The Gita doesn’t need government boost

The Bhagavad Gita is undoubtedly one of the great texts of the world, and one of its most ancient. It has high religious significance for some, and also great secular meaning for those who read it for the sheer beauty of its words, and the valuable lessons it offers for negotiating the complexities of life. It came out of a striking civilisation. The book has been read with care at universities around the world, not only at mutts and scriptural seminaries. For all these reasons it is conspicuously wrong-headed, even ridiculous, to seek to convert the mighty Gita to political uses. The reason is that such attempts will be laughed out of court by ordinary people who quote chapter and verse from it in their daily lives and interactions. The Gita is an exalted body of work. It has no need for official exaltation by this government or any other.

When external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj prescribed on Sunday in the company of sundry notables of the Sangh Parivar that the Gita should be made India’s “Rashtriya Granth”, or national book, she was in no way enhancing the magnificence of the famous text, for that is hardly possible. What is more likely is that by making a proposal whose intent appears nothing more than low politics, she will draw the ire of even those of her party’s opponents who might otherwise have nothing but praise for the Gita.

In any case, how is any book to be made a so-called national book — by passing an order, notifying it in the gazette, making its study compulsory for citizens? All these methods will elicit ridicule. Indeed, it is hard to think of any famous book in the world, such as the ancient Iliad, or even great religious texts like the Bible and the Quran, that are national books anywhere. As someone said at a level most mundane, but not wrong for that reason, that it was enough in a deeply diverse democracy that its Constitution — for ideological and political purposes — be deemed the country’s basic law, document or text. Certainly the privileging of a scriptural text would divide society. Ms Swaraj is originally a socialist who has found herself in saffron company for decades. Since she is now trying to get official recognition for a revered and admired text, many might think she is doing so in order to curry even more favour with the RSS than she has already. Since the formation of the Narendra Modi government, Ms Swaraj, who is naturally ebullient, articulate and reasonably moderate in many of her attitudes, seems to have found herself disregarded and in some degree of  isolation. This may just explain her strange espousal.