Why brahmins must support BJP?

In this blog post I am going to try and articulate the need and importance of political leverage and why the brahmin community needs it for its survival and at a later point of time, thriving. It will also be evident that communities without political leverage would be bound to undergo subhuman treatment from other communities and denial of even fundamental justice. I have used the term community more loosely to mean caste, religion and group of people.

Do we need to stick to caste identities?

This is an important question every one in the modern era asks. To elaborate, I have seen many brahmins ask, "why do you cling to caste identities?", "why are you so narrow minded?", "are castes relevant today?", "should we be even giving importance to caste anymore?", "should we not annihilate caste?", "I am a peaceful person that lives his life calmly without affecting anyone. Why should I get involved in politics? Why should I be concerned about caste?", "My friends like me a lot. My residential community likes me a lot. I am like bro to them. What danger can befall me?" etc. All these are great questions in books and in academic spaces, but not in the real world. You are a brahmin from the moment you were born. The governments (especially the dravidian ideology ones) which are supposed to be against the birth based caste system badly want to retain the caste reservations. DMK and DK inspired goons keep cutting sacred threads, tufts of poor brahmins who have never followed discrimination or untouchability in their whole life. DK goons are very much ok with other community people killing SC/ST community men. All they hate is the poor brahmin walking in the streets of Triplicane. The dravidian governments have gone about increasing the quotas for the OBC and non general category. The dravidian governments are the first ones to oppose the quotas for the Economically Weaker Sections of the society. They care the most about caste and care the least about social justice. Even if you wanted to give up your caste identity, DMK/DK won't let you. See how they treated Gyani. No matter how much he exalted Periyar and lived by his teachings, for the dravidian stocks, Gyani was always a Papaan (brahmin). They will not miss to note your brahmin birth. I am all for annihilation of caste. I have been doing it ever since I was impressed by the social justice movements all over India. Caste will not be annihilated unless there is a strong political will. There is no political will to annihilate caste whatsoever. Vote bank politics and caste politics are preventing the caste annihilation from happening. As a result, castes are relevant even today.

So, it is not I who is clinging to caste, but caste is clinging to me through reservations, hate speeches, caste politics, and polarization & isolation from the mainstream population. I am a pragmatist. I am not going to live in a fictitious world and I pretend that caste does not exist and there is a perfect equality. There is caste around me. When you are in a forest, you cannot imagine that you are living in your house. You need to wake up and stay in the reality to save yourself from wild animals.

I understand that politics runs around caste equations in India. The dominant caste of the constituency gets to exert political power and get their interests served in their constituency. I badly want to annihilate caste. I would like to live in a world where everyone is treated equally. Who doesn't ove to be in that world of fair opportunities for all? But the reality is very different from all the hunky dory social justice fair world. To stay relevant, we need to be caste politics aware. I have never and will never ask anyone to follow the medival practices of untouchability, discrimination and so on in the name of preserving the caste sanctity, traditions and practices. I also want to make it clear that brahmins were not the only community that practiced untouchability as it has been projected today. Nor are there any evidence to state that brahmin community started it or created it. Savarkar notes that Mahars (the caste of Ambedkar) practiced untouchability against the castes that are considered lower to them. So, to hold brahmins solely responsible for untouchability is childish and devoid of cognizance of facts on the ground. To sum up, we need to give up discriminatory practices which have no place in our society; at the same time, caste politics is a reality and we need to actively play it to save ourselves and to get the political system do things in our interest. Collective bargaining.

What if we don't have political leverage for our caste?

One question that I have asked myself - won't it be a great idea to do a lots of inter-caste marriages so that there is a better integration in the society? Won't it solve all the problems we have been having? The answer I got was: The society is not ready yet. It will take 3-4 generations for that kind of mingling to happen. If a large number of youngsters attempt this intermingling, families will not be able to handle and life will become too much chaotic. Social changes take their own time to happen.

Summarizing the points I have covered so far: 

(1) Caste equations and politics are here to stay. No amount of broadmindedness of individuals would be sufficient to change the system upside down. We can very well be the broad minded person, but we can't escape reality. Sun doesn't cease to exist jut because I close my eyes. We should still try to be the broad minded person we have all aspired to be while also being pragmatic.

(2) It's wise to take cognizance of the political and social realities. It's also wise to not push social systems beyond what it can tolerate.

I have not still answered what if we don't have leverage in the political system? Let me start... A community can be said to be wise if and only if it has the ability to learn from the history. There are particularly three events in history which I want to draw your attention to.

1) Massacre of Melukote Iyengars by Tipu Sultan.

The “festival of lights” brings with it good vibes, good food and a sense of well-being. Diwali/Deepavali stands for the victory of good over evil and reminds us of how light dispels darkness. But for one community in Karnataka, Deepavali is a dark and unwelcome reminder of their tryst with a tyrant, Tipu Sultan. The Mandyam Iyengar community (a Brahmin sub sect) observe “Naraka Chaturdasi” as a day of mourning. It was on this day more than 2 centuries ago when the “Tiger of Mysore”, massacred close to 800 Mandyam Iyengar men, women and children in cold blood in the town of Melkote. Although the exact year of the massacre is not known, members of the community state that it occurred between 1783-1795.

2) Genocide of Chitpavan Brahmins post Gandhi's assassination.

Not many people would know that a pogrom very similar to the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in Delhi was orchestrated by the Congress after Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination in 1948 in Maharashtra.

Brahmins of Maharashtra were targeted and thousands of them were murdered to avenge the death of Gandhi.

Renowned historian Vikram Sampath told Times Now’s Navika Kumar that several Congress officials and office bearers took part in the carnage.

He further said more than 100 Congress workers were arrested in Nagpur but no cases were registered against them and the entire dark chapter of post-independent India was erased from the pages of history.

3) Genocide and exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from Kashmir.

Government of India records 64,951 displaced Kashmiri families. It is a dubious distinction for the world’s largest democracy to also be the nation whose citizens are refugees within their own country.

The UN Genocide Convention of 1948 defines “genocide” as an act with the intent to destroy an ethnic group, including the killing of its members. In 1995, the National Human Rights Commission headed by the former Chief Justice of India, M. N. Venkatachaliah, held the systemic ethnic cleansing of Kashmiri Pandits akin to genocide.

In all the cases, the moment the communities stopped having political support, that is, some influential and powerful political parties to talk for them, the communities had to undergo massacre and genocide in their own country. We need to be mindful about these historic events that are relevant to us. The silent majority will always be silent. They will be keen in protecting their own lives and their families when targeted massacres like the ones happened to the Chitpavan Brahmins, Melukote Iyengars, and Kashmiri pandits happen. Do you think the KPs would not have had such peace loving silent majority friends? Do you think KPs were not peace loving secular when Islamic terrorists butchered them? Do you think the Chitpavan Brahmins were not peace loving and secular when the congress party goons targeted them? History will always repeat to those who don't learn from it.

So, we need to be mindful of the history. We need to be mindful of the social realities and political realities about caste. We need to courageously deal with it. I am in no way asking you to be a casteist, caste supremacist, inheritor of bad practices of your caste or carrier of those ocial evils to the next generation. At the same time, be wary of your political and social environment. Play accordingly.

Why BJP?

BJP seems to be the party that seems to understand the problems and aspirations of the brahmin community. In the 2019 national elections, its SC/ST/Muslim vote share has also increased significantly which shows that most of the communities think of BJP as their ally. BJP is somehow able to work with all the communities and give schemes which benefits all of them. So, today BJP seems to be a viable party for brahmins. Brahmins like to be in harmony with other communities. 

Today it's the BJP. Tomorrow, if other political parties work in nation's, brahmins' and Hinduism's interest, we'll support that. In politics, there is no permanent ally or adversary. Our interests are our top priority. No community should face misinterpretations, unfair abuses, ridiculing, for all the good practices and beliefs it holds dear. So, in summary, it's not always the BJP. Now BJP it is.