The most pernicious impact of Vajpayee government has been its relentless implementing of the RSS agenda seeking to convert India's secular democratic republican polity into a rabidly intolerant and autocratic `Hindu Rashtra'.

Recollect the chronology of events. First came the frenzied activity of building the temple through pre-fabricated pillars to be installed at Ayodhya at the appropriate time, irrespective of the pending judicial verdict. The Vajpayee government, instead of taking any action, went to the extent of saying that it is a private activity and, hence, cannot be interfered with. Simultaneously, the Bajrang Dal announced the decision to train Hindu `patriotic' youth against cultural `invaders' and activities of missionaries. Within weeks came the large scale attacks against the missionaries. These ranged from the brutal rape of nuns in Jhabua, the forcible disrobing of a Christian missionary in Dumka to the inhuman torching of the Steins in Orissa. Elsewhere in Karnataka, communal passions were roused in the name of "liberating" a centuries old Sufi pilgrimage centre. This was followed by the Suratkal communal riots. While the Srikrishna Commission was summarily rejected, the issue of saraswati vandana, vande mataram have been used to deepen the communal divide. The Vajpayee rule also saw the Shiv Sena's virulent campaign against the Pakistani cricket team, the obnoxious digging of pitches, the forcible stopping of the screening of the film Fire, the attacks on M.F. Hussain and the disruption of Ghulam Ali's concert in Mumbai. The recent attacks on Dilip Kumar only confirms such a despicable trend.

A concerted campaign against Bengali-speaking population in Maharashtra as `Bangladeshi immigrants' was launched and many were illegally sought to be `sent back' as a part of a larger strategy to communally polarise society. Large scale infiltration of RSS loyalists in educational institutions and research bodies was accompanied by changing the syllabi and curricula with heavy communal overtones. The attacks on Christian minorities, however, have been unprecedented in independent India.

Terming these attacks as aggressive and its scale and magnitude as bestial, the United Christian Forum for Human Rights has listed over a hundred incidents of violence against the Christian community since the present government assumed office. In a scathing attack, the Forum says: "the State has failed to do its duty in protecting the life, dignity and property of the victims. At many places, it seems as if the Central and the State governments have tacitly supported the communal groups".

The situation has deteriorated to the extent that the Statutory National Commission for Minorities in its report released on November 24, 1998, observes:

"We are disturbed by and distressed at the current minority situation of the country. The growing polarisation of society on communal lines is a cause of deep anxiety for us.

"We take a serious view of the growing trend of communalisation of crimes and are anguished by the misbelief of criminals that crimes against particular communities may not be firmly dealt with by the authorities concerned under the country's general laws.

"We regret to observe that the Constitutional provisions relating to rights and safeguards for minorities are not actually in force in full. They are often violated under various pretexts including arbitrary public policy and presumed administrative expediency. Clear provisions of the Constitution calling for affirmative action in favour of minorities -- who are weaker sections of the society -- have taken a back seat."

That the Wadhwa Commission to inquire into the brutal murder of Staines was only an eyewash has now been confirmed. It was clearly an effort to give a `clean chit' to the Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad. This report holds just as much sincerity as does the claim that Nathuram Godse was not an RSS member!

Apart from such minority bashing, the most diabolic attempt that has been going on during the last year has been the attempt to re-write Indian history and appropriate India's plurality into an illusory Hindu monolith.

In the first category falls the blatant attempt by the Uttar Pradesh BJP government to rewrite history to suit the political project of `Hindu Rashtra'. 25 history books meant for students upto Class VIII are being rewritten by a dubious organisation called the "Lekhak Mandal" believed to be a adjunct of the RSS. The UP Minister for Basic Education had the temerity to state, "Yes, we are rewriting history in order to remove the distortions. The history being taught to children at present has been distorted deliberately and it is because of this that our children have no sense of national pride." It was the same Minister who was responsible for making the recitation of the saraswati vandana compulsory in primary schools earlier this year. This decision is unashamedly defended by stating that such rewriting will magnify the role of the Hindu kings and rulers and marginalise the Muslim rulers and their contribution to the evolution of India's syncretic culture.

The BJP, as the political wing of the RSS, is following to the dot the famous dictum of George Orwell that, "those who control the past, control the present and those who control the present, control the future." The inspiration for this is not far to seek. Golwalkar in his chilling communal treatise with fascist content -- We, or Our Nationhood Defined bemoaned, "Unfortunately such misconceptions (read secularism) are stuffed into the brains of our young ones through text books appointed by various Universities in the country. It is high time that we studied, understood and wrote our history ourselves and discarded such designed or undesigned distortions".

In a similar vein, the attempt to impose saraswati vandana or vande mataram is a part of this overall strategy. Amongst the rich diversity of Indian culture and tradition, the Saffron Brigade deliberately chooses only these hymns in order to deepen the communal divide. Even within the rich historical tradition of Hinduism itself, saraswati vandana represents just but one stream. Even if we were to discount, for a moment, the rich non-Hindu legacy of Indian culture, it is clear that the imposition of the saraswati vandana is nothing but the attempt to strengthen the brahmanical tradition and consequently its tyrannical social order based on caste oppression. In other words, it is not only a communal `Hindu Rashtra' that the RSS seeks but simultaneously a social order based on caste oppression that not only reverses whatever little that the oppressed castes have gained since independence, but threatens to heap greater repression.

With regard to vande mataram, it should be borne in mind that this song was part of the famous novel (Anand Math) by Bankim Chatterjee based on the sanyasi or fakir rebellion. It gained popularity in the early part of this century in the historical context of the Swadeshi movement, following the British division of Bengal on communal lines. On the one hand it roused the masses against oppression and tyranny and for independence. But it also contained references that may be injurious to non-Hindu religions, particularly the Muslims. More important, however, is the manner in which vande mataram was misappropriated and used by the communal forces to inflame frenzied communal passions in post independent India. The most common slogan that rents the air in any communal holocaust is, "bharat mein rehna hai toh vande mataram kahna hai". It is this memory that leaves a powerful imprint on the Indian mind, not so much the origins of this song. Thus, in such a situation, the imposition of this song is nothing but a way to increase comunal strife.

With regard to the attempts to assimilate forcibly the non-Hindu elements of Indian historical tradition, one must note the strident manner in which L.K. Advani claimed that Buddhism is only an offshoot of Hinduism and does not deserve the status of a separate religion. Speaking to an international gathering at a seminar on Buddhism at Sarnath marking at the 2500th anniversary of the Buddha's first sermon recently, Advani made an outrageous statement saying: "Buddha did not announce any new religion. He was only restating with a new emphasis the ancient ideals of the Indo-Aryan civilisations". Not surprisingly, there was a virtual unanimous condemnation of such an understanding with one participant saying that Advani was "making a political statement that is 100 per cent wrong. I may call it 101 percent wrong".

It should be borne in mind that the size of the Muslim minority population in India is more than the population of Britain and France put together. The 102.6 million Indian Muslims are those who had opted to stay in a secular democratic India. Similarly, the 10 million Indian Christians carry with them a legacy which is older than the growth of the Christianity in many parts of Europe. Likewise, despite systematic hounding that resulted in the virtual expulsion of Buddhism from Indian borders, there are some seven million Buddhists in the country who carry with them a legacy that is, in India, twenty five centuries old. To deny these people their rightful existence and freedoms enshrined in our Constitution is tantamount to negate the very idea of a secular democratic modern India.

Instead of taking action against the perpetrators of inhuman violence against Christians, the Saffron Brigade has, once again, called for a national debate. This time on "religious conversions"! They take recourse to such a tactic whenever they seek to destroy the secular democratic foundations of modern India and negate its Constitution.

The chilling similarity to the run-up leading to the Babri Masjid demolition cannot be missed. The Saffron Brigade has perfected its fascistic methodology and Goebellisian propaganda tactics (Goebell's was Hitler's minister for propaganda, whose dictum was "if you tell a big enough of lie, frequently enough, it becomes the truth"). The run-up to the demolition of the Babri Masjid was punctuated by demands for a national debate on secularism. Slogans such as `appeasement of minorities', `pseudo-secularism' were all given circulation to buttress the whipping up of hatred and communal frenzy against the Muslim minority. The bloodshed and mayhem that followed still continues to shame the soul of India. And, all this was done to gain political and electoral advantage at the expense of destroying the very vitals of a pluralistic society and its syncretic ethos.

Just as the Babri Masjid was described before its destruction as "a disputed structure", churches in Gujarat today are described as "prayer halls". The charge being levelled by the Saffron Brigade is that conversions of tribals are taking place through allurement and coercion. If such is their concern for people changing their faith, one wonders why the Saffron Brigade is silent over people deserting Indian nationality and clamouring after the US `green card' lured by the glitter of the west. After all, such Indians (many of whom incidentally constitute the bedrock of the reactionary communal international support base of the Saffron Brigade) have betrayed and deserted their Bharat Mata. In the RSS terminology, they have betrayed their matrubhoomi, janmabhoomi and punyabhoomi. Surely, aghast at people converting from their religious faith, they should be equally, if not more, outraged at the thousands of Indians betraying their motherland being lured by the west! If the question is of banning conversions, then the first on the agenda should be to ban the conversion of one's nationality!

The so-called propaganda that the Hindu order is being threatened by conversions is contrary to facts. The regular census figures show no dramatic rise in the proportion of minority population. For instance, in the 1961 census, the Muslims constituted 10.5 percent of the population. In 1971, it was 11.2 percent and in 1981, it was 11.4 percent. At this rate, it will take 3626 years for the Muslim population to become 50 percent of total Indian population! By this time, however, the Hindu population would have grown many more times than what it is today. Likewise, over these years, the Christian population remained around 2.5 percent of the total population.

However, let us turn to the question of tribal conversions. As everyone is aware, with the process of economic development and modernisation, many of the tribes are drawn into the mainstream of societal development. In the process, they change their customs, their traditions, and assimilate with the mainstream. Many of them have their original tribal animistic religions and form of worship which become integrated or `converted' in this process. Some may adopt, in a multi-religious country like India, Hinduism while some others may adopt Christianity, Islam or any other religion. For instance, consider the fact that the deity at the famous Bhadrachalam temple in Andhra Pradesh is called Kodandarama. It is a black figure and as legend has it was the local presiding deity of the `koya' tribe who still inhabit this forest region. Over centuries, it has assimilated itself into Hindu religion and rituals and is now considered a version of Rama. Similar interpretations abound regarding various other deities who are considered central to the Hindu pantheon including Lord Jagannath of Puri.

Therefore, to presume that every tribe is essentially a Hindu tribe is the first travesty of truth. It is precisely this untruth that the Saffron Brigade spreads to further its communal agenda.

Further, consider the fact that Mahavira, Guru Nanak or Lord Buddha were all born in Hindu families. The fact that new powerful religions emerged from their teachings cannot be described as `conversions'. In fact, Buddhism was embraced by millions of Indians as an escape from the torturous brahmanical caste oppression being practiced by Hinduism. No less a person than Swami Vivekananda confirms this. For nearly ten centuries, the brahmanical order fought to decimate Buddhism. They eventually triumphed only by the seventh century AD, by virtually banishing Buddhism and Buddhists from Indian borders. This is what explains the spread of Buddhism immediately beyond Indian borders towards the far east. The violent destruction of Buddhist viharas and centres of glorious civilisation and wisdom is eloquently recorded in history.

Similarly, it was against such tyrannical, brahmanical caste oppression that the architect of modern Indian Constitution Baba Saheb Ambedkar led his dalit followers to embrace Buddhism.

The issues being raised by the RSS have been answered many decades ago by Swami Vivekananda who said "without the Buddhist revolution what would have delivered the suffering millions of lower classes from the violent tyrannies of the influential higher castes." (Works, vol-4, pp-462).

On the question of the current campaign against the minorities on the so-called "forcible conversions" Vivekananda had to say: "(Mohammedianism) came as a message for the masses... the first message was equality. There is one religion -- love. No more question of race, colour, (or) anything else." (Works, vol-1, pp-483)

Further, "my experience is that if ever any religion approached this equality in any appreciable manner, it is Islam and Islam alone." (Works, vol-6, pp-415)

"The Mohammedan conquest of India came as a salvation to the downtrodden, to the poor. That is why one fifth of our people have become Mohammedans." (Works, vol-3, p-294)

Therefore, he shaped his vision of India's future by stating: "I see in my mind's eye the future perfect, India arising out of its chaos and strife, glorious and invincible with Vendanta brain and Islam body." (Works, Vol-6, pp-416)

The soul of India is, thus, far removed from the RSS vision of a `Hindu Rashtra'.

It needs to be emphasised that national debates on secularism, on conversions, were conducted for many years preceding the adoption of our republican Constitution and settled when an independent India was based on secular democratic foundations. By seeking to re-open these issues, the Saffron Brigade today is only seeking to carry forward its pernicious ideology and political project of establishing its "Hindu Rashtra". The naked hatred against all non-Hindu religions has been repeated consistently by the RSS since its formation in 1925. Golwalkar in a later book, "Bunch of Thoughts" devotes an entire chapter to what he characterises as the three `internal threats' to India -- Muslims, Christians and Communists. The hatred against Communists is not only because they are the most steadfast and consistent upholders of secularism but also because they had allegedly spurned Hinduism to become atheists. By this logic, Golwalkar is, in fact, spurning the entire wealth of Hindu Indian tradition itself. Being a devout votary of the tyrannical, brahmanical order, the RSS conveniently forgets philosophers like Charvaka and the entire Lokaykta school of Indian philosophy. Its followers not only revolted against brahmanical oppression but also openly embraced and propagated atheism. Of course, since such parts of Indian heritage negate the Saffron Brigade's political project, these are discarded contemptuously.

Violence: RSS Credo

Further, in their effort to establish such a religious intolerant brahmanical oppressive social order, the Saffron Brigade adopts violence as its credo. In 1952, Golwalkar justifying violence as an integral part of their philosophy said, "It should be used as a surgeon's knife ... to cure the society" (Spotlights, p. 110). Report after report of the Judicial Enquiry Committees instituted by the government to probe communal riots have indicted the RSS for directly preaching and indulging in violence against the minorities. To name a few: Jaganmohan Reddy Commission (Ahmedabad riots, 1969), D.P. Madan Commission (Bhiwandi, 1970), Vithayathal Commission (Tellichery, 1971), Jitendra Narayan Commission (Jamshedpur, 1971), Venugopal Commission (Kanyakumari, 1982), and Srikrishna Commission (Bombay, 1992-93). The attacks against the Christian community that the country is witnessing today are just the continuation of such inhuman methods adopted by the RSS and the Saffron Brigade to fulfill its reactionary objective of converting a secular democratic India into a rabidly intolerant "Hindu Rashtra". In fact, it is they who are resorting to `forcible conversion'.

In the post Kargil situation, the RSS with an ostensible anti-Pakistani campaign is converting this into open anti-Muslim bashing. The recent communal riots in Ahmedabad is a classic illustration of this. Burning effigies of Nawaz Sharief in Muslim dominated areas, the RSS whipped up an anti-Muslim communal frenzy. Clearly, with Shankar Singh Waghela joining the Congress, the Saffron Brigade faces a serious political threat under these circumstances, it is seeking communal polarisation to derive electoral benefit. They can go to any level of inhumanity in their lust for power!

It is, indeed, a matter of anguish and shame that the country is under siege by such forces at a time when millions of our brethren are groaning under oppressive economic conditions. Instead of directing its attention to solving the people's problems, or atleast seeking to alleviate their miseries from poverty, disease, squalor and illiteracy, this BJP-led government is imposing an agenda that only deepens the communal wounds aggravating people's miseries.

It is, indeed, ironic that we Indians, are to suffer such forces whose priorities and pre-occupations are far removed from the day-to-day realities of the Indian people. Worse still, as we move into the last year of the 20th century, as the world braces itself to reach higher civilisational levels, we, in India, have such communal forces who seek not to take India forward but to take it backward towards medieval barbarity.