The misuse of state broadcaster (Doordarshan) continues

If someone had told me before the general elections of 2014 in India that if BJP (or to say it correctly Mr. Modi) wins this election with an absolute majority, there will be a live telecast of the RSS chief's speech on Doordarshan (or DD, national broadcaster of India), I would have dismissed this statement immediately. But we all witnessed this event just a few days ago. DD telecasted the speech of the RSS chief live, this was the speech that he delivers every year on the occasion of Vijayadashami (Dussehra). To be honest, I was really surprised if not shocked to read this news. It is not that the national broadcaster of the country was misused for the first time, previous governments also misused it on many occasions to propagate their own party agenda but any previous wrongdoings don't legitimize present mistakes. Unfortunately, this has become the trend, if anyone asks any question about the BJP government they point fingers to previous Congress governments who also did the same things. This never-ending blame game has been going on for years between these two major political parties. Both of these parties claim to be different from each other but in many aspects, they look quite indistinguishable from each other. 

Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) is a nongovernmental organization. It claims itself to be a nonpolitical, cultural organization but everyone knows about its political affiliation and pro-Hindu ideology. RSS chief neither holds any constitutional post nor is an elected member of any of the houses (Loksabha or Rajyasabha). So, it was an unprecedented move to allow such an organization to use the air time of a national channel that is entirely funded by taxpayers' money. There is nothing wrong in having pro-Hindu, pro-Muslim, or pro-anything organizations; every religion has the right to form an organization and have its gatherings wherever it wants with proper permissions. Many of them including RSS do a lot of good social work in various areas. But at the same time many of them have a very sectarian ideology that heavily favors particular religions and for a central government to allow any such sectarian organization to use national air time was a big surprise for me. Another question is now where do we draw the line? If RSS can get live coverage why not Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP)? Why not Bajarang Dal? Why not the Muslim Waqf Board? Or any other organization that promotes a sectarian ideology of any particular religion but claims to be a cultural organization? Why only RSS? What is so special about them apart from their proximity to the current ruling political party?

Many NGOs (nongovernmental organizations) do a lot of good work in India. At the same time, many NGOs exist only to make money or to spread some sectarian religious ideology. RSS's political affiliation is very well known, BJP is considered as their political arm and there is no secret that RSS controls many things happening at top levels in BJP. If they only allow this particular event to go live on national television and not other events by similar organizations then it is a blatant misuse of government resources. I was amazed to see spokespersons of the BJP pathetically and shamelessly defending this action during many TV debates. They sounded hypocritical as they didn't have any logical explanation for this action and they had a really tough time defending this decision, but they did it anyway. But one really good thing happened because of this event, the mask that was on the face of the BJP finally fell off. They tried to make people believe that RSS and BJP are two separate units, even though they both share the same ideology they claimed that they are different but now this delusion ended. It is good that now people know whom they are voting for and which ideology is going to dominate. It is always better to have a clear picture.

Any government can use or misuse the resources that are at their disposal, it is entirely their choice. The current government made very clear which direction they want to go and which ideology they want to propagate. But there is a remote possibility that all these things are wrong and this was a decision taken by the DD administration on their own without any government pressure as claimed by BJP. If this is true, then I am waiting for them to allow similar air time to all other cultural organizations. After all, any government body cannot be partial towards one cultural organization and ignore all others, they need to give equal treatment to all of them. Either there should be appeasement for all or appeasement for none. I am willing to wait and watch if other cultural organizations get their share of time on national television or not before reaching any final conclusion. I hope I am wrong in my assumption that RSS was favored because of its ideological closeness with the BJP and I will be very happy if the current government proves me wrong, let's wait and watch.

Thanks for reading and please share your views on this topic.

[Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing]