Congress- A party that lost its path on the altar of appeasement

There is trail of destructive politics that has done its best to cripple of Bharatiya civilisation. There are a number of signposts in contemporary history of Bharat that mark the deviation of this ancient nation from its destiny that Swami Vivekananda and Maharshi Aurobindo had envisioned long time back. Path to freedom was laid well by visionary political leaders and revolutionaries. The trio of Lal-Bal-Pal (Lala Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Bipin Chandra Pal) were the last of powerful Congress leaders who had full faith in Bharatiya civilisation and strength of its people to unshackle Bharat Mata. However, Congress lost its bearings in 1920s and could never go back to the path set by its earlier leaders.

Congress government thought that Hindus are incapable of managing their own social behaviour, hence to reform them Hindu Code Bill was implemented without consulting any Hindu leader or scholar

I would divide these signposts in the history of Congress in four periods to make it easier to see how the party ended up where it is now and how it has vitiated the social and political environment of Bharat for nearly 100 years and delayed its march to its destiny as the powerful civilisation that can save the world with its inclusive philosophy.

From pre-independence to the time of independence and partition

• Gandhi ji as the new supremo of Congress tried to ‘buy’ the support of orthodox Islamist elements by supporting the outdated idea of restoring the Caliph of Turkey by supporting Khilafat move. This was done despite opposition from educated modern Muslim leaders, thus making archaic elements of Muslim society the leaders and abandoning the secular modern Muslim leadership
• Not just utter silence but sympathy was shown when Moplahs turned violent in Kerala and killed nearly 11,000 Hindus. Senior leaders like Annie Besant and Dr Ambedkar protested against this violence. The idea of Pakistan took shape in 1921 as Islamists got emboldened. This Islamist violence was air brushed and presented as a revolt of landless labour against the Hindu landlords
• Congress leadership bowed down to horrific violence of 1946 Direct Action on the streets of Bengal and showed no will to fight for hapless Hindus. Not only that, this dark chapter was removed or presented in a sanitised version in history
• Direct Action and cowardice of Congress leadership saw the Partition of Bharat. Because of lack of strategic thinking and reluctance to support Hindus and Sikhs, we saw another round of violence that saw millions dead and crores become homeless refugees in their own land. Instead naming and shaming the aggressors, Congress tried monkey balancing the violence and absolving Muslim League of initial aggression.
• What could have been a peaceful transfer of population if Congress leadership had shown patience and fortitude turned into a macabre dance of death. It refused to Dr Ambedkar’s plea for total transfer of populations on religious basis, the basis of the Partition

• The appeasement did not stop here. While Pakistan used the properties of Hindus who went to Bharat for settling Muslim refugees, Bharat did not. It dragged refugees out of mosques and homes into open skies to protect those properties. Indian Government went on to appease Muslims not to leave Bharat, and was successful to quite an extent
• Post Partition, the new Congress Government refused to accept the truth that the Partition was on the basis of religion. Even after losing one third of our motherland to the blood bathed Partition, it did not abandon the path of appeasement. When K M Munshi ji proposed renovation and rebuilding of Somnath Mandir, and overwhelming majority of Congress agreed to it as a civilisational project to restore national pride, Nehru opposed it. He was so bitter that he did not forget it even in the death of the first President of independent Bharat, Rajendra Prasad
• Congress party allowed members of Muslim League, to participate in the making of Indian Constitution despite those members having actively supported division of our motherland
• No lessons were learned. The new constitution should have been religion agnostic and truly secular that gave no community any special privileges. However, we received a Constitution that discriminates in favour of minorities and against Hindu majority. Minorities had all the rights to run their own institutions, impart their religious training, and follow their personal laws; but Hindus had no such rights. Minority institutions like mosques and churches were autonomous but Hindu temples could be taken over and their devotees’ contributions used for secular, non-Hindu purposes. Nurturing of faith was used to give free license to convert Hindus into Abrahamic religions. And Nehru was very specific that Churches must not be disturbed in their conversion work
• Congress government thought that Hindus are incapable of managing their own social behaviour, hence to reform them Hindu Code Bill was implemented without consulting any Hindu leader or scholar. But it had no courage to implement Uniform Civil Code, or to dictate terms to Personal Laws of other communities. This was termed as secular. UCC was inserted in Directive Principles for future generations
• Special laws like Article 370 were enacted for Jammu Kashmir in a secular country as the state had Muslim majority
• Congress was the first political party to give a cover of respectability to Muslim League after Partition in Kerala by certifying it as secular and having an alliance with it. Current leaders of Congress still call Muslim League as secular party
• The Government that shied away from naming the perpetrators of Directo Action or Partition violence, used bullets to kill hundreds of peaceful Sadhus who had collected in Delhi to seek a ban on cow slaughter in 1966
• Such was the narrative set by this time that anyone talking about national integration or Hindu dharma was termed as communal and those who appeased minorities were called secular, from Kashmir to Kanyakumari. As the country settled down to governance, Nehru and later Indira Gandhi virtually outsourced the entire education to Left lobbies and Islamic scholars. This is when the negative definition, much different from the western concept of separation of state and religion or the Bharatiya philosophy of same respect for all religions was ingrained in our minds.
• Special status to minority institutions like Jamia Milia and Aligarh Muslim University though they run on tax payers’ money. But no such privilege was granted to Banaras Hindu University, the only higher education institution built by Congress and Hindu Mahasabha leader, Madan Mohan Malaviya as a Hindu institution. Gurukuls were allowed to die but Madrassas received grants from the secular Governments
• In an effort to give the idea of pro-minority, anti-majority secularism, history was re-written under the Marxist historians appointed by Indira Gandhi who air brushed Mughal atrocities and presented them as benign rulers. These historic accounts removed or underplayed the history of struggle against invaders by Bharatiyas from North to South, from West to East.

• The ‘new’ history diluted the role of revolutionaries in the freedom struggle, and tried to hide the role of INA trials and Naval revolt in Mumbai and many other cities as the major reason for hurried independence given to Bharat
• The beautiful history of Hindu kings and their dynasties that lasted much longer than the British in Southern Bharat was simply ignored so was the history of North East that has strong ancient Hindu links since Ramayan and Mahabharat. Idea was to remove any evidence that glorified Bharat’s past
• The fake historic narrative became anti-Hindu showing Hindus in bad light as uncivilised, ignorant orthodox society and Muslim invaders in good glowing terms who brought science, art and technology to Bharat. Till recently even British were glorified as the ones who created this nation and gifted India civilised society and knowledge. Taj Mahal was glorified but architectural wonders like Ajanta Ellora and Brihadeshwara mandir were left in poor condition.

Congress was the first political party to give a cover of respectability to Muslim League after Partition in Kerala by certifying it as secular and having an alliance with it

• To further buttress the image as the guardian of minority rights, it introduced the terms Secularism and Socialism during Emergency when entire opposition was in jail. It is noticeable that founding fathers had found this unnecessary after long debates in constituent assembly. Congress forgets that we are secular because we are a Hindu majority nation. None of the countries who went out of Hindu fold have remained secular, they have become Islamic nations. The above phase did maximum damage to Bharat as a civilisational nation. Under Rajiv Gandhi, Congress touched the nadir, by bowing down to Islamist orthodoxy once again by amending the constitution in case of Shah Bano. Resulting in a chain of events –
• Though Rajiv Gandhi opened the locks of Ram Mandir, Congress party did its best to stop reconstruction of Ram Mandir in courts. It supported extremist Islamic elements to block any peaceful resolution of the Ram Mandir issue. The government even decided to demolish the world heritage – ‘Ram Setu’ – despite Hindu protests. It was stopped only with court intervention
• Congress amended an already draconian Waqf Board Act, which gave its powers at par with the courts. It could put its finger on any property, it would become theirs. The solution was to go to the same Board to seek relief! If one was resourceful enough, one would have to run from pillar to post to various legal avenues to prove it otherwise
• It opposed every move to reform the inhuman Personal laws like Triple Talaq. It opposed Uniform Civil Code though it was enshrined in the Constitution in Directive principles, in an assembly that had no RSS or BJP members

• As terrorism peaked, Congress tried to soft pedal the issue of internal security, afraid of losing its minority votes. This resulted in a dangerous situation of heightened terrorism when we witnessed regular routine bomb explosions. In its quest for Muslim votes it weakened the terror cases by introducing fake stories of Hindu terror, allowing Pakistan to escape the serious charges of supporting terrorism
• Congress introduced a diabolical bill apparently to control communal violence. The bill turned Hindus into aggressive majoritarian community that was responsible for any riot. A Hindu, without knowing who complained against him/her would need to prove his/her innocence. This, despite the fact that this may be the only country where the majority needs police protection for celebration of its festivals or taking out religious processions, never the minority

Though Rajiv Gandhi opened the locks of Ram Mandir, Congress party did its best to stop reconstruction of Ram Mandir in courts. It supported extremist Islamic elements to block any peaceful resolution of the Ram Mandir issue

• While working for Right to Education, it introduced an amendment 93A to exempt minority institutions from its implementation universal education though they had some of the best running educational institutions.
• To appease minorities, it plumbed the depth of falsehood that saw mayhem on the streets in the name of CAA, that is a law to give asylum to minorities suffering persecution, death and rape in Islamic countries

The appeasement politics and compulsive Hindu hate is now reaching its crescendo to win elections. It is supporting organisations and parties that spout open hate against Hindus with attacks on Sanatan Dharma and threaten to break apart Bharat. It supports the forces that are openly insulting and threatening our eon old civilisation and traditions. One need not be a scholar and intellectual to see these evil games of Congress party. I wonder whether Congress is now captive of its own rhetoric. Indira Gandhi tried to move Congress out of anti-Hindu mindset, Rajiv Gandhi too tried. But, somehow the new set of JNU brand left loonies controlling the policy making under Rahul Gandhi have brought Congress to a ruinous stage. Congress needs to introspect before it is too late.

These are facts of our freedom struggle and post independent Bharat. Their actions speak louder than their theories. We the people, need to be vigilant to stop this divisive game of appeasement. We are all children of this land and we can live together peacefully and happily if we agree to respect every faith (the essence of Hinduness) and be ready to be governed by the same set of laws, whatever be our religion.