deccanchronicle | Why did Bharatiya Janata Party’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra
Modi offer no comment on the Supreme Court order making homosexual love
a criminal activity again?
Modi is usually quick to climb into an
issue and offer his opinion. The issue was, and remains, one of the
most debated matters on television. News-papers have been scathing in
their editorial criticism of the judgment. The Congress’ leaders spoke
out unequivocally in favour of human rights, but there was no word from
Modi on this subject.
This is not to say that he has been silent
generally, because he hasn’t. He had a thing or two to say (later proved
to be false) about how Kashmiri law constitutionally discriminates
against its female residents.
He remains pretty active on Twitter
and in the same period as the judgement he tweeted to wish various
people a happy birthday, including Sonia Gandhi, Sharad Pawar, Pranab
Mukherjee and even Rajinikanth. But there was nothing on this important
constitutional issue.
To be fair, there was nothing from the rest
of the BJP for most of the week either. Party chief Rajnath Singh’s
terse statement backing the court on Saturday shows us this is the sort
of issue that the Hindutvawadis find distasteful and would rather stay
away from. But Modi is the man running for the office of Prime Minister.
Why is he silent?
It would have been a good opportunity for him
to have shown his more liberal values without damaging his Hindutva,
anti-Muslim side. He would not have put off any large part of his
constituency if he had said a few words in sympathy to the gay
community. He chose not to. So why not?
The fact is that he does
have an opinion on this, but it runs counter to the media consensus. The
media is liberal and was incensed at the order, saying it was a setback
to individual rights and a clinging on to the code imposed by
colonialists.
Modi is from the old school of morality and doesn’t
like the idea of homosexuals, much less making their activity legal. If
he were absolutely pressed to weigh in on the subject, he would say that
he agreed with the law and the judgement.
But it would have been
politically damaging for him to say this, because the attention of the
media would turn to the only person swimming against the consensus. This
is why he chose to remain silent instead.
This will disappoint
those supporters of Modi who have chosen to vote for him based on his
non-Hindutva credentials. But it must be recognised that for Modi, his politics and his beliefs are something deeply held.
Attempts
to pick and choose some of his aspects and try and imagine him as a new
person will always come to grief. Modi is what he has always said he
is: a worker of the Rashtriya Swa-yamsevak Sangh, whose ideas are
moulded by that body.
