Book analysing 2019 General Elections launched/ Book on rise of right-wing politics launched (REVISED)

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 15

A book titled — India’s 2019 Elections: BJP’s Hindutva Wave and Hindu Nationalism — was released at the Institute for Development and Communication (IDC), Sector 38, today.

The book launch was followed by a session, under the Prof Randhir Singh Memorial Series, on “Legitimisation of Right-wing Politics in India: Redefining the secular space.” The event was organised by the IDC in association with Chandigarh University, Mohali.

The book was sixth in the series on India’s elections and said to be the first to critically analyse the 17th Lok Sabha Elections.

An amalgamation of region-based case studies on electoral politics in the country, the book critically explores underlying factors such as the absolute dominance of extreme nationalism based on majoritarian religious identity as well as the increased participation of women and the marginalised sections of Indian society.

The book has been edited by Prof Paul Wallace, Professor Emeritus at the University of Columbia, Missouri, USA. “Politics creates problems and the only way to resolve this is politics,” Professor Wallace said.

Gurbachan Jagat, former Governor of Manipur, launched the book along with Dr SY Quraishi, former Chief Election Commissioner, and Prof Pramod Kumar, Director, IDC, Chandigarh.

The former Manipur Governor underlined that changes in politics and political behaviour do not happen in a jiffy. It requires insights and tremendous efforts by the contesting political groups.

He said a lot of effort by the BJP and its mother organisation, the RSS, had been put behind the 2019 General Elections. They have been waiting for this day for the past 50-60 years. They organised it right from ‘shakhas’ to upward, he noted.

He further shared that preparations for 2019 Elections did not begin in 2014 and preparations for 2014 did not start in 2013 but a long time ago. For a long time, the process of radicalisation of various sections of society was happening. This phenomena is now growing at a much faster pace as they are in power now. He said universities, NGOs and intellectuals are being targeted. Many organisations are under a threat, he added.

Prof Pramod Kumar said the legitimisation of right-wing politics has historically evolved and rooted in consensus among political parties on neo-liberal economic reforms and political parties for electoral alliance did not subscribe to any ideology. However, most of the alliances in post-globalised economy were on the right side of the politics. He gave an example of the alliance between the Congress and the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra in 2019.

The central objective of the session as redefining the secular space was contested and discussed exhaustively and concern was raised how liberal, rational, nationalist and secular thoughts are being targeted under the right-wing political arena. Most of the experts emphasises the need to theorise substantive questions pertaining to the contemporary right-wing agenda and kind of political ideology.

It was highlighted that the space of nationalism as redefined by the BJP is being resisted by a formidable section of society. There is a need to revisit Gandhian prescription. It was also reiterated that with the introduction of the third interjection that is, the Constitution; minorities got the license to consolidate their identities in the secular space and appropriation by politics lead to polarisation.

Expert views were expressed at the event by Prof Harish Puri (retd), Department of Political Science, Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar; Prof Ujjwal Kumar Singh, Department of Political Science, University of Delhi, New Delhi; Prof Ronki Ram, Department of Political Science, Panjab University, Chandigarh; Prof M Rajivlochan, Department of History, Panjab University; Prof Lallan Baghel, Department of Philosophy, Panjab University; Ramesh Vinayak, resident editor, Hindustan Times, Chandigarh; and Swaraj Bir Singh, Editor, Punjabi Tribune.