ing parliamentary support from outside. Calculations over parliamentary major-
ity alone kept the Janata Dal in its relationship with the BJP, and the BJP bided
its time as part of an anti-Congress front without worrying its fellow organiza-
tions in the Sangh Parivar.
The Hindu nationalism of the rest of the Sangh Parivar, which the BJP was
now acknowledging as successful in the mobilization of the Hindu vote, was able
to reinterpret basic socioeconomic concerns amongst a large section of the
population as a cultural issue, wherein lay its success. A small, but influential
urban elite was concerned to increase its wealth and power through access to
the instruments of state, in a way directly opposed by the Left parties (including
the Janata Dal) and indirectly by the promiscuous and erratic populism of
Congress. The Hindu nationalists, by claiming that they would recast the state
as a traditional (if unspecified) Hindu organism, promised these aspirational
elites a dispensation in which they were likely to gain influence commensurate
with their perceived standing in traditional (caste) society. The larger group to
appeal to, however, was the middle-class (and middle-caste) semi-urban groups
caught in the uncertainties of economic modernization – scarce public sector
jobs, a competitive educational market, erosion of agricultural certainties. This
group had a perception of loss of access to economic wherewithal. Hindu
nationalists explained this as being caused by the unfair and threatening dis-
crimination by the state in favor of Muslims – the very people who, by virtue of
history and transnational loyalties, were alleged to be least “deserving” of statal
support. To both these groups, Hindu nationalist offered a Hindu state, in which
natural, organic privileges would come to those who “belonged.”
The crucial political achievement, however, lay not in this targeting, but in
the symbolization of Hindu identity for a Hindu state. Clearly, in order to draw
upon the support of Hindus as Hindus, a definable conception of Hinduism as
the cultural essence of India had to be given; and this, as we will remember, was
the concern of both Savarkar and Golwalkar. The success of Hindu nationalism
in the late 1980s and early 1990s lay in presenting identifiable symbols of such
an essence. The most potent symbol the Hindu deity, Rama, and his supposed
birthplace, Ayodhya, in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.
Ayodhya and the consequences of mobilization
Rama has a long and complex history in Hinduism; but suffice it to say that,
warrior though he is from the beginning, his divinization by the tradition
depends heavily on seeing him as the exemplar of compassion, forgiveness, and
gentleness in the most extreme circumstances of war, conflict, and misfortune.
In contrast, Hindu nationalism selectively reread him as a martial hero, a lop-
sided guardian of cultural honor. They also took the Gandhian idea of a Utopian
“rule of Rama” (ram rajya) as an age of balance, harmony, and peace, and re-
fashioned it as the exemplification of a culturally pristine Hindu nation. Thus
reread, the popular worship of Rama (mostly in north India) could become an
contemporary political hinduism 539