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'Chakravyuha': A Striking Parallel Between Rahul and Mahatma Gandhi in Unpacking the Metaphor

politics
Mahatma Gandhi’s disapproval of Chakravyuha in the context of Bordoli Satyagraha 96 years ago is of crucial significance in appreciating Rahul Gandhi’s incisive analysis of its 21st century version and finding remedies to it.
Rahul Gandhi in parliament on July 1. Photo: Screengrab from video.
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The Chakravyuha, an unassailable military formation, adopted by Dronacharya in the Mahabharat war to encircle Pandavas and inflict defeat on them for the victory of Kauravas was penetrated by young warrior Abhimanyu who entered it without knowing how to get out and was eventually killed inside in violation of all norms governing the warfare during that era.

C. Rajagopalachari, in his book, Mahabharat, published by Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in 1951 used another name for Chakravyuha, Lotus Formation,  in the chapter ‘The Death of Abhimanyu’. The usage of Lotus Formation denotes that Chakravyuha used to take the shape of that full-blown flower.

Gandhi’s rejection of Chakravyuha

That Chakravyuha invoked as a metaphor in many battles of life to denote the invincible method of trapping and eliminating the enemy was described by  Mahatma Gandhi in 1928 as “devious” during the Bardoli Satyagraha of farmers who under the leadership of  Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel refused to pay land revenue, which was increased by 30% by colonial rulers and sought for justice.

He did so in his article ‘Settlement or War’ published in Navajivan on August 5, 1928, in the context of the arrest of Sardar Patel by British authorities and attempts being made by some people for a settlement of the core issues of the Bardoli Satyagraha.

He persuasively wrote that a Satyagrahi “…should never adopt devious ways. He should not have the chakravyuha…, he should have only one golden, straightforward path, which even a child can see”. While forcefully stating that “He has nothing to hide, he can have recourse to no underhand dealings” he then asked, “What then has he to think about?”

Chakravyuha negates justice, Satyagraha embraces it

In his response, Gandhi stated, “If Satyagrahis fully learnt their lesson under the leadership of Shri Vallabhbhai, they would not be scared at all at his arrest or that of other leaders and, while allowing things to take their own course, would remain steadfast in their determination”.

He while welcoming those trying for a settlement cautioned them not to do so out of misplaced pity for Satyagrahis and should if necessary remain prepared for a battle eschewing hatred and ill will. Gandhi then claimed that Satyagrahis while never seeking pity were craving for justice. “If the demands of the Satyagrahis are just,” he remarked, “it is the dharma of the mediators to make a determined effort to see that justice is done to them.”

Mahatma Gandhi Photo: Wikimedia Commons, public domain

It is quite illuminating that Gandhi stated that the method of Chakravyuha would not ensure justice which the straight path of Satyagrahis would achieve. To secure the fulfilment of the just demands of farmers he stressed that Satyagrahis should educate public opinion and make facts fully known.

In other words, Chakravyuha, as stated earlier as Padma Vyuha, Lotus Formation, had layers and layers of soldiers and warriors armed with deadly weapons with the intent to generate fear and violence, and cause death and destruction to those who get trapped in it. Therefore, Gandhi advocated for its rejection and instead urged Satyagrahis to reach out to people and mould their opinions with the facts and substance of their struggle for justice.

In fact, in his aforementioned article, he employed the metaphor of “tabernacles,” a large building or tent used for evangelistic services, and urged those striving for a truce with British rulers not to construct such structures with imagined facts which in his own words, would “get burnt down with a single spark of the match-stick of truth, just like tents made of paper”.

Gandhi’s rejection resonates in Rahul’s 21st century Satyagraha

It is indeed extraordinary that 96 years after Mahatma Gandhi rejected the idea of Chakravyuha from the Mahabharat war in the context of Bardoli Satyagraha involving farmers, Rahul Gandhi as the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha, in his budget speech, charged the Modi regime of encircling the country with a 21st century Chakravyuha trapping, among others, farmers who launched a year-long movement against three farm laws enacted without consulting them and demanded a legally mandated minimum support price for some of their crops.

He also stated that the MSMEs (micro, small and medium enterprises) got strangled by it after the demonetisation of 2016 broke its backbone.  He also said that many other sections of society, including youth facing the worst unemployment crisis in the last 40 years and the Agniveers, youngsters recruited in the army and deprived of permanent employment and other entitlements due to a regular soldier came under the grip of that Chakravyuh.

Rahul very strategically juxtaposed the Padma, the lotus symbol of the BJP with the Padma Vyuha, the other name of Chakravyuha of the Mahabharat war. Then he drew a parallel between the six warriors from the Kaurava side who killed young Abhimanyu in that Vyuha with six personalities such as Prime Minister Modi and home minister Amit Shah, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief Mohan Bhagwat, national security adviser Ajit Doval and the businessmen Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani. He then charged that those six personalities were in charge of the 21st century Chakarvyuha which has caught India in its death-like grip. Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla expunged the last four names.

Four factors controlling 21st century Chakravyuha

Rahul while flagging the role of those personalities in trapping the country in the 21st century Chakravyuha, forcefully referred to four factors such as monopoly capital and two corporate giants possessing significant wealth of the country, the instruments of the state such as the CBI, ED and Income Tax Department and of course the political masters steered the 21st Chakravyuha causing havoc for the people and the entire country.

Mahatma Gandhi’s characterisation of Chakravyuha as devious and rooted in violence and underhand dealings resonated in Rahul’s articulation on its 21st century version which kept farmers in the dark by enacting legislations without involving them, ruined MSMEs by a non-transparent and sudden declaration to demonetise high valued currency notes and of course devastating the future of our youth who became victims of worst levels of employment.

Transparency and involvement of people

Mahatma Gandhi prescribed that Satyagraha as opposed to Chakarvyuha would involve people by making them aware of the facts of the struggle, shaping their opinion proximate and seeking justice.  Rahul’s advocacy that the 21st century Chakravyuha engineered by six personalities would be countered by drawing lessons from Shiv ki Barat, the marriage procession of Lord Shiva, which gives space to people of all hues and allows them to exercise their imagination without any fear or causing scare to others embodies the core meaning of Gandhi’s Satyagraha rooted in involving people by making them aware of the details of the struggle, disseminating information in a transparent manner and putting the idea of justice for all.

In fact, Gandhi’s stress that a Satyagrahi ceaselessly strives for justice is reflected in Rahul’s claim that a caste census rooted in social justice would be an effective counter to the 21st century Chakaravyuha under the exclusive jurisdiction of six personalities.

Therefore, Gandhi’s approach that truth and facts would be critical for sustaining Satyagraha in pursuit of justice is reflected in Rahul’s efforts to employ these two ideals to understand the injustice caused by a caste-ridden society and remedy it by conducting a caste census and representing people of all castes and denominations in the endeavour to reconstruct India with the constitutionally ordained vision.

Mahatma Gandhi’s disapproval of Chakravyuha in the context of Bordoli Satyagraha is of crucial significance in appreciating Rahul Gandhi’s incisive analysis of its 21st century version and finding remedies to it.

S.N. Sahu Served as Officer on Special Duty to President of India K R Narayanan. 

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