The rush to appropriate icons Updated: Updated: Political parties are trivialising Vivekananda, Tagore and Bose to win the West Bengal elections Share Article Political parties are trivialising Vivekananda, Tagore and Bose to win the West Bengal elections When mainstream politics becomes recklessly instrumental, nothing is spared; even great idols and cultural symbols are trivialised through a process of appropriation in order to manipulate people’s emotions. In the campaign to the Assembly elections in West Bengal, we have been witnessing the competitive game of demonstrating one’s affinity with the icons of Bengal, such as Swami Vivekananda and Rabindranath Tagore. The Bharatiya Janata Party is at pains to demonstrate that it is not a north Indian party; and even if it loves to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’, it understands what the average Bengali bhadralok regards as his ‘cultural capital’. No wonder the leaders of the party, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah, often express their close ‘attachment’ to Vivekananda, Tagore and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose.