I am confident my Hindutva face will be an asset when dealing with foreign affairs with other nations.
Prime Minister Narendra Damodardas Modi
From the first organization in the 1951 to the current face of BJP, the party has changed a lot and this transition is not exactly the ‘School Political Science’.
From 1951 when Syama Prasad Mookherjee had just formed the Bhartiya Jana Sangh in collaboration with the Hindu Nationalist Group RSS (RASHTRIYA SWAYAMSEWAK SANGH) to December, 2022 when BJP won a historic win in Gujarat, this party has endured a lot of difficulties to reach the pinnacle of power where it is sitting at the moment. The current face of the ‘world’s largest party’ is not what from where it started.
The party started a while back in 1951 when Syama Prasad Mookherjee, the first Minister of Industry and Supply, resigned from the first Nehru Cabinet on 6th April, 1950 and after consultations from Shri Gowalkar Guruji founded THE BHARTIYA JANA SANGH on the 21st October, 1951 to protect what he called ‘India’s Hindu Identity’ and to counter the ‘Muslim appeasement’ by INC and specifically then Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru .
The RSS gave The Jana Sangh ‘pracharaks’ to get the things going. The party stood in the general elections of the 1952 and won 3 seats, one of them being Shri Mookherjee’s itself. He was a staunch believer in the Integration Of the Jammu And Kashmir in India. He termed Article 370 as the ‘BALKANISATION’ of India, and therefore along with The Hindu Mahasabha and The Ram Rajya Parishad launched a satyagraha on the Removal of the same. He visited Kashmir in the 1953, got arrested on the 11th of May, 1953 and died on the 23rd of June, 1953 while in detention.
It was during his period the slogan, “NAHI CHALENGEY EK DESH MEIN DO VIDHAN, DO PRADHAN AUR DO NISSAN.” was ‘coined’ and was used extensively. The Bhartiya Jana Sangh was the party in which then young names, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and L.K Advani started taking leadership positions. Atal Bihari Vajpayee took the role of the Party President in the 1968 and made more central agendas for the party such as, legislating of the Uniform Civil Code, Banning the Cow Slaughter and abolishing the Article 370.
After the assembly elections of 1967, the party came into a coalition with many parties like The Swatantra Party and formed Government in the Hindi Belt, holding the Political office for the first time.
Then came the Emergency of 1975 in which, the Jana Sangh participated widely in the protest due to which many of their party members were imprisoner. The State of Emergency went on for 2 years after which at last the Emergency was revoked and the country finally went for the General Election, during which the Jana Sangh merged with various parties like Congress (O), Socialist Party and more with the sole motive of removing then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi from power.
As a result The newly formed party namely Janata Party, won a majority in the election and formed the Government with Morarji Desai as their Prime Minister and Atal Bihari Vajpayee as their Minister of External Affairs. This newly formed party had a Very Rocky Life as under the parties rule the Hindu-Muslim riots were at peak and as its said the cherry on top was that the members of the Janata Party were the once who were implicated in the riots.
Eventually this caused displeasure to a lot of members and they demanded the Jana Sangh to cut all its ties from the RSS which the party denied to do and therefore a section broke from the party and formed a new party called the Janata Party (Secular). This led to a minority of Morarji Desai led Government and forced him to resign. In the elections conducted in the 1980, the Janata Party performed poorly with just 31 seats. Shortly after the elections The National Executive Council Of Janata Party banned its members to affiliate itself with The RSS and as a response the members of The Jana Sangh left the party to form a new party called THE BHARTIYA JANATA PARTY (BJP).
As the Historian Ramachandra Guha writes 1980s were marked by Hindu-Muslim riots, this new party under the leadership of Atal Bihari Vajpayee had the same Ideologies like the Jana Sangh but it did moderated the Hindu Nationalist to gain a wider appeal but after the bad performance of the party in 1984, the party turned to a new leader, Shri LK Advani and he was appointed the National President in 1984. Under his leadership the party went back to its Hardline Hindu Nationalism Ideology and became the political voice of the Ram Janambhoomi Movement.
As the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) started the movement to get back the disputed site of the Ram Janambhoomi the party extended its support to the movement. This showed its colours in the 1989 Lok Sabha Elections when the party won 89 seats and played crucial role in the support of The National Front Government of VP Singh. In the September of 1990, LK Advani began a rath Yatra to Ayodhya in support of the Ram Janambhoomi Movement and as described by the historian Ramchandra Guha, the Yatra was “religious, allusive, militant, masculine and Anti-Muslims”.
As the karsevaks died in a firing by the Paramilitary, the VHP urged for’ revenge’ and this resulted in a lot of Hindu-Muslim riot and the BJP withdrew its support from the Government which resulted in a fresh election in which the party’s tally increased to 120 seats. after this increase in the party’s seat the tension Increased drastically in the country and finally on the 6 December, 1992 group of workers of VHP and BJP under unknown circumstances demolished the structure and this spread a widespread riot across the country and several of the leader of the party were arrested including Vajpayee, Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi, but just 4 years later in the election of 1996, the party used this as a plus point and emerged victorious with 161 seats, though the Government only lasted 13 days, as it was unable to retain the majority.
The party again came into power 1998 with the coalition led by BJP called The National Democratic Alliance(NDA) but the happiness was short lived as in the May of 1999, the coalition ruptured again after Jayalalitha of AIADMK withdrew her support. This called for a new election in which again, The NDA without the AIADMK, formed the government with 303 seats and the party getting 183 seats, its highest ever. During this tenure of 1999-2004, the party maintained a strong and aggressive stance on terror and defense as well as neo-liberal economic policies.
Vajpayee called for early elections in 2004 and based the campaign on the slogan “INDIA SHINING”, but contrary to the slogan, the party didn’t shine and faced defeat in the election as Manmohan Singh succeeded Vajpayee as the Prime Minister Of India. However, In 2014 the Party won the election yet again with 282 seat of its own and 336 seats the alliance (NDA). This outright majority was not exactly the ‘LEFT-LIBERAL’ stance but still again in the elections of 2019 BJP yet again crossed the mark alone with 303 seats and NDA as a whole getting 353 seats.
This outright majority of BJP was fully because of the popularity of a new leader that emerged as if to make a dynasty of his own: NARENDRA DAMODARDAS MODI.
