At the national executive held a week ago, the RSS had taken an aggressive line and had passed a resolution that refusal to chant the slogan ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’ was unacceptable and amounted to disrespecting the Constitution. This Monday the organisation’s chief, Mohan Bhagwat said the slogan should not be forced on people. “It has to be voluntary,” he added. He urged the cadre to build themselves in a manner
that ‘we build a Bharat where everyone chants the slogan voluntarily’. The climb down by the RSS is significant and is probably aimed at stemming the flow of anger against the Centre and shift attention back to the development agenda of the BJP. The JNU incident, the rise of Kanhaiya Kumar and the defiance displayed by the student community to the hard line pursued by the Centre and RSS could have prompted Bhagwat to make the statement. It is also significant that the change of heart was made known in Lucknow, UP which goes to the polls in 2017. The state has a large minority population which the BJP does not want to antagonize so early in the game. Electoral politics or not, the statement will hopefully have a calming effect.
