Modi, who has tried to stake claim to Gandhi’s legacy even before he became PM, has borrowed excessively from the Mahatma’s legacy, if just to corner Congress.
New Delhi: The Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan, dedicated to Mahatma Gandhi, may have been in vogue as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s absolute favourite since he assumed office in 2014, but his attempts at appropriation of the Gandhian legacy go way back, and have assumed multiple forms.
One of the first flagship initiatives of the Modi government – swachhta – has been pushed by the PM on mission mode ever since the drive was launched in 2014.
Through his promotion of cleanliness and people’s participation in it, Modi has consistently evoked Gandhi, and, in a concerted effort, attempted to portray his politics as being moulded around Gandhi’s core beliefs.
Modi began seeking to stake a claim to Gandhi’s legacy much before he even became PM, from his defining days in Gujarat that saw his politics evolve.
Moulding his politics around Gandhi
In mid-2010, as Gujarat chief minister, Modi decided to build the Mahatma Mandir in Gandhinagar, a memorial dedicated to the Father of the Nation.
In perhaps one of his earliest and biggest mass mobilisation programmes, he urged people from 18,000 villages and around 160 towns across the state to bring a ceremonial
kalash (urn) filled with soil from their own villages/towns for the ground-breaking ceremony of the memorial.
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In the district, taluk panchayat and municipality elections later that year, the BJP swept to power and Modi dedicated the victory to “matti the dum (strength of the soil)” and his movement to construct the Mahatma Mandir.
The movement became a defining moment in Modi’s appropriation of Gandhi in his political career.
The implications and careful messaging of this very public display of what he claimed to be his commitment to the Gandhian legacy were not lost on anyone.
It isn’t just in external posturing, however. Even within the BJP, Modi has evoked Gandhi as part of his political position.
While speaking to BJP workers, Modi has often said how they should learn the art of organising and mobilising from Gandhi, using his instances as motivational elements for karyakartas.
As a case in point, at the BJP’s karyakarta mahakumbh (workers’ grand rally) in Bhopal in September 2013, Modi projected his political ambitions of decimating the Congress through Gandhi’s lens.
“Mahatma Gandhi’s last wish was that the Congress should be disbanded,” he said.
“It is our responsibility to fulfil his dream. To free the nation of Congress’ culture, activities, corruption and dynastic politics, we must make our polling booths Congress-free,” he said.
The idea of a ‘Congress-mukt Bharat (Congress-free India)’ is now an oft-cited BJP mission, but Modi sought to justify this ambition as part of fulfilling Gandhi’s vision, and not just the BJP’s.
Weakening the Congress at the booth level has been an integral part of the BJP’s micro-level electoral strategy.
The BJP’s decision to expand its base and attempt to bring Dalits under its fold have also seen Modi use Gandhian symbolism and references.
As Prime Minister
Swachh Bharat has been Modi’s most prominent and glitzy appropriation of Gandhi as PM, but he has attempted to do so in other aspects as well.
The PM has aggressively promoted khadi – known to be dear to Gandhi. In several episodes of his monthly radio show Mann Ki Baat, as well as otherwise, the PM has urged people to buy and wear khadi.
Modi also tries to emphasise his commitment to Gandhi’s vision of environment conservation. For instance, at the Paris climate summit in 2015, Modi referred to Gandhi in his speech.
“Together, we shall live up to Mahatma Gandhi’s call to care for a world that we shall not see,” he said, a message to preserve the world for the coming generations.
He also often cites the example of Gandhi’s house in Porbandar to highlight the importance of water conservation.
“I have always said that people who visit the house of Mahatma Gandhi in Porbandar should also see the underground tanks constructed there about 200 years ago, that were built to save rain water,” Modi said in the April 2016 episode of Mann ki Baat.
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“Water collected in these tanks remained pure,” he added.
In fact, Gandhi has been somewhat of a constant on Modi’s radio show, finding mention in the very first episode as well as the one aired last week.
“Bapu gave an inspirational mantra to all of us, which is known as Gandhiji’s talisman,” he said in the 30 September episode, “This mantra is extremely relevant today.”
In the first episode, aired a day after Gandhi’s 2014 birth anniversary, Modi had said, “Yesterday, on 2 October, Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary, more than 125 crore countrymen started the Swachh Bharat movement.”
BJP position on Gandhi
The Bharatiya janata Party (BJP) has not been overtly hostile to Gandhi in its public position. In fact, when it was formed in 1980, the BJP adopted Gandhian socialism as a core precept, a departure from its erstwhile Jana Sangh avatar.
However, the subtle political messaging of the BJP — and the Jana Sangh before it — and the RSS, of course, has revolved around how Gandhi made some fundamental errors of judgement.
The Sangh worldview holds that Gandhi was wrong in his fundamental conviction in Hindu-Muslim unity, and way too generous towards Muslim aspirations and demands.
They have also criticised his selection of Jawaharlal Nehru over Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel as India’s first PM, claiming that while the former represented the westernised elite, disconnected from Indian roots, the latter was a symbol of the hard muscular state India should have been, with strong Hindu roots.
Nathuram Godse used to be member of the Sangh, but not at the time he assassinated Gandhi. The RSS faced a ban after Gandhi was killed.
Over the decades, however, the Sangh and the BJP have come to increasingly own Gandhi, with a particular emphasis on his Hinduism.
By repeatedly taking Gandhi’s name in his radio talks, as the author points out, Mr Modi hopes that gradually over time the audience will start identifying him with the greatness of Gandhi. Mr Modi should realize that Gandhi’s greatness lay not in his words but in his kindness, compassion, fair mindedness which attracted people to him like a magnet. He spoke in a slurred voice. Half the people wouldn’t have understood what he was saying, let alone getting impressed by it.
Mr Modi’s attempt at the appropriation of Gandhi’s legacy has been visible on two levels. First the less complimentary one, to Mr Modi that is, which manifested in removing Gandhi’s photo from the khadi gramodyog calendar and putting Mr Modi’s in its place. It is difficult to say if it was an act of an overzealous officer who thought he would endear himself to Mr Modi by this act, or if it was directly sanctioned by Mr Modi himself. Let’s leave it at that, that’s over.
The second and more important attempt at the said appropriation is through the Swacchta campaign. Gandhi ji was all for Swacchta, but why did he not succeed? Modi ji’s intent was admirable, but before spending or allocating huge funds for it, he should have realized that Swacchta is SECOND NATURE to some people, and NOT second nature to some people. Period. There is no magic wand to convert the latter type to the former desirable type.
If you chance to see army barracks in a cantonment, you will understand what I mean by “second nature” to some. Interestingly, a few years ago I had a chance to travel by road through the interiors of Tamil Nadu. I was on road for approximately 13-14 hours, across different parts of the state, so it can be called a large enough “sample” to form an opinion. And believe it or not, I saw the ARMY BARRACKS TYPE OF CLEANLINESS throughout the countryside of Tamil Nadu! And this was BEFORE 2014. Simple, but freshly whitewashed houses, spic and span courtyards and adjoining lands, no dry or wet filth by the roadsides etc. I concluded to myself that cleanliness was “second nature” to the inhabitants of Tamil Nadu. There was no need to teach them Swacchta, they already knew it. As against this, think of or travel through any part of the Hindi belt, to the parts to which I actually belong! Do you see even a shade of Swacchta anywhere, despite crores being spent on this project?
Swacchta will become “second nature” also in these parts of India when today’s school children become big, and start leading adult life. Because Swacchta is “becoming” (hopefully) second nature to them through awareness campaigns in schools. That means 5-10 years from now. There’s no need to mindlessly going on pumping money into this scheme now.