Interview | We are secular because India is a Hindu-majority nation: Bhupender Yadav

Today, Bhupender Yadav is the minister of environment, forests, climate change, and of labour in the Narendra Modi government. But in political circles he is well-known for his organisational skills and sharp politico-electoral mind during his stint as a general secretary in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In the latter’s role, he played a significant part in turning the BJP into a formidable electoral machine that won two consecutive Lok Sabha elections and several Assembly polls.

As Yadav comes up with The Rise of the BJP: The Making of the World’s Largest Political Party, co-authored with economist Ila Patnaik, Firstpost reaches out to them to talk more about the book, which traces the BJP’s transformation from being a party of 2 MPs to 303 today. They also talk about the party’s historic victory in Uttar Pradesh, its defeat in West Bengal, and of course the BJP’s Hindutva politics. Excerpts of a conversation with the authors:

This question is for both of you: How did the idea of writing and collaborating for this book come about?

Bhupender Yadav (BY): The idea of writing is like the idea of India: Two perspectives come together, get discussed and reach an amicable conclusion. After the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Ila ji inspired and also persuaded me to write a book on the just-concluded polls. I prepared some notes and after a few rounds of discussion we came to the conclusion that we should instead write a book on the BJP which will help the reader understand the background of the victory. I decided to write the history of the BJP, while Ila ji wrote the section on governance and economy. With an economist of her repute by my side, it helped me understand the other perspective as well, which I believe has made the book better in terms of content.

Ila Patnaik (IP): I was quite curious about the BJP, and how it operates, especially after the 2019 elections. Most observers like me expected the party to get fewer seats, but it proved us all wrong. This made me realise the need to explore and examine the party, and so we decided to expand the horizon of the book, and include the history of the BJP on which we didn’t find books written by people who were inside the party and who understood the party as well as Bhupender ji did.

Ila ji just mentioned how most observers got it wrong when they predicted fewer seats for the BJP in 2019. How did the party manage to do what then seemed impossible?

BY: As I have written in the book, 2014-19 was a phase of expansion for the BJP. Not only did we increase our cadre base, but also we became stronger in states where we had an inconsequential presence. For instance, in Maharashtra, where we were a junior partner in the alliance, we became the largest party; in Haryana, where we had hardly any presence, we formed our own government; in Jharkhand, Assam, Tripura, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh, we formed BJP governments.

We analyse in the book how Amit Shah had singled out 120 seats where the BJP had never won in the past; we won 51 such seats in 2019. We not just won high-profile seats like Amethi, where we had never won, but also made significant inroads in states like West Bengal, Odisha and Telangana where we had negligible presence. So, in 2019 we curbed our losses and made newer, bigger gains. When we complimented the party’s expansion both cadre-wise as well as state-wise, with the performance of the Central government since 2014 and the charisma of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, it was expected that we would exceed our 2014 performance. And we did exactly that in 2019.

Image courtesy Amazon.in

Critics say that after 2019, the BJP has expanded the most, now it can only shrink. What’s your take?

BY: I think this is the language of political opponents and not political observers. Political opponents will say such things; we should not give much credence to what they say. The BJP will do well because it is the only party to which new India can relate — a party that is non-dynastic in nature, which works for all and sundry, pursues democratic values and has adopted a good governance model.

We have seen the BJP doing well in the recent Assembly elections, especially in Uttar Pradesh. You talk in detail in the book about how the party under Amit Shah pulled up an incredible show in UP in 2014, 2017 and 2019. How did BJP manage this feat in a complex state like Uttar Pradesh?

BY: There are several reasons for the BJP’s success. For instance, the BJP is not a person-centric party, unlike most parties in the Opposition. In our party, there is no space and scope for a leader’s personal aspiration and ambition. But that was not the case with other parties that had ruled the state in the past. No wonder, the issue of governance in UP got side-tracked.

In the last five years, we worked on a mission mode to improve law and order in the state; we provided equitable representation to the marginalised people; and, development again became the buzzword under the Yogi Adityanath rule. The BJP brought these three issues to the centre stage, and it helped the party create history in Uttar Pradesh.

Ila ji, the BJP governments are said to be more successful in the implementation of welfare policies like Ujjwala, job scheme, Jan Dhan, etc. What’s your take on this? Do you think such schemes have helped change the political narrative?

IP: I think the BJP, right from its inception, has pursued the objective of reaching out to the poorest and raising the living standards of the masses. The Modi dispensation, for instance, has worked in a coordinated manner to ensure that the poor receive the benefits due to them — we see this big focus right from 2014. Jan Dhan accounts were created so that money could be directly transferred to the beneficiaries, instead of 85 per cent of it leaking out. Then schemes like housing for all, clean cooking through LPG, toilets helped change the narrative of development and governance in the country.

There has been a lot of criticism of the Modi government on its handling of the economy? As a leading economist, how do you see that?

IP: I think every responsible government has to strike a balance between growth and redistribution. In the UPA-I we saw so many social schemes being implemented and when we thought that during the second term we would finally see some growth-related initiatives, the government was hit by policy paralysis. Since 2014, what I am seeing is that welfare schemes are being followed by a series of economic reforms such as privatisation, improving productivity through various mechanisms, and improvement in labour codes. I believe that despite the pandemic, if these reforms go through, then growth will automatically pick up in the Indian economy.

What’s your take on GST? Do you think it was not implemented well?

IP: We have to understand that implementing GST was a challenging task. In fact, many nay-sayers cautioned the BJP from adopting the GST regime, saying the government that had done so could never come back to power. For me, I think GST is a work in progress.

Economist Ila Patnaik. PTI

Bhupender ji, please tell us about the BJP’s evolution from being a party of two MPs to that of 303 MPs. What differentiates Modi’s BJP from that of Advani and Vajpayee?

BY: The party remains the same. There is no fundamental change here when it comes to its ethics and ideology. But as the party evolves, it raises a new leadership every 15 years or so. The BJP has retained its core ideology while nurturing a new leadership. The party has also evolved with time, updating its technology and strengthening its cadre and party base. It has ensured that its programmes remain relevant and not out of sync with the masses. After all, we had to make a transition from a sloganeering party in the 1980s, to the ruling party now.

If we look at the performance of the Modi government, we realise it has worked hard for “Sabka Sath, Sabka Vikas”, and yet it is seen to be a Right-wing majoritarian dispensation. How do you see this? Isn’t it the failure of the party and the government to fight and win the battle of perception?

BY: Deendayal Upadhyaya ji had written in the 1960s that social stigma had gone but political untouchability remained in the country. The attempt to paint us in communal colours is nothing but political untouchability at play. What one needs to see is the track record of the BJP. After coming to power with a clear majority, the Modi government gave the slogan of “Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas and Sabka Vishwas”. The BJP, at the same time, has been categorical enough to say that the party believes in Bharat’s long cultural, civilisational tradition and identity. We call it cultural nationalism and we believe in it unapologetically. One needs to understand that we are today secular because of Bharat’s core civilisational ethics and values. We are a secular nation because it’s a Hindu majority nation. If you don’t believe it, you can look at the fate of the countries that emerged out of India; they are today religion-based nations.

The BJP’s central leadership faced a lot of criticism after the way the party left its Bengal cadre to fend for themselves after the Assembly poll results in that state. Do you think the party could have acted any differently?

BY: This is wrong to say that we left our Bengal cadre at the mercy of TMC goons. We tried to address their plight through democratic means and processes. In fact, it’s the massive failure of the Mamata Banerjee government that allowed violence of this scale after the results. Our Bengal unit is very much active and working incessantly against the misrule of the TMC in the state. Though I don’t make such political statements, I will tell you that in the coming years the BJP will form its government in Bengal.

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