The Rise of A Yogi!!

With Yogi Adithyanath we have another great leader coming up from the ground to contend for PM of our country after Modi’s era. They are proving there is no dearth of leadership based on Ideology. These are not coming from the Dynasty. But they are coming purely based on the ideology that has held India together since many millennia. And that ideology is of selflessly servicing the society. That ideology is that of helping the downtrodden and ready to become a King from an Ascetic to clean the system. That ideology is to stand up against corruption, lawlessness. It takes a lot of courage to stand up against the lawlessness & cleanse it. You have to take it head on and face the consequences.

Yogi is charged as having his own small army and running a parallel system. How can he bring back law enforcement according to the constitution?

He has built a group of selflessly serving youth organization called Hindu Yuva Vahini. He does support & works for VHP. He is calling for joining hands across all religions and caste to build an iconic temple for Sri Ram in its original place where it was destroyed by the marauders 5 centuries back.

He & his group do respect the Law of the Land. But the Police, the Law enforcement agencies do not have independence & strength in implementing the law & order. They are weakened by the goondas running the Jungle Raj in UP till now. The goondas run their own business of extortion, abduction, threat and terror. When normal hard working people are under threat, and police are reduced inefficient, there is not law & order.

The volunteers with good intention serve the tribals, labourers, and downtrodden people. They set up healthcare units. They help in getting government schemes, ration card to these people. They help in getting children education through government system. These enable and empower the downtrodden. They become empowered & raise questions and rights against the extortionists & goondas who contract these labourers to high profile industrialists, large farmer, estate owners. This creates clashes and police reduce to be spectators as they are under threat of suspension from the powerful people running the politics of the area. These clashes are reported by outsiders as goonda wars. But the stakeholders are the normal people who know who is in support of them. Democracy gives them an opportunity to voice their support silently and through secret ballot.

So through the good service works and taking head on violently when and where required on to the law breakers, Yogi has emerged the people choice over the years. Now with the peoples stupendous mandate and the state machinery at his hands, it is a double edged sword. He has to deliver. And he has a huge state machinery to turn around to service the people. It is chance. But it is a very big responsibility. Peoples expectations are stupendously high.

What guarantee he will reinstate law & order? Will he give freedom to Police to act by the books of Law?

This is a hypothetical question. Answer lies in the ideology through which he has come elected. It is based on Hindutva Ideology. Hinduism says: “Sarve Janah Sukhino Bhavanthu”; “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam”. Now as an election slogan they have adopted is the same “Sabka Saath; Sabka Vikas”.

But this is basically answered looking back on our history. In the Mughal’s period, the law keepers perpetrated atrocities targeting the Hindus. They all went to their Guru – Guru Arjan Singh the 7^th Guru of the Sikh order. He took up the lawful route to raise the question of atrocities committed by the armies on the normal citizens. But the law keeper Jahangir promptly followed Islamic ideology to behead him.

Next the same kind of atrocities continued. When the Kashimiri Pandits were given ultimatum to convert to Islam by Aurangzeb, they approached their Guru – Guru Tegh Bahadur. He took up their cause to take up legal fight with the Mughal Emperor. True to his religious diktat, he promptly jailed him and later beheaded him.

This meaningless legal route and getting beheaded was not really helping the normal faithful people of the country who looked up to their Guru for some peace. So Guru Gobind Singh the 10^th Sikh Guru started a Khalsa movement. He called for selfless sacrificing group of volunteers to form the army. And this army fought for the political dominance. Thus a saint became a political head of the people. A saint picked up sword for restoring peace. He gained independence of many areas seceding from the Mughal Empire. And in his areas, based on the ideology of equality to all, he maintained peace and prosperity to all including the Muslims. When he restored peace, the same officers, takedars, killedars, who were running the administration of the country in local areas continued. But, now with much more confidence in the law enforcement due to independence given to them to follow the written principles. When principles run the country, the whims and fancies of individuals do not confuse and change course of the country. It will follow predictable principles in letter and spirit.

Same is the case with the Raise of Shivaji. He rebelled against the lawlessness under the Bahmani Sultans. He appealed to the Mughal Aurangazeb to reconcile. But he promptly put him in jail. Shivaji made a miraculous escape and installed himself as the Chatrapati. Under his rule, there was benevolence. The normal people wished his era to continue for long. The peace returned. Law was implemented in letter and spirit with independence of interference by the powerful.

These people were principled. Their principles were strongly hinged on Rama and Krishna’s Ideology. Rama and Krishna themselves lived this ideology of fighting demons for protecting the rights of the common man. And in our India, this will keep repeating. The bad is always there in the society and rises often. The bad people are there in Hindus, Muslims or any other sect. When the bad rises slowly, the good becomes weak and silent. But soon, the good will emerge again and rise against the bad and re-establish. This is India. All our Heroes are keepers of Good. Good means selfless service to the humanity. And all our stories end with Jaya. Vijaya of Good over Evil.

This is not the case of just one leader/party overthrowing another. In the examples of Mamata Bannerjee overthrowing CPM rule; or in Kerala one time Left comes to power, another time UDF comes to power; similarly in Karnataka one time BJP or JD and one time Cong comes to power; But the common man is still getting exploited. In these examples, the ideology is not based on giving freedom & rights to the common man. But it was about just yanking power for self. 

For example in West Bengal, with the CPM overthrow by Mamata everyone expected a cleaner governance. But the common man who was shaved off his earnings by hafta, goondaism, extortion etc., still faces the same. He has not got independence to do business and keep his earnings as per law. Because the power struggle was not based on ideology of transferring power to the common man. But it was just yanking power for self. 

In Yogi's case, it is similar to the Ideological wars of Guru Gobind Singh, Shivaji, Rama & Krishna. The power struggle is not for self but to give the power to the common people to lead normal life and remove threats from the bad elements. The bad elements to be under threat by the state Police who will be given independence to implement law by the books independent of nepotism. 

Is Violence necessary to overthrow an authoritarian rule? How then Gandhiji could win through legal, non-violent, peaceful persistent battle? He never picked up a gun.

It is the British narrative. Their propaganda mechanism is emphatic almost flawless. People even today think British rule was benevolent and argue and write about it. Even today, British believe they uplifted the Indians. Many Indians think the same. Their propaganda is such strong that it may seem impossible for us to master and defeat them in that.

British atrocities are unparalleled. Shashi Tharoor in his recent books & hugely popular talks going viral in social media, writes they were as bad if not worse than the Germans in killing people except they don’t burn them and keep their records and then claim it. British are polished in killing through policies & not keeping a count of it.

The protests against their misrule was raising. They handled the protesters with iron hand. The likes of Tilak was jailed for long in distant Mandalay; Subhash Bose was jailed in Mandalay in Burma for long term; He was later house arrested; He finally escaped out of the country in disguise; Veer Savarkar was chained and put in distant Andaman in a dungeon.

But to the world British claimed their rule was democratic. They needed Congress to represent people. They listened to people through Congress. Gandhiji was a perfect leader for them. He was a mass leader. He connected well with people of all class and caste. People thronged to him because he could connect well with them. He talked people’s ground level problems like untouchability, illiteracy, water, employment in villages through khadi gramodyog etc., He created a mass movement, mass appeal; He was a true leader of the masses.

At the same time he was not hard on British. He launched Non-Cooperation movement in 1930. There was a minor clash in a village called Chauri Chaura in UP. British chided him, why he is turning violent? Does he have any control over the crowd? He immediately called off the nation wide non-cooperation movement. So in future, whenever Gandhiji was jailed for any reason by the courts, British authority released him on pretext of health or any other silly reason, in less than an year to come to mingle with the masses. Their propaganda was to respect Democracy and respect Gandhiji.

Then the whole world plunged into the WWII. Gandhiji opposed India to join. But nevertheless British pulled India into it. Nethaji Subhash used this opportunity, took the reins of INA and stormed towards British India with Japan’s assistance to free India from British. This rattled the Congress who was considering a safe option of taking over the India’s reins after British or continuing under them. So Gandhiji called for Quit India. Till now, Gandhiji being non-violent calling for non-cooperation, suddenly turned violent calling Quit India. He had written in Hind-Swaraj in 1900s and I agree with him that British need not quit. They are welcome to assimilate as any others from all the world who have assimilated in India as long as they live peacefully and democratically. But now in 1942, he suddenly took a U turn on non-violence. During Quit India movement, many violent outbursts happened across the country. Several Police stations, rail stations, post offices were burnt in outburst. It did not move Gandhiji. It reminded British of the 1857 horrors of the War of Independence. They are smart. They said we’ll give independence. But how? They raked up the issue of Muslims demand for a separate state. They told Gandhiji that Jinnah is adamant. They released Gandhiji from jail to go and negotiate with Jinnah. Gandhiji’s mission diverted. British mission accomplished. (Referenced from ‘India Wins Freedom’ by Maulana Abul Kalam Azad)

So it is a British narrative, that India got Independence through Non-Violence. It is questionable. That narrative is well carried forward by the Congress. It is a good narrative for primary education & it should stay there. But for adults & college education, it should evolve more deeply questioning.

Gandhiji stood for Non-Violence. But Non-Violence alone did not bring Independence. So he also ultimately authorized violence for Independence through a strong slogan – Do or Die.

Gandhiji definitely deserves to be the Father of our Nation purely for bringing about the mass movement and awareness about Independence movement amongst the masses & eradicating social evils. He is also an icon of Non-Violence. We need such icon for a peace loving nation like ours. But we should not forget so many other leaders who architected the Independence movement for us. 

This article is not an endorsement of violence. Violence is wrong. But when the ruler rules by violence perpetrated on the normal hard working people, only Non-Violence will not help to restore peace. Somebody needs to fight 'Do or Die'. The good people should openly support if possible or at least secretly support through secret ballot.