A new urgency is evident in the Sangh Parivar’s decades-long campaign for the creation of a Ram Temple in Ayodhya. That urgency, prima facie, has to do with the fact that the present NDA government headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has very little time left to complete its five year term. But, there could be other issues as well, including a requirement for the new leadership of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad that spearheaded the cause for long to prove that it is serious about the matter. The time to push the case is now also for the reason that it’s at this juncture that the BJP runs governments both at the national level and in Uttar Pradesh, under two able stalwarts of the RSS.
Giving out a feeling to the hard-core Hindutva activists that these governments are not being serious about the main plank of the Sangh Parivar is also to give a chill down their spines – something that Prime Minister Narendra Modi can ill afford in the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls. This is the time the full energy of the Saffron brigade needs be put to best use in the election arena. Instead, if the government as also the Sangh Parivar waited for a court order in the matter – as was the RSS stand till a while ago – it could prolong the matter endlessly. If so, it could give no political dividend to the BJP in the coming general elections. The case could go on and on with this case, as is the way of the judiciary in India.
It must be surmised that the RSS is bent on pushing the case at this juncture for the reason that Prime Minster Modi as also the rest of the BJP leadership could be made to see the benefits it could derive politically if the matter – dear to Hindus across the board – is brushed out of the cupboard and given a new and energetic lease of life. At the same time, enactment of a legislation even now is not easy since the BJP does not have the majority in the Rajya Sabha.
Antagonising the Muslims is, as far as the BJP is concerned, a non-issue. They are bound to vote almost en masse against the saffron party and Modi. There, thus, is “merit” in the contention that this is the time to consolidate the BJP’s Hindu support base.