166 "Presenting" the Past
class, and the urban poor, but simply enlarged its homogenous support
base, namely the upper castes and lower-middle and middle classes for
ideological and political support and allegiance. The failure to acquire a
heterogeneous base resulted in the taming of the party and projecting Atal
Behari Vajpayee as the party's prime ministerial candidate.^57
With no electoral wave in its favor and the absence of a plank of past util-
ity such as Ayodhya,^58 the BJP resorted to parivartan yatras (social change
tours) around the country. Although the party improved its performance
in the 1996 parliamentary elections by bagging 160 seats, it could not
emerge as the dominant party either in the Hindi-Urdu heartland or in
the whole country. The party's emphasis on negativity (anti-Muslim, anti-
reservation, etc.) and the lack of consolidation of the "backward" castes
in the "proud Hindu identity" that is integral to the upper caste groups
could be some of the major reasons for this.^59 In the 1998 general elections,
the BJP won 182 seats out of the 388 that it contested and formed the gov-
ernment in New Delhi with its alliance partners. When the BJP-led coali-
tion government collapsed following the withdrawal of support by the All
India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam from Tamil Nadu, another gen-
eral election was forced on the Indian electorate in 1999. The BJP barely
managed to win the same number of seats it had in the previous Parlia-
ment (182), although it contested this time only in 339 constituencies. In
the 2004 general elections, however, the overconfident BJP that boasted
about a "shining India" under their rule won just 138 seats out of 364 that
it contested, with 37.91 percent of the vote. When all is said and done, as a
rural voter had told a journalist during the 1991 campaign: "Ram bhakti is
one thing, politics another."^60
Although the BJP's jingoism did have some influence in its electoral
performance initially, the party pulled away from its communal agenda
strategically and cunningly. The Indian civil society considered the BJP to
be another political party that could be an alternative to the steadily dete-
riorating Congress party. Given the fact that there is no viable alternative,
Indian voters have reinstalled the ousted arrangement. In a world that
is tormented by state collapse and accompanying ills, the Indian voters
appreciate the need for a functioning government in New Delhi, but are
not confident about any single party or leader. The only recourse for them
then is to vote in a coalition that has not had its chance yet. At the same
time, they have also demonstrated their maturity and shrewdness by dis-
couraging the BJP combine's phony patriotism, nuclear adventurism, and
needless militarism. Whatever the Indian voters' intent may be, we need
to accept their verdict in the true spirit of democracy.
The Gandhian understanding of "the real India," which he correctly
thought was living in the villages, is privileged here because it is the
Indian mass culture that is playing a crucial role in the interface between
national history, mythification, and political socialization. Despite all the