Congress fears of antagonising voters as well as its organisational issues in Maharashtra might be behind its studied silence.
Mumbai: The arrests of four Hindutva activists, including a former Shiv Sena corporator, by the Maharashtra Anti Terrorism Squad (ATS) in a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-ruled state and the confession of one them of having being involved in rationalist Narendra Dabholkar’s murder has put the Congress in a bind.
The Congress, which had once vociferously accused the BJP and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) for inciting terror, has been comparatively silent, even on the back foot, on the arrests and the seizure of a large cache of weapons and explosives.
The ATS Sunday arrested former Sena corporator Shrikant Pangarkar in connection with its probe into a conspiracy to organise attacks in five cities of Maharashtra.
This came just days after the agency arrested 40-year-old Vaibhav Raut and 25-year-old Sharad Kalaskar from Nalasopara near Mumbai and 39-year-old Sudhanva Gondhalekar from Pune, potentially averting a terror strike.
All three are said to be activists associated with Hindutva organisations, with Raut and Gondhalekar also having worked with members of the Sanatan Sanstha, a right-wing outfit suspected to have links with those being probed for the murders of rationalists Narendra Dabholkar, Govind Pansare and M.M. Kalburgi, and journalist Gauri Lankesh. Kalaskar has confessed to have directly participated in killing Dabholkar, the ATS said.
Also read: Saffron terror? Maharashtra ATS says arrest of trio helped avert attacks
Besides Maharashtra Congress president Ashok Chavan demanding a ban on Sanatan Sanstha and former Union minister and party leader P. Chidambaram questioning if the BJP and the RSS plan to condemn those who were plotting terror attacks, no senior leader has made any strong statement on the arrests.
Congress and ‘saffron terror’
It was the Congress that raised red flags on terrorism allegedly sponsored by Hindutva organisations, especially after the 2008 Malegaon bomb blasts case, in which Sadhvi Pragya Thakur, Lt. Col Shrikant Purohit and six others were accused. The prosecution argued that the attack was part of a plan by Hindu right-wing group Abhinav Bharat.
Senior Congress leaders flogged the BJP and RSS for allegedly encouraging the fringe Hindutva groups and were seen as instrumental in coining the term ‘saffron terror.’ Strong statements in this regard by Congress leaders such as Digvijaya Singh, Chidambaram and Sushil Kumar Shinde sparked a debate on how the term defames the Hindu religion as a whole and if terror should at all be given a religious hue.
BJP leaders have repeatedly accused the Congress of promoting the term to woo the minorities, while the Congress has of late made a conscious attempt to distance itself from it.
For instance, following the arrests when Chidambaram questioned if the BJP and RSS plan to condemn those plotting attacks, he also tweeted, “Hindu, Muslim or any other religion, radicalism is radicalism. Terror is terror. There’s no purpose in burying one’s head in the sand.”
Hindu, Muslim or any other religion, radicalism is radicalism. Terror is terror. There is no purpose in burying one's head in the sand.
— P. Chidambaram (@PChidambaram_IN) August 11, 2018
Congress fears
Analysts and party insiders say the lack of a strong stance is because the Congress is struggling to put its house in order in Maharashtra on the one hand, and on the other, any strong statement highlighting terror linked to Hindu outfits may antagonise a section of voters in a political climate coloured with Hindu ethos.
Besides, there is also the fear that a strong condemnation of the three accused could give political heft to the BJP as the arrests were made in a BJP-ruled state.
“Congress is looking at this just as a law and order issue and not as a political or an ideological issue. If the party uses strong words of condemnation, it might go against the party when there is some sort of a Hindu majority ethos prevalent in the society. They would like to be very cautious talking about this. Also, party leaders are unable to provide a political angle to these events and see them in a broader framework,” said political commentator Surendra Jondhale.
A senior Congress leader, requesting anonymity, told ThePrint there is a deeper problem within the party where the Congress is unable to take any political advantage of public anger against the BJP.
“The Congress is barely active in Maharashtra. It is only the president who takes a press conference and issues a statement. There is a lot of discontent. People who used to talk have gone silent. There are no grassroots-level programmes or camps happening and the interest of karyakartas has also dipped,” the leader said.
Also read: Pune Right-wing activist arrested for making bombs had nearly cut himself off from the world
Besides, the leader added, on the national front too those like Digvijaya Singh who used to be very vocal on the extremist Hindu element have been sidelined.
Congress leader Sachin Sawant, however, suspected the BJP to have a political agenda behind the move and said more information needs to come out.
“I really believe we need to have some more investigation. I have seen people from Sanatan Sanstha coming to Vidhan Bhavan and Mantralaya and meeting BJP leaders. The intention is definitely questionable and doubts will remain. We are still not sure, but it seems like the main culprits are being shielded,” said Sawant.
Atul Bhatkhalkar, a senior Mumbai-based BJP leader, said the ATS arrests and the political reaction to it shows that the BJP is the only secular party. “Dabholkar was assassinated during the Congress reign. Kalburgi was assassinated under a Congress government. They are blaming BJP for their own political benefit. The ATS action shows that the BJP is the only real secular party,” he said.
No political dividend for BJP either
“There is a more aggressive wing of the Hindu parivar, which is not necessarily the Sangh parivar, but those who find even the RSS to be moderate. There is a sizeable segment of the society that is Hindu, but cannot tolerate such extremist views of these Hindus. In the action of the ATS, the government could be trying to reach out to this segment of people,” said Deepak Pawar, assistant professor at Mumbai University’s department of politics and civics.
He, however, said Raut, Kalaskar and Gondhalekar seem to be just the tip of the iceberg.
“There is a difference between having a Hindu militancy sentiment and actually operating on it. This government seems to be okay with allowing the presence of saffron militancy, but does not want it to be operated on,” Pawar said.
Another political expert Pratap Asbe said, “The BJP can face criticism that this happened only because the BJP government allowed right-wing Hindutvawadi groups to foster rather than timely discouraging them.”
Asbe added the silence of the government and BJP leaders on the arrests, besides one comment to the media by the CM on how the arrests were made after thorough intelligence, also does not help.
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BJP’s ally and its partner in the Maharashtra government, Shiv Sena, slammed the arrests as a possible attempt of the government to prop up its image at a time when the state’s law and order situation has taken a beating.
Shiv Sena’s Sanjay Raut, a Rajya Sabha MP, said, “In Maharashtra, law and order has become a sensitive issue due to incidents such as the Bhima Koregaon violence and the Maratha protests. So, is this an effort of the government to divert attention from the main issue? The government often makes such political moves and there could a concern that this is one such move to show that law and order is still very strong and the BJP government can even take action against Hindu outfits.”
Good that the ATS is doing a fine investigation. People in responsible positions need to reflect how words are morphing into deeds.