Opposition leaders are absolutely right. How can anyone ask anyone’s caste identity in this day and age? In the 21st century, as the world races ahead, to identify a person on the basis of one’s caste is reprehensible and symptomatic of a regressive mindset. But then the luminaries protesting a ruling party MP’s outburst against the Leader of the Opposition in Parliament are forgetting that most of them are guilty of the same practice of asking people’s caste—in fact, basing their entire politics on people’s caste. The Leader of Opposition may play the victim card on this, but in reality, not a day goes by without him mentioning the “C” word, that includes asking people’s caste. Since Mr Rahul Gandhi has forgotten, it is time to remind him of the incident during his Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra, when during a rally in Rae Bareli, his supporters beat up a television cameraman belonging to this newspaper’s sister channel, India News, after the Congress leader tauntingly asked his name/caste and the company owner’s name/caste. Rahul Gandhi was trying to prove the point that OBCs and Dalits were discriminated against in the workplace. It’s a different matter that the reporter concerned was an OBC and Mr Gandhi’s narrative-spinning fell flat right at the spot. But then who can stop Rahul Gandhi when he has decided that caste deprivation is the plank that will give him electoral dividends?
As we saw in the general elections, all the efforts of the Opposition had only one focus—dividing the voters along caste lines. Rahul Gandhi’s sole focus was on winning OBC and Dalit votes, first by telling them that they were being deliberately deprived of their rights, and then by fear-mongering by spreading the canard that the BJP would end reservations if it returned to power. It’s a canard because no political party in present day India would commit the political hara-kiri of removing caste-based reservation. However, Congress’ message was effective enough to have some resonance in Uttar Pradesh in particular, with chunks of BJP’s Dalit votes shifting away from the party. Of course, Akhilesh Yadav’s caste engineering of bringing together Pichhde, Dalit and Alpsankhyak (Backward, Dalit and minorities) voters too played a big part in the SP-Congress success in UP. Hence, it can be said with certainty that the Opposition’s effort was to revert to identity politics from what had come to be known as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s development politics. Of course there is another view that making the elections all about caste was the Congress’ way of fighting BJP’s efforts to unite Hindus on the plank of religion. And now that Rahul Gandhi believes his caste rhetoric has given his party the right kind of push, it seems the topic is not going away anytime soon. In fact, the ripples he created by saying that the pre-Budget halwa ceremony did not have any backwards or Dalits are yet to die down. In this context, let’s take a look at another political party in the Opposition camp, the DMK, which too says that issues of caste should not be raised in public. Given that DMK’s whole history is premised on demonizing a particular upper caste, to say that it’s not right to speak of caste in public, amounts to rank hypocrisy.
Regional parties make caste identity their political plank because their existence depends on identity-based voting blocs—not that this justifies their action; it doesn’t. It’s the same old caste narrative that these smaller parties play on for decades. But that shouldn’t be the case with national parties like the BJP and the Congress. Caste politics is divisive—it emphasises on the fault lines that exist in society and amplifies the divisions. To constantly talk of caste deprivation is to fan the flames of underlying social divisions. Every caste group has some unhappiness or the other. But to say that nothing has been done for these groups in the last 75 years, a majority of which was ruled by the Congress, is to make a mockery of facts. Calling certain caste groups deprived, automatically paints the less-deprived groups as villains and oppressors. Caste-based identities may lead to social fragmentation, often resulting in conflicts and violence, as groups develop animosities towards each other based on historical grievances. It’s a formula for dividing India and must not be pursued for short-term political gains by political parties, irrespective of their hues.