Opinion: Religion, The Leitmotif Of The 2024 Election

In full-page newspaper ads on the ninth anniversary of the Modi government in late May, there was only a veiled reference to the BJP's Hindutva platform, which is the bedrock of its electoral strategy to win the Hindu vote. It was tucked away innocuously towards the end. Under the last item, titled 'Virasat aur Vikas', mention was made of the "Magnificent Shri Ram Temple being constructed in Ayodhya" and of "Honouring the faith of the people through reconstruction of cultural and spiritual heritage sites".

If heritage sites of faiths other than Hinduism have been reconstructed in the last nine years, they have not been adequately publicised. But the construction of the Ayodhya Ram temple, we all know, is being tightly supervised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's former Principal Secretary, Nripendra Mishra, who is leaving no stone unturned to ensure that it is ready for its consecration in January 2024. In tandem, the UP Government has earmarked more than Rs 57,000 crore for making Ayodhya a "world-class" city to coincide with the temple opening. Under feverish construction are an international airport, major revamps of the city's two railway stations and a bus station, and various intra and inter-city roads.

It is worth recalling that the resurgence of the BJP began with the Vishwa Hindu Parishad's call nearly 40 years ago of "Mandir wahin banayenge", on which LK Advani mounted his rath yatra of the late 1980s. The campaign gave Narendra Modi a chance to display his organisational skills on a national platform. What impact the grand opening of the Ram Mandir and the consecration of the city as one of Hinduism's eminent religious and cultural icons will have on the Hindu vote can be left to historians to assess, but this much can be said - it will be hugely cathartic for many among the Hindus who make up 80 per cent of the country's population.

Seeking votes on the basis of religion is, of course, banned. But it is increasingly clear that the 2024 general election will see the unprecedented prominence of religion as a backdrop, more so than in any previous election. This, predictably, is largely because the BJP will continue to galvanise the Hindu vote on the Hindutva platform. While established BJP leaders will continue to largely speak the language of Hindu nationalism, its emerging leaders, fringe organisations and troll armies will seek to polarise the Hindu vote with vicious othering. But this is also because the Congress is gearing up to fight Hindutva with its own brand of Hinduism.

The recent social media share of External Affairs Minister S Jayashankar's interaction with students in Pune was significant. Speaking in fluent Hindi, having grown up in Delhi, Mr Jayashankar suggested that while it is common to identify the best proponents of highly rated leadership attributes with Western figures - Machiavelli with statecraft, Metternich with diplomacy et al - and that is true and deserving of recognition, what needs to be reiterated to our countrymen is that the best examples of these attributes are all in the Mahabharata and Ramayana. Was there a more effective envoy in history than Hanuman, who did not end his Lanka mission at just conveying his message from Lord Rama to Sita? Was there a better diplomat or strategist than Lord Krishna?

This cerebral-emotional pitch is constantly amplified by the troll army, aided by its media supporters. Even the Balasore train tragedy was sought to be communalised. It began with - "It's a Friday, just saying". Then came the reference to a so-called "Islamic-looking" structure in photos of the wreckage (it was a temple). And finally, the canard that "Muhammad Sharif, the stationmaster at the accident site was missing" (the station master was a Hindu; there is no one of that name in the station's rolls).

Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma recently accused the largely Muslim vegetable growers of Darrang district, the epicentre of Assam's vegetable production, of conducting a "fertiliser jihad" because the growers were using chemical fertilisers.

In Maharashtra, there have been more than a dozen incidents of communal clashes since March, for which Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis of the BJP, with an eye on the popularity enjoyed by Yogi Adityanath and Himanta Biswa Sarma among Hindus in their respective states, has publicly blamed "Aurangzeb ke Aulad".

Meanwhile, the Congress is picking up from where it left off on the Hindu platform in Karnataka, to a much more overt show of religious faith as it girds up for elections in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh later this year.

After Mr Modi exhorted voters to shout "Bajrang Bali" at the election booths in Karnataka, following the Congress's election pledge to ban the Bajrang Dal, the Congress in Karnataka vowed it would erect many more Hanuman temples.

Lord Ram and Hanuman are emerging as the leitmotifs of the Congress's election pitch in Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. In Chhattisgarh, the Bhupesh Baghel government is developing a 2,226 km "Ram Vam Gaman Tourism Circuit" of pilgrimage centres to mark the spots the deity is said to have stopped at during 10 of his 14 years of exile spent in what is now Chhattisgarh. The circuit starts at Chandkhuri, the "birthplace" of Ram's mother, Queen Kaushalya, where the only temple devoted to her has been massively beautified by the government.

"Lord Ram is our nephew," says Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel of the Congress. A Minister explains: "While they (the BJP) have their nationalism, we have our sub-nationalism. That is why it is important to project Ram as a cultural icon, as opposed to a religious icon." The Baghel government has also opened cow "gauthans" (shelters) in more than 8,500 villages across the state, where cow manure and dung cakes are sold, providing an income stream. As a local analyst commented: "Baghel has appropriated the cow, he's appropriated Ram - there's nothing left for the BJP to do in the state."

In Madhya Pradesh, Kamal Nath, widely believed to be the Congress's chief ministerial face, has emerged as a Hanuman bhakt who has no qualms about appearing in public events with a saffron scarf adorned with "Jai Shri Ram" motifs. The party plans to have religious festivals in all 230 assembly constituencies before the year-end vote. Among the Congress's most sought-after campaigners is Richa Goswami, a katha vachak who says her "job" is to "expose those who claim to be proponents of Hindutva". Priyanka Gandhi Vadra launched her Madhya Pradesh election campaign with a puja on the banks of the Narmada, waving a Hanuman mace.

Recently, the Congress absorbed a little-known outfit, the Bajrang Sena, with the involvement of Deepak Joshi, a recent import from the BJP and the son of Kailash Joshi, a former BJP Chief Minister. It does not seem to matter that, until recently, the Sena leadership was praising Nathruam Godse and pledging allegiance to a Hindu Rashtra.

Larry Jay Diamond, a Stanford Professor in political science, is among the leading scholars of democracy in the world. In a recent podcast, he recalled asking a leader from the predominantly Muslim north of Nigeria if he could ever think of getting a significant vote in the largely Christian south. He replied, "Blood is thicker than water", meaning religious identity would override any other loyalty.

While the BJP sees no need to modify its model of identity politics, the Congress has been impaled by its past. As the progenitor of the Constitution - which situated the state as equidistant from all faiths - and the uncertain upholder of secularism in its decades in power, it finds itself on the defensive when its reign is characterised as being suffused with "minority appeasement".

Clearly, the Congress is actively positioning itself as a proponent of Hindu identity, as much as the next party. It seems to be banking on the evidence of public opinion to bolster its belief that underlining its claim to a Hindu identity will not require it to play the politics of polarisation. A recent Pew public opinion survey clearly indicated that while a majority of Hindus see the Hindu faith as integral to the idea of India, they also wanted the proponents of other faiths to live in India with dignity and the freedom to practise their faith.

As the 2024 election approaches, the challenge for Congress will be to resist the tactical traps the BJP can be expected to lay for them. Witness its reaction to the Law Commission proposal for a debate on implementing the Uniform Civil Code, a Directive Principle in the Constitution. Predictably, Congress came out in blanket opposition to the UCC, leaving it open to the familiar charge of, yes, "minority appeasement".

(Ajay Kumar is a senior journalist. He is former Managing Editor, Business Standard and former Executive Editor, The Economic Times.)

Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author.