BLUNT BUTCHER
For Indian politicians home is where hope is – hope to remain glued to power, hope to remain relevant in politics, politics of opportunism and politics of deceit.
Like a traditional Indian politician, cricketer-turned-politician-turned television- laughing-buff Navjot Singh Sidhu has added yet another chapter to the book of Aya Ram’s Gaya Ram’s of Indian politics while saying that he had joined back him-in this case Congress-after deserting the BJP. It is different that during his honeymoon in the BJP Navjot Singh had compared the Congress with Kumbhkaran (which remained in the sleeping mode all the time), named Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as Moni Baba, said Rahul Gandhi should go to school to learn politics, taunted by saying Congress was more defamed than Munni Badnam Hui, participated in massive protests against the Congress for 1984 Delhi Sikh riots and described Narendra Modi’s emergence in Indian politics as a spectacular beginning and so on. What changed overnight that made the laughing cricketer buff see all the virtues in the same Congress. He says with a sense of pride that joining Congress is like a home coming for him, as his father had also remained with it as a freedom fighter. But the question arises, where had his sentiment for his father gone all these years of bonhomie with the BJP?
Navjot’s U-turn is the truth of murkier Indian politics, where politicians keep coats of different faces always with them and wear the sides as per situations. Whenever they change sides, they talk about ‘home coming’ or Ghar Wapsi’. Hypocrites as they are, these politicians are either fools or treat the people as fools. How come they think that people believe buffoons like them?
Navjot Singh Sidhu is not the only politician suffering from Ghar Wapsi syndrome. India has lot many of them. So has the State of Jammu and Kashmir, which, in the recent past, has seen politicians like Sheikh Abdul Rehman, , Radhey Shyam, Abdul Gani Kohli, R. S Chib (to name a few) and lately Choudhary Lal Singh. Whenever these opportunist politicians changed parties, like worn-out clothes, they used to rant “Ghar Wapsi”, without knowing where there home actually is.
Choudhary Lal Singh has been a classic case of Ghar Wapsi. Days after mud-slinging against the BJP and its Prime Ministerial face Narendra Modi then, when he switched over from Congress to the BJP after being denied ticket to contest 2014 Lok Sabha elections from Kathua-Doda-Udhampur (wherefrom Ghulam Nabi Azad had unsuccessfully contested), he had abused the Sangh Parivar in a unique way.
Ahead of joining the BJP, he had eulogized the Congress character by saying that “If the Congress has to take even a dog into its fold, it (Congress) will bo by its specie.” He had made this comment over the people from various parties joining the BJP due to charismatic emergence of Narendra Modi on India’s changing political scene in 2014.
Choudhary Sahib, who used all the invectives against Modi then found all the virtues in him after staging Aya Ram Gaya Ram, which paid in terms of paving his way into the Legislative Assembly, as also the Council of Ministry. So for him, the BJP is a real home till the time it rehabilitates him politically and gainfully. If situation changes, he will feel no hesitation in Ghar Wapsi to Congress like Navjot Singh Sidhu did today. But it is a million dollar question whether the Amritsar based Sidhu will be as lucky after coming back to ‘home’ as Choudhary Sahib of Kathua was in 2014.