Rethinking India in a Post-Mandal Situation

The idea of ‘Rethinking India’ comes from a series of books published by Samrudha Bharat, a Delhi-based organisation. This organisation gathered several intellectuals from different walks of life to edit 14 volumes to Rethink India, in a situation of the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) coming to power for the first time in 2014 with full majority.

The Indian National Congress and the regional parties that were working in alliance with Congress were in shock that the BJP, under the leadership of Narendra Modi, came to power in Delhi in 2014 with an unexpected majority, which the BJP, too, had never imagined.

Samrudha Bharat came into existence in 2017 to evolve an intellectual solution to this crisis by mobilising intellectuals who broadly do not agree with RSS-BJP ideology. The anti-Hindutva ideologues never imagined that the RSS-BJP would come sweep to power in Delhi. They came to power in 2019 for a second time with an improved majority.  Of course, for the third time (2024), with the support of some regional parties, it is now in power.

Such a power shift from Congress as a national party to BJP is because of the shift of the Shudra/OBCs (Other Backward Classes), who were operating around the reservation ideology. The Shudra/OBC category was never seen as an ideological category, unlike the Muslim and Dalit category, by Congress and aligned intellectuals. They, by and large, remained a silent caste in its civilisational role in India.      

The main problem of Congress was the Shudra/OBCs, particularly lower OBCs, such as artisan castes voted for BJP in significant numbers in 2014. Of course, the non-Shudra castes, like Banias in North India, are also part of the OBCs and are fully aligned with BJP.  Unless the Congress and its allies regain OBCs into their fold, they cannot come back to power in Delhi.

OLD IDEOLOGY OF CONGRESS

The old ideology of Congress was operating around secularism and pluralism, mainly depending on Muslims, Dalits and upper castes. That combination in a changed situation at the national level, cannot bring the Congress to power on its own, because once the Shudra/OBCs shifted to the BJP, the combination of Muslim, Dalit, upper castes cannot win the national election.

In fact, the upper castes also quite decisively shifted to BJP. The only saving grace for Congress was that in South India the Shudra/OBCs did not move into the BJP’s fold in any significant way. Either they are with the regional parties, such as the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, Telugu Desam Party, YSR Congress Party or with the Congress. Otherwise, the Congress would have become a marginal party in Parliament like what Jana Sangh was in pre-1967 electoral politics.

Congress as a ruling party has the baggage of opposing OBC reservations from the times of Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi. Hence, it needed to reposition itself and see India as a changed country with competing political forces on the OBC vote base. Congress, till Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra, was not willing to fight for a caste census nor was it willing to mobilise OBCs into its electoral fold.

The Dwija intellectuals aligned with Congress were against OBC reservations at policy level and implementation. The lacklustre implementation of OBC reservations during the Congress-led United progressive Alliance regime is a standing testimony. Leaders and intellectuals, who broadly oppose the RSS-BJP ideologym needed to ‘Rethink India’ in this background.  Samrudha Bharat has suggestively started to work to reposition the intellectual consciousness among such forces.             

BOOKS OF SAMRUDDHA BHARAT    

In this background, Samrudha Bharat entered into an agreement with Penguin India to publish 14 volumes on the common theme of ‘Rethinking India’. So far, Samrudha Bharat has published 11 volumes, which can be found on the Samruddha Bharat website.  

However, the idea of ‘Rethinking India’ is not seriously examined, as to what it actually means, by reviewers of these books. The idea of ‘Rethinking India’ in my view is to rethink India from what it was thought to be by Congress, its aligned liberal regional parties and intellectuals.

This rethinking was needed in view of the fact the RSS-BJP combine changed its ideological strategy on the question of caste, reservations and nationalism. Earlier, the RSS-BJP forces never accepted Mahatma Jyotiba Phule and B.R Ambedkar as positive national icons. But, now they are trying to own them, while not leaving out their Brahmanic Sanatana Dharma. Whether this change is genuine or tactical for the sake of pulling votes and power only time will tell.

However, the recent statement of Union Home Minister Amit Shah in Parliament, that people keep saying “Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar” several times (he repeated seven times) and instead if they were to take the name God, they would have gone to heaven.” Which heaven is he talking about? The Shudra-Dalit-Adivasis have no place in that heaven at any time. When they do not have equal rights on earth in the spiritual sphere, how will they get equal rights in ‘their’ heaven?         

The RSS-BJP’s opposition to the present Constitution, after it was adopted in 1950, is well known.

Samrudha Bharat has brought together a conglomeration of intellectuals, academicians, including those intellectual liberals who were not keen on accepting Mahatma Phule, Ambedkar and the reservation ideology earlier.  This is a new experiment in the intellectual domain in a post-Mandal situation, and of the RSS-BJP’s adoption of a new strategy to gain power.   

Earlier, the RSS-BJP would mainly talk about cultural nationalism as an antidote to Islamism inside and outside India. As of now, the Islamic countries are unable to sustain democracy. Broadly, it was understood that Hindu nationalism also had characteristics of Islamic nationalism in Pakistan and other West Asian countries.

But after RSS-BJP came to power for the third time, basically with the votes of Shudra/OBCs, their slogan of ‘no reservations for Muslims’ is seen as gain for OBCs.   

Most of the RSS/BJP agendas were defined by anti-Muslim communal politics. Yet, the OBCs were not convinced of supporting BJP in national elections earlier. Though RSS-BJP mobilised forces on several anti-Muslim issues, their pure anti-Muslim politics did not take them to power in Delhi with a majority of their own.  When they started a pro-OBC campaign in 2013 with a view to winning the national elections and made Modi an OBC Prime Minister candidate, the OBCs began to trust them. 

Just before the 2014 elections, RSS-BJP not only brought in Modi, who had a strong support base in Gujarati-Mumbai Bania capitalists—particularly from Gautam Adani and Mukhesh Ambani -- but convinced most capitalists to support him. The election funding power to OBC candidates by the RSS-BJP network has made the number of OBC candidates from BJP much higher than what the Congress camp has in terms of real representation.

At the national level, BJP has grabbed the money market in election season, without any intervention of the state election machinery. This situation is a huge problem for all Opposition parties, including Congress. The regional parties face a real existential threat in this game. Elections in present day India are totally different from what these were before 2014.  There is a visible gain in OBC candidates contesting on BJP tickets, even though, by and large, OBCs are ideology neutral.

The RSS-BJP strategy to mobilise the lower OBC castes, who were waiting for share in regional and national power, had huge implications for Congress. The intellectuals who lived around the old Congress ideology have also realised that they need to ‘rethink India’.

POSSIBLE EMERGENCE OF TWO-PARTY SYSTEM  

Today’s India is moving toward a two-party system. The experiment of regional parties may not last long. The emergence of regional parties, starting with DMK in Tamil Nadu, took place by opposing Congress, particularly C. Rajagopalachari, a kind of caste hegemonic Brahmin. After the Nehru government rejected the Kaka Kalelkar report (the Kalelkar Commission prepared a list of 2,399 communities that were treated as socially and educationally backward), the Shudra/OBCs found themselves in shock. In Uttar Pradesh, under the leadership of Charan Singh, a rebellion took place against the Brahmin leadership and their opposition to OBC reservations.

With the Mandal movement (in the 1980s), a nationwide anti-Congress ideology got strengthened among OBCs. Today, Rahul Gandhi seems to have realised the OBC antagonism against Congress, and is leading a crusade for caste census and removal of the 50% cap on reservations imposed by the Supreme Court.

This is certainly part of ‘Rethinking India’. At the same time, regional parties must also rethink because BJP is hell bent on breaking them by owning up the OBC project. Hence, this idea of ‘rethinking India’ has to deepen among political forces, intellectuals of all castes, who see a danger that our constitutional democracy may crack if untrustworthy RSS rules the nation for long.

If Congress wants to come to power, it has to either rope in several regional parties by giving up old antagonisms and allow regional leaders to become national leaders. The party must also move in the direction of unification, as several regional parties are breakaway units of Congress party.

The OBCs of India must also realise that the RSS-BJP forces are talking about supporting OBC reservations because they voted them to power, but are also bringing back the Sanatana Dharma discourse sharply.

The history of Sanatana Dharma shows that its core ideology is based on Varna Dharma and Manu Dharma. Even the OBC Prime Minister is talking about Sanatana Dharma as his own core ideology. They want to use the OBC card to finish the Congress and regional parties and bring back Sanatana Varna Dharma back once the Opposition parties are decimated. This poses a greater danger to all – Shudras, Dalits and Adivasis.                       

The writer is a political theorist, social activist and author. His latest book is 'The Shudra Rebellion'. The views are personal.