Hindutva fascism has emerged as a clear and present danger to Hinduism and Indian democracy. It is time for the silent majority to speak up before it is too late

A Pakistani friend of mine, who has always had a soft corner for India and has extended family on both sides of the border, is most bewildered these days at the way things have been unfolding in the country under the current order.

“I do not have words to express my distress about what India has become,” she messaged in the wake of the Kathua horror in Kashmir, involving the macabre rape and murder of an 8-year old Muslim girl. “I cannot believe that people are divided about a case that is at once a disgrace for all of humanity as it is for India. All this reminds me of those horrible Partition stories that I’ve heard or read!” Indeed, instead of confronting the BJP on its claims to represent and speak for a noble faith and its followers, who are known for their tolerance and equanimity, more and more people seem to be throwing their weight behind the Parivar, condoning its crimes against humanity and Indian democracy. Over the past few years, one has increasingly heard friends and intellectuals complain of an alarming and never-before-witnessed polarization of our society along religious lines. More and more people, otherwise known for their fair and peaceful nature, are either openly backing the extremists or tacitly supporting them out of their misplaced sectarian sense of loyalty.

Ignoring the appalling crimes against minorities and the rule of lynch mobs that the Parivar has unleashed on a great faith and ancient civilization, the good people have been rooting for the Right. They have ostensibly fallen for Hindutva’s claim to champion Hinduism and the Hindus. How else do you explain the BJP’s winning streak in various states across the country, in the face of numerous economic disasters that it has gifted the country, not to mention its incredible bumbling on other fronts. If any other party had visited the twin disasters of demonetization and incredibly inept GST (Goods and Services Tax), it would have been subjected to the severest of chastisement and punishment at the hands of people. While the rich friends of the BJP and Modi get richer, the country still reels from the catastrophic effects of the bizarre note ban. There is no money in banks and ATMs with leading politicians and economists openly talking of a run on the banks. In a country where agriculture remains the biggest source of livelihood, farmers have been killing themselves in their thousands. Indigenous industries with millions of jobs in both organized and unorganized sector have disappeared. As for the law and order situation, the less said the better. Yet the saffron party somehow keeps winning. There is only one explanation for this — unless you believe in all those conspiracy theories about electronic voting machines and stage-managed polls! That too many good, gullible people still take Hindutva’s claim to represent Hinduism seriously. Which is an epic tragedy.

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