies again leaned on each other. But since then there has been a tug of war between the two to win the hearts and minds of their core constituencies. This has unleashed a spiral of competitive nationalism, extreme right-wing appeasing measures and announcements. The battle is for who poses as the ideal political representative of intolerance.

However, in Kasuri's case, the battle flipped. There was no better opportunity for BJP to show its strength to Shiv Sena than beat them at their home turf. Both BJP and Shiv Sena have worn their hatred for Pakistan on their sleeves. If Kasuri's book launch could happen of all the places in Mumbai, then there can't be a tighter slap on Shiv Sena's face. BJP had to risk looking liberal and tolerant towards Pakistan. It was a gamble. Shiv Sena was humbled and groping for a face saver. They haven't found any so far. And the irony is that, in this tussle, democracy has won.

Sometimes, two similar extremists at loggerheads open a liberal chasm, create a counter balance that helps serve democracy's pluralist notion. That was quite an unexpected outcome of this gladiatorial battle between two illiberal agendas.

But one thing I am sure of. Had this been a Congress government, the champions of liberal secularism, it would have buckled under Shiv Sena's pressure and the book launch would have never happened.

In the end, it was a good day for Indian democracy.