The Polity: BJP Prepares for the Morrow

Unlike any other political entity in the country, the BJP is an arm, a front organisation, and an extension of another organisation, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. In the Eighties there was a fundamental transformation in the mass character of the party: on the heels of the VHP's test runs with emotive symbols the party cashed in to reap a rich harvest of votes. When these proved inadequate to reach power without back-pedalling the core issues, a compromise was arrived at. The issues were deferred but never renounced. They were put on the shelf, ready to be activated when the time was ripe. Such a time had clearly arrived by mid-March 2002 for a variety of reasons.