Sushma and the politics of dance

The BJP is generally seen as a stuck-up party when it comes to song and dance, but the Congress, it now appears, is going all out to appropriate that distinction.
Sushma Swaraj's dance at Rajghat has got the Congress upset and fuming. Its loquacious general secretary Digvijay Singh has described the BJP as "a party of dancers", as though dancing were somehow more shameful than hoarding black money. The Gujarat Congress chief denounced her dancing as a 'cheap exhibition'. A party that takes pride in its writers (Jawaharlal Nehru, P V Narasimha Rao, Veerappa Moily, Shashi Tharoor) is demanding the resignation of an opposition leader for dancing.
Many in cyberspace have also taken digs at Sushma's impromptu performance. Sushma has hit back, saying the Net is filled with videos of Congress leaders Indira Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi dancing. For those who came in late: On Monday, Sushma danced at the Mahatma Gandhi memorial, where her party was protesting the brutal midnight swoop on Baba Ramdev and other anti-corruption campaigners.
Two years ago, a mob attacked a pub in Mangalore, reportedly under the benign gaze of the ruling BJP, and beat up girls and boys hanging out there. You may also remember that the flamboyant BJP leader Pramod Mahajan had been particularly nasty to artistes. In his eagerness to praise Dhirubhai Ambani, he had said the industrialist, and not some 'naachnewale and gaanewaale', ought to have been awarded the Bharat Ratna.
It's another matter that the BJP minister's son Rahul Mahajan got busted for drug use, wife-beating, and other crimes you wouldn't associate with a 'patriotic' party like the BJP. Rahul has also participated in reality shows that many consider scandalous, including one in which he has to showcase his dancing skills. But that's another story. Groups supported by the Sangh Parivar had forced the celebrated painter M F Husain to go into exile. (He died this morning in London). The BJP, as we can see, isn't really a party famous for its patronage of the arts.
Ironically, the two parties have switched their positions now. A self-righteous Congress is targeting Sushma for doing a jig with party workers, while she is defending her right to dance. After all, she argues, she was dancing to a patriotic song, and not to Munni badnaam hui, as some mischievous Congress sympathisers suggest. But, says the Congress, was it appropriate to dance at Mahatma Gandhi's samadhi?
What is she guilty of? Dancing? Dancing at Mahatma Gandhi's samadhi? Or dancing at Mahatma Gandhi's samadhi in support of Baba Ramdev? Convinced that it has found a weak point, the Congress is battering the BJP, without for a moment pausing to think that there are many in its fold who love the good things in life, including dancing. In India, dancing isn't taboo (even saints like Purandaradasa and deities like Shiva are portrayed in dancing postures), and to go on and on about someone who danced spontaneously may actually boomerang on the Congress. Was it insensitive to dance at Gandhiji's memorial? Maybe. But perhaps Gandhiji would have approved of a protest where people danced rather than threw shoes.
Some dance to remember, some dance to forget, sang the rock band Eagles in their hit number Hotel California. Sushma might offer a variation on it: Some dance to celebrate, some dance to protest.