Gun-nesh puja

Everytime I think our leaders couldn't get more vulgar or politically incorrect in their behaviour, they promptly go out and prove me wrong. When I saw a front page picture this morning of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi praying to assault rifles and guns on the occasion of Dussehra, I thought my still sleepy eyes and brain were playing tricks on me. I blinked and took another look. Same picture. I rubbed my eyes and looked yet again. Nothing had changed. There he was, reverentially worshipping a huge display of modern firearms and medieval weapons.

I read up a little bit about this bizarre ritual and was horrified to learn that this is something Modi has been doing for some years in his home to mark Dussehra, a festival that celebrates the triumph of good over evil. Apparently it is an old custom called Shastra Puja, or worship of weapons, that was popular among Rajputs and other warrior classes. That I can understand, because it was a ceremony where these warriors were paying their respects to the tools of their trade. It is something people in many professions do even today, praying to whatever helps them earn their living. Policemen often perform Shastra Puja, but then they use these weapons in the defence of innocents like you and I.

But Modi is the chief minister of a state. He sits in an office, administers, signs papers, works the phones, canvasses votes, shakes hands, poses for photos, pontificates, and rubs people like me the wrong way. I don't agree with a lot of what he believes in - that's okay. This is a democracy after all. But him sitting with folded hands in front of the tools of death - Kalashnikov rifles, guns, cartridges, tridents, swords - just seems WRONG. He is a public figure. Surely he considers how something like this would look?

Modi has a large fan following among hardline Hindus because of his tough posturing on some sensitive religious disputes. But more moderate Hindus who believe we Indians should just try to get along view him with a degree of suspicion, especially after the 2002 religious violence in his state that led to the deaths of many Hindus and thousands of Muslims. There were allegations that the administration turned a blind eye while Hindu mobs went about killing Muslims across Gujarat in retaliation for the burning of a train carrying Hindu pilgrims.

Let me state clearly here that I have nothing against Shastra Puja. It's just that it looks bad when a public figure holding a job that has nothing to do with weapons sits and worships them. Bad PR is what it is. Is Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) too myopic to see how bad this is for its image among millions of liberal middle class Indians that it is so desperately trying to woo?