The ‘Ram Janmabhoomi Movement’ that involved L.K. Advani’s Ram Rath Yatra, his arrest in Bihar, and the demolition of the Babri Masjid – all in the 1990s – played a pivotal role in altering the psyche of large sections of Hindu society and the subsequent change in India’s political landscape.Prime minister Narendra Modi’s reign from 2014 onwards has witnessed the systematic sidelining of the “original heroes” of that movement – Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Ashok Singhal, Uma Bharti, Praveen Togadia, Vinay Katiyar et al. Yet the Modi-Amit Shah duo has made enormous political capital out of the Hindu-Muslim divide, the seeds of which were sown in the 1990s.Be it the ruling Sangh Parivar’s growing clout over institutions such as the judiciary, or the investigating agencies that aid the judicial process, its control over public narratives, or otherwise, the construction of the Ram temple at the site where the Babri Masjid once stood, following the Supreme Court’s order, is largely credited to Modi, particularly by sections of Hindu society in the Hindi heartland.And by acting as the jajman at the consecration ceremony of the new Ram temple at Ayodhya ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the Modi emerged as the most potent Hindu Hriday Samrat.Obviously, the alleged embezzlement of chadhawa (offerings) before Lord Ram and chanda (donations) for the temple in cash and jewellery worth crores of rupees has driven observers of politics and religion to fathom its impact on the Hindu society’s faith in Modi and his apparatus, if not in Ram.The questions in the minds of these observers include: If the Ram Janmabhoomi movement created what the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) – the fountainhead of all the Sangh Parivar affiliates, including the BJP – describes as a Hindu navjagaran (renaissance), will the unprecedented heist of Ramdhan (God’s wealth) have no bearing on the minds of Hindus?If invoking Ram’s name created huge political capital for the BJP, will the alleged embezzlement of the chadhawa and chanda for Ram not jolt people’s faith in the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, manned by RSS functionaries – all reportedly picked by the prime minister’s Office and the Union Home Ministry? Grassroots realityThe recent travels of yours truly through the remote hinterlands of Purvanchal – Siwan in Bihar, and Mehrauna and Bhatpar in Deoria district of eastern Uttar Pradesh – brought to the fore a drastic change in socio-economic relationships at the grassroots level.Advani’s first Ram Rath Yatra from Somnath to Ayodhya and his arrest by the Lalu Prasad Yadav government’s police took place in 1990. The Babri Masjid was demolished in 1992. It was still a pre-digital, pre-internet, pre-Android phone and pre-information technology revolution era, in which the pre-market economy and community life largely guided the thinking process of the people, particularly at the grassroots level.Political leaders – Advani, A.B. Vajpayee, Joshi and Uma Bharti – and their speeches were distant phenomena, discussed only when they visited and addressed the people. Welfare measures like allotment of houses to the poor, subsidies during floods, droughts and other disasters, and special financial assistance to the deprived and marginalised sections existed. But the beneficiaries depended heavily on the physical infrastructure of the block and panchayat administration to deliver these benefits.Be it Yadav or Advani or any other political figure, people discussed them at community gatherings – village chaupals, under the shade of old trees in summer and around bonfires in winter – far removed from today’s bombardment of information and rhetoric on mobile phones.Others who attracted and influenced the communities were local folk and ballad singers and village melas (fairs). The villages still had Ramleela actors and singers of Alha-Udal, Birha, Sorathi and Lorikayan to entertain them. The residents who played Ram and Ravana in the Ramleela also extolled the sacrifice of Hussein at Karbala during Muharram, known in these parts as Tazia.The one use of technology that seems to have had an enormous impact on the socio-economic order at the grassroots is linking over 540 million people with the banking system (known as the Jan Dhan Yojana), involving the linking of Aadhaar, bank accounts and mobile phones, and the direct transfer of subsidies – old-age pensions, seasonal subsidies and poll-time bonanzas – to the beneficiaries.The State Bank of India (SBI) and some other rural banks have opened Customer Service Points (CSPs) in almost all villages. Now, these CSPs have emerged as new places where people gather on designated days to withdraw old-age pensions and subsidies.Parallel to the CSPs have come up ubiquitous computer and internet centres issuing KYC (Know Your Customer) documents and submitting online applications for caste, residence and domicile certificates, which have become primary requirements for people in this digital era.It is not that these digital outlets are free from corruption. Similar to the pre-digital era, when block and panchayat officials demanded bribes, these CSPs and computer centres often ask for Rs 200 to Rs 300 for KYC or other certificates. But it is easier for the beneficiaries, who receive their dues directly in their accounts and are notified through the Short Message Service (SMS) on their mobile phones after paying the “bribe”, which is apparently far less than the “free dole” they receive.Facebook and Instagram have witnessed an enormous surge of folk and ballad singers and storytellers, creating an illusion that they continue to flourish at the grassroots. But this writer found few Alha-Udal, Birha and Lorikayan singers in the villages of Purvanchal. Traditional sports and games that once attracted local youth, too, have largely vanished. Movement against corruption?By all accounts, the alleged loot of Ramdhan is perhaps the biggest scam in the history of Hindu, or Sanatan dharma. Will it impact the BJP’s political prospects?“Had you gone to Ayodhya? Did you make offerings?” Replying to this query, Hardan (name changed), a poor farmer of Daraili in Purvanchal, said, “Paap to hua hai” (A sin has been committed). But he was not willing to speak much against Modi, for he was a beneficiary of Modi ka Paiswa (as villagers describe old-age pensions and other subsidies). He appeared to fear that if he spoke against the alleged heist, he might lose the “Modi ka Paiswa” that he was receiving through the bank.In fact, several major scams have been alleged against the BJP government – the Rafale deal, the Pegasus controversy, the Electoral Bonds case, keeping the prime minister’s CARES Fund outside public scrutiny, the alleged acquisition of large tracts of land owned by Madhya Pradesh chief minister Mohan Yadav, and allegations relating to a subsidy of nearly one crore rupees for cucumber cultivation involving a Union minister.But unlike the Bofors scandal, which this writer remembers Vishwanath Pratap Singh turning into a major political issue even at the grassroots, with local communities discussing and interpreting it in their own ways, the present Opposition parties and leaders have been unable to unite and mobilise people against the alleged scams during Modi’s tenure, probably because of the disappearance of the old community life and the control over the narrative in the digital era. Jolt to people’s faithSome experts are hopeful that the alleged embezzlement of chadhawa and chanda in the name of Ram has the potential to disillusion large sections of the people against the ruling political dispensation that controls and manages the temple administration at Ayodhya. Some senior RSS functionaries this writer spoke to also sounded anxious about the political implications of the alleged scam at Ayodhya. The Opposition parties – particularly Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav – in election-bound Uttar Pradesh appear quite alert to the situation.But the people, fearing repression and the withdrawal of the “doles” that have now become the mainstay of their sustenance, remain relatively subdued. Moreover, there are also a fair number of Sangh Parivar supporters in the media who believe they will eventually be able to shape and control the narrative, thereby smothering the current debate around the alleged heist at the Ram temple in Ayodhya in the run-up to the 2027 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.Only time will tell what the eventual political outcome of the alleged scam in the name of Lord Ram – Maryada Purushottam and the greatest icon of ancient Hindu dharma – will be.Nalin Verma is a journalist, author and folklorist.