Infiltrator Muslim Vote Banks Under Threat From CAA, NPR & NRC

Infiltrator Muslim Vote Banks Under Threat From CAA, NPR  & NRC

Speech was given to man to disguise his thoughts- Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord

There is a red alert, panic stations, a little hysteria, much opinion, and frantic political mobilization afoot. There is however nothing secular about it. Tellingly, it leans on concentrations of Muslims, Communists, gullible students and illiterate Muslim housewives.

Political parties that rely on their votes, are exhorting them to oppose the government. In Communist run Kerala and TMC run West Bengal, this protest is leading to frequent maiming and murder as well.

The people who are paying for it hope against hope that this will turn into a countrywide mass movement. That none of the three laws in contention, CAA, NPR or NCR have anything harmful for Indian Muslims is being glossed over. Fear amongst the large Muslim minority is the key, and it is being deliberately fanned.

What could not be done by democratic means in parliament or through two general elections, is being attempted via a cooked up and ultimately bogus protest. It has seditious overtones, uses expert arson, destroys public and private property, blocks roads, beats up people. It is deliberately provoking the police and other authorities with physical attacks on them.

Overthrowing the Modi government is the abiding desire and fantasy, though it is couched by its intellectual supporters in much unctuous verbiage. However, the government’s responses have been canny, measured, cautious. This even as it asserts that there will be no roll back of the Citizens Amendment Act (CAA).

It is only the first of three laws on the anvil, the latter two carried forward from the UPA regime. But like the related Assam Accord signed by Rajiv Gandhi, they have remained unimplemented.

The protest for the TV cameras, web portals, the social media, the broadsheets, is ostensibly against what a section of the depleted Opposition, supported by a propagandizing, dwindling, Lutyens Delhi media, calls “polarization”.

This polarization is meant to be diabolical because it allegedly favours Hindus. This is a frequent charge during the Modi administered years, grown out of the earlier sneer that labelled the BJP communal. That tag no longer works like it did over 10 years ago. Today the BJP gets on and works with a number of regional political parties, who accept its desire to engender progress for all, and do what is best for the nation. These parties vote with the NDA to pass crucial legislation.  

However the Congress and those who agree with it, find it difficult to accept the ascendancy of the BJP. This, particularly since they have either been driven from power altogether, or into a humiliating subsidiary role, by the very voter that was with them till six years ago. Shrill as their outrage is, it may be no more than the sooty kettle calling the cooking pot black.

A recent India Today-Karvy Mood of the Nation opinion poll, released just a day after the Supreme Court refused to stay the implementation of the CAA, suggests a dip in the Modi government’s popularity. It suggests  unhappiness with both the abrogation of Article 370/ 35A in J&K and the expected implementation of the CAA, already begun in some states.

But even this poll, which may be far from objective, given its slanted questions, says if there was a general election right now, the NDA would win 303 seats. That means a comfortable majority, even if it is much less that the over 350 seats the NDA had in 2019. It also calls Modi the best ever prime minister, Amit Shah the best performing union minister, and Yogi Adiyanath the best chief minister.

It is clear  that the Congress, CPM, TMC, SP, BSP, RJD and others who encourage Muslim infiltrators and rely on Muslim vote banks feel an existential threat. After all they have furnished the illegals with Indian identities, inclusive of addresses and voter/aadhar cards. The numbers involved are estimated to be over 2 crores of such immigrants.

It is this subversion of the electorate and national security that has necessitated the implementation of the National Population Register (NPR) and the National Register of Citizens (NCR) now. And why Muslims in particular have to be excluded from the largesse of the CAA. The Rohingyas from Myanmar via Bangladesh, often terrorist, are also being targeted.

CAA has, in fact, been mandated by the Supreme Court for Assam. It is now likely to be implemented nation-wide, even as an earlier failed exercise in Assam will be redone. While NPR is also beginning to be implemented in some states, no final norms or roll-out dates have been worked out for the nation-wide NCR. All these laws may appear confusing but their intent is all too clear, and disruptive for the nexus between the illegals and certain political parties.

But the current protest is not really about the CAA at all, though liberal and Left-leaning intellectuals have been trying to give it a high-minded tone of being violative of the Indian Constitution.  That it is a democratically passed law by parliament after due deliberation in its formulation, debate in both houses, and voting, does not seem to impress these thinkers.  

The Supreme Court, at first glance, seems to think that the CAA is not ultra vires. However, a five judge constitution bench is slated to begin hearing some 140 petitions in about four weeks time. As for similar petitions against Article 370’s nullification, the Supreme Court has reserved its judgement in the interests of the nation.

Looking beyond the CAA which is likely to stay, the government may find ways and means via NPR and NCR in particular, to disenfranchise, if not also detain and deport the illegals.

The government, having got away with three revolutionary successes in a row in the first flush of Modi 2.0, is also said to be preparing a population control bill that will deny government jobs and succour to those who have more than two children, as well as the long awaited Uniform Civil Code (UCC). These are essential laws if the per capita income is to rise and the inequities of the Muslim Personal Law are to be curtailed.

The three successes that caught the Opposition unawares because Modi 1.0 proceeded with much less speed, despite demonetization and GST, were first the parliamentary nullification of Articles 370/35A and J&K’s overnight transformation into two union territories.  Second came the passage of the contentious Triple Talaq Bill into law. And third was the momentous verdict handing the long sought-after land at Ram Janmabhoomi in Ayodhya to build a grand new temple upon.

 The Congress Party and those in its train do not want to be caught napping again. However, this government seems determined to press on with its legislative agenda. Perhaps it thinks that protests are inevitable, even useful safety valves in a democracy, and is unimpressed with threats of general anarchy.

The economy too is showing signs of responding to efforts and a cyclic revival, and may take away yet another plank of the opposition ire. Once this revival gains momentum, and the upcoming Union Budget on February 1^st may give it a fillip, it will be difficult to say these laws were brought in to distract the public from their economic and financial woes.

The Modi government always seems to thrive in the face of constant opposition, but the nation too may have come to a watershed worth noting.

Even as the largest minority, nearly 200 million strong and 17% of the population today, along with its rabble rousers, sharpens its attack, the Hindu majority, per even a partisan poll, is in no mood to relent.

It is true however that the attitude of the protestors stem from legacy issues. However, that particular construct and its benefits have already been redeemed in full. It is no use acting spoilt because there is no sympathy for it except in motivated quarters.

Now we all live in a “New India” that takes inspiration from other sources.  It is not just the epics like the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, but the thoughts of long sidelined historical stalwarts such as Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, Swami Vivekananda, Sardar Patel, Veer Savarkar, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya, Syama Prasad Mookerjee, that count. And yes, even the recently departed Balasaheb Thackeray and APJ Abdul Kalaam. It is time these great men got their due in the task of nation building and the shaping of our thoughts.  

(1,396 words)

For: The Sunday Guardian

January 24, 2020

Gautam Mukherjee