The Modi-Shah duo has clearly outwitted the opposition. But they will not pat themselves on the back; for even a child knows that it is an easy feat to achieve! It’s superfluous to thumb one’s chest on outsmarting the opposition when, for all practical purposes, there is no opposition. Of course, we have many opposition parties. But that doesn’t mean there is an opposition worth the name.

It is quite common for wielders of power to turn stereotypical and for the opposition to be unpredictable. The wielding of power, especially the sort of absolute power that Modi now commands, tends to have a deadening effect on adventurous thinking. Being out of power, on the contrary, is a good tonic for out-of-the-box ideas.

Strangely, it is the other way round at the present time. It is the opposition parties that remain shackled by stereotypes and imaginative flatness. Modi keeps needling them with surprises. Congress and Co. still don’t realize that when parties become predictable in their proneness to be caught unawares they begin to look jaded and geriatric.

When your adversaries are robust, you may need to expose the chinks in their armours. When it is otherwise, it is better to let them expose themselves, which they are sure to do. As Subramanian Swamy styles it, you only need, at best, to “assist the opposition to commit suicide”. Why bestir yourself after judicial murder when mere euthanasia serves the purpose as well?

It is really funny how rattled the Congress, the TMC, the Left and the rest of the rag-tag parties are just because Modi-Shah has thrown a Dalit candidate at them! Here is compelling proof, if indeed proof is required, that these parties have stopped thinking through situations and strategies. Here is why I think so.

What does the BJP’s handpicking a Dalit candidate have to do with its ideological character or political vision?

Let us be clearer on this. If the Left, say, picks me as a candidate for an assembly election, simply because I happen to be in a constituency which is Christian-dominated, does it amount to the party becoming pro-Christian? Absolutely not! It only means that the party is unscrupulous and does not mind stooping to any level to win a seat.

Does the party’s preference for me signal any change in the character of the party towards Christians? Not at all! It is because the character of the party remains the same –say, unscrupulous in its quest for power- that it prefers me over the rest. So, the truth stands bare and naked: it is because the party is un-Christian that it chooses me for being a Christian to fight its battle; for hypocrisy is incompatible with all spiritual traditions, including the Christian.

How different is the Kovind-to-be-President gambit from what is outlined above?

It is stupid to measure the character of a party in terms of astray or calculated gesture aimed at outwitting one’s adversaries. A group, a community, a party must be judged by its character and ideology, and not by a rare token. Who represents the essential genius of the BJP? Ram Nath Kovind or the Dalit-lynching gau rakshaks? If a Dalit is the “face” of the party for the present election, what “face” will it put on in constituencies dominated by non-Dalits? Don’t blame the BJP for fooling you when you are willing and eager to be fooled!

Will the party bother to be in solidarity with Dalits when they are lynched and Dalit aspirations suppressed?

It is surprising that the opposition parties seem brain-dead on an occasion like this. The core responsibility of the opposition is not to resist or disrupt BJP’s stratagems. It is to educate the public and to serve as vigilant custodians of the safety and welfare of the people and the integrity of the country. Frustrating the ruling party, in a healthy democracy, should be only a by-product, and not the main purpose of the opposition.

The Congress will cut a sorry figure by pitting a Dalit candidate against Kovind. It would have been another matter, if that party had projected a Dalit candidate before Modi-Shah came up with their trump card. Perhaps that would have happened, if the Congress really had a heart for Dalits of this country.

Quite characteristically, the Congress dragged its feet so late into the night and handed over the advantage on a platter to Modi. In point of fact, the downfall of the Congress began when it allowed the glitter of gold to blind its eyes for Dalits. Modi is only filling the vacuum, in this respect as in many others, that the Congress and the UPA have created. Any doubt that he is doing an admirable job of it?

The terrible thing is not that Modi-Shah has stolen a march over their adversaries. It is that the latter refuse to wake up and learn. A BJP loyalist reigning from Raisina Hills is not a capricious calamity. It is a natural sequence to all that has transpired since 2014. The Congress in particular should get out of the delusion that it can arrest its political decline or upset Modi’s apple cart by competing in tokenism.

Pretence can be fought only with sincerity; falsehood only with truth. A make-believe cannot be countered by a different version of the same make-believe. The Dalits of this country will turn or return to Congress when there is a credible change of heart and political culture in that party. There is, as yet, no evidence to that effect.

Rather than muddy the waters with a futilely confrontationist exercise, the Congress should joyfully endorse Kovind as the next President of the Indian Republic, not because he is a Dalit but because he is an RSS loyalist and because the BJP has numbers on its side.

It should not, directly or indirectly, lend credence to the myth that BJP has become a refuge for the Dalits of India just because Kovind is picked, as Swamy says, an unfailing friend to the PM.

Telling the truth is the first step towards clearing the muck the UPA has stuck on the face of the country. Until this reality is reckoned and credibly managed, the party will go on kicking against thorns and opening up more and more wounds for bleeding itself to death. As Swamy says, the BJP will be happy to assist in this euthanasia.