The Mewa Parable in Political Matters: “Who Deserves To Eat the Mewa?”

 

The Mewa Parable in Political Matters: “Who Deserves To Eat the Mewa?”

Shrikant G. Talageri 

 

On 15 January 2026, the Municipal Corporation elections took place in 29 cities in Maharashtra, including Mumbai. As the results poured in, as was expected, the BJP alliance swept the polls capturing an overwhelming majority of the corporations, including the BMC (Brihanmumbai Metropolitan Corporation) the richest corporation in the whole of Asia.

I had written about these elections a few days earlier. In that article, “The Morals/Ethics of Voting (Or Not Voting) In Elections”, I had written: “So NOTA is really a purely symbolic feature. Whether I will participate in this symbolism or whether I will simply sit at home and refuse to participate in it is the only question before me, which I will decide as per my mood or whim on election day”. In other words, I was going to either not vote at all, or vote NOTA.

However, three days before the election (after seeing the UBT-MNS rally in Shivaji Park) I changed my mind − or mood or whim. I had written earlier on in that very article: “So to my mind the only question (for the coming election) is whether I should simply not step out of the house to cast my vote, or whether I should go and cast my vote for NOTA (although on at least two occasions in the past I have been forced by my conscience to follow the allegedly Muslim tactic of voting for “anyone but the BJP” since I strongly believe that in many ways the BJP is much more dangerous for Hindus, Hinduism and India culture than even the Breaking India Forces).” And ultimately I did follow the allegedly Muslim tactic this time as well: I decided to go and vote for the UBT-MNS candidate standing from my constituency, since I do regard the BJP as being in exactly the same category (in the realm of electoral politics) of being worse than any of the others “somewhat like the “minor” who raped “Nirbhaya” in the famous Delhi gangrape case who inserted a rod into her and pulled out her intestines”. As it turns out, and as I knew would happen, the BJP won here.

In earlier times throughout my life, I used to be hyper-excited over election results, pleased to ecstatic when they fulfilled my wishes, and displeased to miserable when they were opposite to my wishes. But nowadays, although I do want, and wish for, certain results, I find myself personally very little affected by the results, and in fact, knowing beforehand what the results are likely to be, very little surprised by them. The first point is of course that I have learnt to distinguish very clearly between what I want and what I get. I have realized that one need not get what one wants, and need not want what one is likely (or sure) to get. The two are distinct things, neither one of them dependent on the other. I have since long realized that victory in any battle is never correlated to what I want, or to what (in my opinion, if you will have it that way) is right or correct.

What is the one factor which leads to victory in any large scale political battle (which does not necessarily require violence and brute force), whether an electoral one or a civilizational one? One can always want one side to win, and one can very strongly and sincerely believe (rightly or wrongly) that one side is in the right and the other is in the wrong, but one must always recognize the truth that wanting one side to win, or feeling, or even knowing, that one side is in the right (with the other definitely being in the wrong), are not necessarily the factors which lead to victory.

Then (leaving aside questions of right and wrong, as well as questions of what one wants and does not want) who usually wins, and does that winning side (regardless of our wishes and the rightness of the matter) deserve to win? I have realized in the last few years that I have to look at it in the form of a parable, or whatever one may like to call it, treating “victory” as being represented (to choose arbitrarily from various items) by “mewa” (dried fruits and nuts or rich sweets, considered in folk jargon to be a desirable symbol of wealth, luxury and power): “who deserves to eat the mewa?”.

The parable (made up by myself) is as follows: There is a woman who has two sons. One of them (call him A) loves to eat mewa, while the other (call him B) hates to eat mewa. But whenever she gets mewa from anywhere, the mother (for some reason) always refuses to give any mewa to A, and instead compels B to eat all the mewa. Is her attitude right? Who should get, or who deserves to get, the mewa − leaving aside questions of which of the two boys is right/good and which of them is wrong/bad, as well as questions of what she wants and does not want? Clearly her attitude is wrong, and I realized quite some time ago that I was behaving exactly like that mother.

This parable, applied to battles where one side wins and one side loses (if getting to eat the mewa is to be construed as victory in a battle), applies in two cases at least in my perception and my case: the civilizational battle between Hinduism and the Breaking India Forces (and particularly the strongest of the BIFs: Islam), and the electoral battle between the BJP and the non-BJP parties.

In the first case, I want Hinduism to win, and I know fully well that Hinduism is in the right. Likewise, I want the BJP to lose, and I know fully well that the BJP is more absolutely in the wrong than any other party. Yet in both cases, it is the other (than what I want) side which always wins. Islam generally wins against Hinduism and will definitely triumph in the long run, and the BJP generally wins against other parties and will definitely triumph in the long run.

 

The wrong thing in the picture is not who wins, it is my wanting (like the mother in the parable) the other side to win. Because it is Islam which deserves to win the civilizational battle, and it will ultimately win that battle; and it is the BJP which deserves to win the electoral battle, and it will ultimately win that battle.

When I want a certain side to win, and I also know that that side is in the right (or at least that the other side is more in the wrong), why do I say that the other side (which I don’t want to win, and which I also feel is in the wrong and should not win) deserves to win? Because I have realized that the side which deserves to win is not the side which I want to win, or which is in the right, it is the side which wants to win. Just as in the parable, the boy who wants the mewa deserves to be given the mewa and not the boy who does not want it (regardless of what the mother wants and which of the two boys is a “better” person), likewise, in all such battles the side which wants victory deserves to win whether it is desired/right or not.

It does not mean I will side with Islam or with the BJP: I will not. It simply means that I will recognize the fact that Islam/Muslims want to win and Hinduism/Hindus don’t, and that the BJP wants to win and the non-BJP parties don’t.

I have already elaborated on these matters many times in countless articles, without reaching this absolute conclusion. Here I will only give the basic points in short:

 

The most salient points in the case of Hinduism/Hindus vs. Islam/Muslims:

Islam teaches Muslims to strive for victory at every point and to be ruthless and uncompromising in reaching the goal of domination.

And Islamic Muslims want Islam and Islamism to rule over the world and win against everyone else. While the overwhelming majority of non-Islamic Muslims (i.e. non-traditionalistic, non-fundamentalist, modern or even atheistic Muslims) may not exactly believe in or support Islamist views or want to live in a state governed by Islamic laws, but they want Muslims as a people to dominate over others (i.e. non-Muslims) and are fully with the Islamic Muslims in attacking non-Muslims or claiming that non-Muslim entities (Hindus and Jews in particular) oppress Muslims.

On the other hand, Hinduism (at least in its stories and moral preachings, though not in its wisdom teachings or in the message of the Bhagawadgita) teaches Hindus to bow down and capitulate before its sworn enemies and to consider the interests of these enemies before their own interests, to value “saintliness” and “self-sacrifice” even against hostile forces, and to treat victory as ephemeral and non-essential. I have written many articles on this subject and need not mention them again here.

And Hindus want certain parties, institutions, organizations and individuals to win, or achieve victory, or rule. Even among Hindus spouting “Hindutva” slogans, Hindus really don’t care for victory for Hindus/Hinduism: their only concern (overt or covert) is to see their pet political personalities and parties eating the loaves and fishes of power.

 

The most salient points in the case of BJP vs. non-BJP:

The BJP wants to win power, and will do simply anything to win power. I have written so many articles on this that I will not bother to repeat the details here. Neither Hindus or Hinduism in general, nor its own BJP voters in particular, nor its BJP cadres and loyal workers in most particular, matter in the least little bit to the persons who control the levers of power within the party. Like a power-winning steam-roller, the BJP machine moves ruthlessly ahead. throwing all these entities to the dogs whenever required or considered desirable, and even handing power to the others in each of the above categories (i.e. non-Hindus and the Breaking India Forces in general, and the leaders and cadres of other non-BJP parties) when those others join hands with the persons who control the levers of power within the party.

And BJP voters include a large number of voters who admit openly, or show by their words, that they have no interest in or concern for Hindu-related issues and only support the BJP for caste/economic reasons or because it is the winning/ruling/dominant party in India today. And those who claim to be BJP voters because the BJP is a Hindu party will continue voting for the BJP even when the BJP indulges in the most blatantly anti-Hindu activities which would have put the non-BJP parties and even the Breaking India Forces to shame: these voters will continue to insist the BJP is a Hindu party, and that non-BJP parties are anti-Hindu, and will ignore, whitewash, defend, support or even glorify everyt anti-Hindu act of the BJP.

 

[A personal anecdote: when I nominally “joined” the RSS in 1978, a staunch swayamsewak staying just opposite our society told me: “I cannot believe that someone from your Saraswat colony has joined the RSS! All the people in your colony are staunch Congress-supporters!” And it was true: at that time, I supported the Jana-Sangh and the whole rest of my residential colony supported the Congress (except for a few who supported the Communists).

Today the whole rest of my residential colony supports the BJP and I alone am staunchly against it. Ostensible, all of us have changed our stand!

But actually, not one of us has changed our stand. We all follow the same ideal or principle we followed in 1978: I still continue to oppose the most anti-Hindu party (it was the Congress in 1978, it is the BJP today). And the rest of my colony still continue to support the winning/ruling/dominant party in India (it was the Congress in 1978, it is the BJP today).

And the support for the BJP today is not based on any principle. A few days after the recent BMC election results, I passed some residents of my colony sitting in the premises. One lady brightly spoke to me about the BJP’s victory, and when I told her I had voted against the BJP, she gasped and said: “But I thought you were a supporter of Hindutva”. Although I knew it was futile, I pointed out in a few words why the BJP was the most anti-Hindu party today. When she looked at me blankly, I told her: “All of you did not vote for any Hindu interests. You voted for the BJP. And you would have voted for the BJP even if Asaduddin Owaisi were the BJP candidate”. She readily accepted it, and said they would vote for anyone who stood from the BJP. I likewise would have voted for Asaduddin Owaisi if he had been the main non-BJP candidate against the BJP, because, of the two, I know the BJP to be more dangerous for Hindus and Hinduism.]

 

So yes, India will definitely be a Muslim country in 50 years time with a large Christian minority and a smaller Hindu minority. And it will still be ruled by the “BJP”. Because Muslims want, and therefore deserve, to win; and because the BJP wants, and therefore deserves, to win.

All this will not affect or change my actions. But it will guide my expectations and reactions.