By Jabali Satyakama, March 3, 2003

Yudhishtira, the paragon of virtue did not lie. An elephant named Ashwatthama was indeed killed. But the most formidable archer in Duryodhayan’s side Dronacharya laid down his bow and quiver in grief over his beloved son Ashwatthama’s death for he heard it announced by Yudhshtira, the most truthful of the truthful. The pandavas won the battle of Kurukshetra. A model for compromising with truth was put in place 5000 years ago in the battle of Kurukshetra. A formula for getting away with murder.

The one differene between Yudhisthtira and our Hindutva leaders is that where Yudhishtira did it once and paid for it with a stint in hell, 21st century Hindutvavadis practice it on a daily basis and worse still, insist that their conscience is clean. After Gandhiji, after Ayodhya, after Graham Staines, after Gujarat, the 21 century Hindutvavadis still claim to have a clean conscience. Every now and then when that small voice deep inside him calls him a liar, our beloved prime minister writes a poem and sheds a tear. But pragmatic Hindutva calls him to order like the VHP is doing right now, “fall in line or you are finished.”

For long, we have heard these pious protestations of the Hindutvavadis. The latest one stinks… but not any more than the previous ones did. IDRF IS NOT CONNECTED TO THE RSS. (legally, that is.). If that sounds to you like Yudhishtira’s declaration that Ashwatthama was killed, you must be a communist, Marxist, mullah loving conspirator against mera mahan Bharat. But it matters little now what the Hindutvavadis call us. The postscript naro va kunjara va is 5000 years old and those of us who can be religious without subscribing to the VHP lunacy, those of us who can care enough for people in India and elsewhere without having to declare it through trashy poetry on the internet, those of us who can be proud of where we come from, and hopeful of where we are going, without resorting to cheap props like nuclear bombs, we know the 5000- year- old post script naro va kunjara va. The difference is the same as that between a man and an elephant. The IDRF is not part of the RSS. (legally speaking that is). But it does serve a particular ideological and operational functionin the sangh parivar. That is the summary of 200 pages of sophistry being peddled by a bunch of people whose grandiose self image makes them declare on the first page of their report that they are like a celestial constellation that has mysteriously come together. Ramesh Rao, Narayanan Komerath, Beloo Mehra, Chitra Raman and Sugrutha Ramaswami. Are like Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. You don’t need astrology to see that there is something sinister in the disarmingly innocent and stunningly ‘spectacular’ alignment “along the invisible necklace of the ecliptic”. Ashok Chowgule, the suave spokesman for Hindutva gave us a hint of the post script even as IDRF kept insisting carefully that it has no connections with the RSS. Legally that is. The difference between a man and an elephant does not amount to untruth. It can be sustained by 200 pages of facts.

Hindutvavadis practice this on a daily basis. The Supreme Court, it seems declared Hindutva to be a way of life and not a religion. The judiciary, a modern institution of bourgeoius democracy, a gift among many others of dubious value from the west, a legacy that the Hindutva has never shown any respect for; it is the judiciary from where Hindutva leaders procure a birth certificate now to prove their legitimacy. It is the same Supreme Court, an institution that Hindutva is daily threatening to destabilize by setting up their whipped up faith to battle the court’s imposed reason. Indeed what did the Supreme Court say ? It said, it is alright to appeal for votes in Hindutva’s name for it is not a religion but only a way of life. So, now there is no religion in India by a decree of the supreme court. There is only a way of life, the one prescribed by the smiling RSS. Do you remember where you saw a smile like that the last time ? Yes, it was in the crocodile pond. There is a Hindutva, a way of life in India and an Islam and a Christianity which are religions. And somehow, by some celestial planetary logic that the authors will not explain to us, somehow, Hindutva is RSS. It is not religion. But a way of life. It is an ideology. It is everything. And nothing too. Aaahhha.

Those of us who are confused by this should turn to Adi Shankara the closet budhist, (lest some hindutva vadi may claim that I am abusing adi shankara, closet budhist is only a bad translation of pracchanna baudha) whose fine philosophical tradition has been the mainstay of lazy people for long. “Watch out against the maya, my friend. that illusion that is cast upon you by the communists, mullah lovers and Marxists. The truth shines ever so wonderously in the heart of the Hindutvavadis. The IDRF has nothing to with the RSS (legally that is). The BJP has nothing to do with babri desruction. (legally that is). The VHP has nothing to do with the killing of 1000 Mulsims(legally that is). And Hindutva is a way of life. (Legally that is.)

To call these things cheap sleight of hand, is to miss the point completely. Hindutvavadis are liars in as much as Yudhishtir was a liar. They lied when they first claimed that ram idols emerged during a bhajan at the ayodhya temple. They lied when Gandhiji was killed. They lied when the Babri masjid was pulled down. They lied when they said Godhra was an ISI plot and went on to endorse the violence in Gujarat.