Opinion of the Bharatiya Janata Party

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Hmmm, the BJP.  Nukes for India, national and state politicians at the forefront of campaigns to destroy mosques and attack Muslim civilians, ever-ramping up hostilities in Kashmir, ect., ect... Nope, shouldn't be in power. 

Why shouldn't India have nukes?

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Also, some on this thread seem to not understand the difference between the BJP and groups such as the VHP, SS or the RSS to a certain extent. No surprise that BRTD is leading that group. I bet he still thinks attacks on missionaries are the worst thing the BJP has done (done by tribal groups I should add, not the "hindu" majority).

Are there problems with the BJP? Of course. But they are better than the socialist Sonia Gandhi and her spoiled and incompetent man child. What qualifications does she have to run a country? She married Rajiv Gandhi? Would I pick a Manmohan Singh led government that did what he said over the BJP? Of course I would, but that is not what we got after 2009 and obviously we wouldn't get that with a Rahul Gandhi government.

So what are the alternatives? There are people like Mamata who are insane, people like Jayalalitha who probably looks in the mirror every 5 seconds and the various caste parties whose whole campaign centers on how to loot the treasury for their particular caste.

So BRTD, if you thought about this for longer than, say, 5 seconds, you would maybe, just maybe realize that not all BJP voters are like Golden Dawn voters. If you are capable of any complex thought, that is.

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It takes a truly remarkable group of people to look at Pakistan and wish that India were like that. Fortunately we have the BJP to fill that void.

Xahar, if you really think that the BJP can win an election and hold on to power after turning the country into Pakistan, you really shouldn't considered an "expert" on Indian politics. Do you think Gujarat and Pakistan are equivalent now after more than 12 years of Modi?

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It takes a truly remarkable group of people to look at Pakistan and wish that India were like that. Fortunately we have the BJP to fill that void.

Xahar, if you really think that the BJP can win an election and hold on to power after turning the country into Pakistan, you really shouldn't considered an "expert" on Indian politics. Do you think Gujarat and Pakistan are equivalent now after more than 12 years of Modi?

Modi hasn't held power at the Centre for those twelve years, so the comparison is facile. The pogroms that he sponsored were certainly on par with anything that Pakistanis have done. Would you deny that?

The Hindutva movement looks to Pakistan as its model for intercommunal relations. That much is obvious from the speed with which they yell that the Pakistanis are lynching Negroes any time the subject is broached.

Yes, what happened in Gujarat is on par with anything that has happened in Pakistan BUT with a few caveats.

First of all, there is no evidence that Modi sponsored the riots. I will defer to the Supreme Court of India on this. You may not, but the Supreme Court is probably one of the few institutions in India with any integrity. India is more or less a lawless land where the people are hard to control.

Second of all, Modi has been in power for more than 12 years after those riots and there has not been any large scale violence after that and the proportion of Gujarat that is muslim is still the same as it was as before the violence. Pakistan on the other hand has lived up to it's name and has made itself into a land for the "pure". I don't care what the hopes and dreams of the VHP are.They may be envious of the Pakistan model, or even the "moderate" Bangladesh model. This thread is about the BJP.

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The BJP does not hate Christians. Go ask any Christian who actually lives in India, as opposed to the Bushie types. Will you not stop spewing nonsense?

Do you realize that the parties of the heavily Christian northeastern states tend to support the BJP? They wouldn't do that if the BJP hated all Christians.

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While it might be more of a state level thing, the BJP has proposed and passed laws in some states to make it illegal to convert to Christianity (and other religions too granted but it's obvious who it's targeted at.)

And the BJP and its allies threw a fit over the possibility of Sonia Gandhi being PM, and clearly not just because she was from the other party.

Yeah, that has to be it! Goddamn, is India a horrible place or what?

Slumdog Millionaire is actually depressingly pretty accurate from what I've been told.

Is one of those states Orissa (Odisha) by any chance? I am telling you man, it is a tribal vote thing. They don't like it when anyone (but it's basically just christians doing it) comes in and tries to destroy their traditions. And usually it is done in a very insensitive way by bribing people with food and goodies and their gods and traditions are trashed.

And by tribals, I mean these people. Obviously there are differences among these groups as well. In the northeast, where the people look more like Burmese people, there are some states that are more Christian than the United States. No one minds or cares because that is what those people want. The local parties there tend to support the BJP at the national level because the BJP is more of a "states rights" (except for Kashmir of course) sort of party and those people like autonomy. Another example is the Darjeeling seat in the mountains of north bengal that voted for the BJP in 2009.

The other type of tribals are those who look "Indian" and have many similarities with "Indian" culture but aren't really integrated into the hindu orthodoxy. These groups for the most part are very resistant of outside influence and christian missionaries in particular. This is where there is a political effort to stop conversions because you can buy off this vote bank by promising that.

Also, to understand why Hindus are so opposed to conversions is to understand that Hindus do not convert people. That is why they feel it is unfair if others try to convert them. It can be difficult to understand from an American perspective but by asking people to convert you are asking them to change their main identity, which is problematic, as I am sure you can understand. It would really be akin to asking black people to stop being black. Race is the main form of identity in most of the United States and in India it is religion.

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And the BJP and its allies threw a fit over the possibility of Sonia Gandhi being PM, and clearly not just because she was from the other party.

But is that specifically because she's Christian or more because she's foreign-born and -raised? Because that isn't a reason with which I'd agree, but it's--to an extent--understandable and not just flagrantly bigoted.

There are many good reasons to not want Sonia as PM, the main reason being she is completely not qualified for the position. What has she ever done which makes qualified?

That being said, a lot of the opposition against her is because she is foreign born and raised. I don't really think it is fair to oppose her solely for that reason because it is obvious she cares about India, although that's not a completely bigoted position. There are some within the congress party who raised these same concerns. I hope BRTD wasn't trying to say people are opposed to her because of her religion, because that would just be hilariously wrong.

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I'm aware Hindus don't proselytize. But that's not really too important, going on those grounds to argue that thus conversion from Hinduism is also wrong is basically stating someone born into some identity is locked into that for life and there's nothing they can ever do to leave that, I should point out most of the earliest Christian converts in India were of the lowest castes...and hey what I said above actually sounds like the caste system itself, and that's simply such a massive affront to freedom I can't tolerate it under any circumstances or in any culture. Now I know some people might say something like "It's one thing if some individual person opts to convert out of their own entire free will and choice but that doesn't excuse the type of aggressive proselytization some of these missionaries do." That is a valid distinction to make. However the BJP for the most part does not.

I would argue that the BJP does make that distinction. I see no evidence suggesting otherwise. Conversion is not banned in any state, but measures to stop aggressive prostelyzing.

And I knew you would say that black people can't stop being black but from another perspective couldn't you say that is the same thing for religion too? You were born into a Hindu family or a Muslim family. You can't change that either. And race is pretty much a social construct as well, like religion.