Author: Manini Chatterjee
Publication: The Indian Express
Date: December 12, 2006
URL: http://www.indianexpress.com/story/18407.html
As BJP members stalled both Houses of Parliament
today protesting against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's remark that minorities,
particularly Muslims, should have first claim on resources in welfare and
other government schemes, Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Jaswant Singh
told The Indian Express that the situation could have been averted if only
the PM had explained his "error" to Opposition leaders before Parliament
met.
"If it was a slip of tongue or an inadvertent
mistake, then all that the Prime Minister had to do was to call 3-4 Opposition
leaders to his house for a cup of tea and said there has been an error and
let's finish it here. And that would have been the end of it," Jaswant
Singh said.
Instead of doing that, the course followed
by the government had only made things worse, Singh said. "This kind
of sleight of hand wherein the PIB is instructed to correct what the Prime
Minister has already spoken and the country has seen on TV is really to treat
with contempt the country, the citizens, their sensibility and their intelligence,"
he said.
He attributed the showdown between the government
and Opposition - both Houses were adjourned for the day without transacting
any business - to the fact that "grace, courtesy, elementary goodwill
and manners has so abandoned our politics."
Apart from accusing Manmohan Singh of lack
of etiquette, Jaswant Singh - who is currently delving into the history of
Partition for a forthcoming book and a series of lectures in Oxford - also
felt that the PM was treading into territory that pre-Independence Congress
leaders led by Mahatma Gandhi would have deplored.
The Prime Minister's talk of "priority"
for Muslims in the context of the Sachar Committee report evoked memories
of the whole question of reservation for Muslims "that has bedevilled
the Indian polity" and led to Partition of the sub-continent, Singh said.
He went on to recall how Mahatma Gandhi had
strongly opposed the Muslim League's demand for "parity" for Muslim
and Hindu representatives in the central legislature and executive as a means
to avoid Partition.
In a letter to Sir Stafford Cripps on 8 May
1946, Gandhi wrote: "As to merits, the difficulty about parity between
six Hindu majority provinces and five Muslim-majority provinces is insurmountable.
The Muslim majority provinces represent over 9 crores of the population as
against 19 crores of the Hindu majority provinces. This is really worse than
Pakistan."
Although the question of parity in representation
and the promise of priority for the uplift of Muslims in contemporary India
are not exactly comparable, the BJP leader insists there is a link.
"If even on the question of parity the
country got divided, can you imagine what will happen if you are talking of
priority? You are asking for great, great trouble," Singh said. Insisting
that the demand for reservations for Muslims was the root cause of Partition,
Singh added, "Even then it was only equal status, not special status.
Special status is both completely unjustified, it is unjust, and most damagingly
it is bitterly divisive."
For the BJP, which has been trying to re-establish
its credentials as a party wedded to Hindutva, the Prime Minister's remark
has come as godsend. Party leaders, who attribute the BJP's good showing in
the Uttar Pradesh corporation polls to the return of its traditional upper
caste urban vote, feel that "competitive minorityism" of other parties
for the Muslim vote in UP will only help the BJP in the Assembly elections
next year.
Therefore, even though Jaswant Singh indicated
that his party would not stall parliamentary proceedings tomorrow, the BJP
is likely to keep the issue on the boil, sources said.
manini.chatterjee@expressindia.com
