Author: Mahendra Ved

Whatever be the outcome of the US-Taliban peace dialogue, Afghanistan is certain to remain the deadliest conflict zone of the world in 2019

A minor casualty ahead: Screening of Indian films in Kabul cinemas. ‘The End’ does not herald the typical triumph-of-good-over-evil. The do-gooder, now dispensable, can only hope to hum “kabhi alvidaa na kehna.”  

There is nothing filmy about India being cast aside after 18 years of investment in goodwill and $3billion in development of the Afghan people who have no say in the way outsiders are hurtling towards a “peace agreement” to end a long-drawn conflict, whatever that costs.

There is a strong sense of déjà vu. India was close to the Soviets in the 1980s. When they quit Afghanistan and eventually disintegrated, India earned some opprobrium and went ‘friendless’. And the West withdrew triumphantly, leaving behind the mess.

ALSO READ: India Must Keep Its Food In The Door

India is now with the government in Kabul that the West helped create and supported, but is ready to ditch. With differing interests, all players seem keen to help the United States extricate itself. For, President Donald Trump must “get the boys back home” in time for his re-election bid next year.

How can you solve this conflict when its fundamentals are ignored? The players don’t want to await outcome of the Afghan presidential polls scheduled for September 28. They are ready to push the Ashraf Ghani Government towards mortuary.

All those who root for democracy want to sidestep this democratic exercise. How is democracy served when an elected government is given no role in the peace parleys at the behest of one of the participants? Isolated, India opposes it. But none of its concerns cut much ice with any of the players – democrats or otherwise. Even former President Hamid Karzai, an old Delhi-ally, is with the peace dialogue.

Afghanistan is the second-largest recipient of Indian foreign aid over the last five years. Although it launched its ‘soft’ diplomatic drive with free distribution of Lagaan film cassettes, India’s popular transcends Bollywood films. It set up infrastructure, including hospitals, roads and dams, and contributed to building of institutions, training of civil servants and students in Indian universities. New Delhi’s support to Karzai and Ghani insured India’s primary investments and attracted others. Will all this go in vein?

Everyone is suing for peace with Taliban who are calling the shots, literally, holding talks even as they kill civilians, including school children. At their meeting at Doha recently, “all participants agreed” to bring down civilian casualties in the country to “zero” and to ensure the security of schools, hospitals and markets. Afghans would say: Thank You, Taliban, and Thank You, negotiators, for this mercy.

The players’ line-up is impressive – only they are not impressed with India’s role. Trump once asked India, China and others in the region to send troops – in effect, to pull his chestnuts out of fire. Some of his apologists are now blaming India for not taking the offer.  

India gets hyphenated with Pakistan by the way the US plans to withdraw from Afghanistan, leaving Islamabad as the principal policeman and guarantor of peace and stability. This is despite knowing well how Islamabad performed that role earlier.

ALSO READ: US Exit Holds Scary Prospects

Russia was once an India ally and so was Iran. China is now firmly a Pakistan ally. All of them are convinced that the threat from the Islamic State (IS) is greater than Al Qaida or anyone else. British, the original imperialists who failed to rule Kabul from Calcutta (now Kolkata) and New Delhi want to stay relevant. Saudi Arabia and the UAE are bailing out Pakistan from its economic stress as Mr Trump’s proxies.  

Trump will be hugging Imran Khan in Washington next week. Eighteen months back, while still unsure whether to quit or not from Afghanistan, Trump had condemned Pakistan’s “lies and deceit” in fighting terrorism. His rant was about Pakistan not preventing — actually nurturing – Taliban and the Haqqani network that attack American interests in Afghanistan. The Haqqanis are not mentioned — not publicly at least. Presumably both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ Taliban are being engaged and their mentor Pakistan is on the talks table.

Never really out of American calculations, Pakistan enjoys a win-win situation. It has moved away from America’s threatening embrace to China’s calculatedly welcoming one. It is riding piggyback on China that matters, not just with regard to Afghanistan, but globally.

India is clearly isolated but it has itself to blame. It has failed to anticipate that the US would leave Afghanistan someday and for that it would need Pakistan. One is waiting to have a glimpse of its contingency plan. At least, some behind-the-scene contacts with those who are vary of Taliban and their Pakistan sponsorship. 

India has had two priorities in Afghanistan: To prevent Pakistan from setting up a friendly government in Kabul again, like in 1996 with the Taliban of Mullah Omar and, secondly, to avoid the return of jihadi groups that which could strike in India. On both fronts, India is losing ground.

India has been telling its domestic audience and anyone who cares to listen that Pakistan is being ‘isolated’ because of its terror credentials. But today, on Afghanistan at least, Pakistan is a key facilitator. The US, Russia and China meeting last week ‘invited’ Pakistan to discuss the peace moves in Afghanistan. None from Afghanistan, especially the Ghani Government was present – so scared everyone is of Taliban.

Al Qaida was the reason the US invaded Afghanistan. It is passé today. The Islamic State (IS) is the new global specter. That the Qaida chief Aiman Al Zawahiri recently renewed calls to his followers to inflict punitive losses on the Indian authorities in Kashmir and elsewhere should worry only India. And India would naïve if it expects anyone else to help it beyond harsh warnings and heavily-worded resolutions.

Proximity to Moscow, by hindsight, was never so debilitating. Today, India’s hands are tied down by proximity with the US. Indeed, two pillars of India’s regional foreign policy are shaken because of the American strategy in the region — the relationships with Iran and Afghanistan.

One big casualty is Iran’s Chabahar port through which India connects with Afghanistan’s western flank and to Central Asia. A non-starter due to American hostility towards Tehran, it gained momentum after Obama’s rapproachement. But after its reversal by Trump (meant to spite Obama, we are now told) New Delhi has had to admit that it cannot further develop Chabahar when shippers and cargo handlers are kept away by US sanctions on Iran.

Whatever be the content of the Peace Agreement, still in works, it is clear that Afghanistan will remain the deadliest conflict zone in the world in 2019, far surpassing the levels of violence witnessed in Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and other hotspots.

There will be no victors this time – it will be a victory-less withdrawal, whatever the icing on the “peace cake” now being baked. Every player knows this, but won’t admit — that you are likely to leave behind a mess, again. It could entail another round of the Great Game in future for control of this hapless nation.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

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Unbridled population rise in northern BIMARU states will sharpen the North-South discord over sharing the central resources, with grave political ramifications for the country

How does one discuss population explosion in a country where age-old tradition is one of elders blessing the young: “may you be blessed with a hundred children”?

Who would want to pick quarrel with the powerful religious leaders? The Hindus are exhorted to multiply since a Muslim begets a dozen children from his four wives he supposedly marries. And the latter is advised to increase the numbers to fight “discrimination and injustice”; else he would remain “second class citizens” forever.

Like the nuclear mutual assured destruction (MAD), this is mutual assured explosion (MAE), exacerbated by mutual distrust. It remains a major reason why India is poised to outpace China as the world’s most populous nation by 2023, advancing earlier estimates.

Besides the socio-economic complexities this generates, there is an overwhelming, but silent, political factor. Politicians pay lip service to family planning and leave all the action to officials and medicos. Where political thrust is needed, a general lack of political will has scuttled family planning.

Records say Mahatma Gandhi opposed “killing life” and advocated only abstinence. Family planning pioneer D K Karve was attacked by people all around, sacked by the Christian missionary college that had employed him.

Deep scare against family planning seeped in after Sanjay, Indira Gandhi’s younger son, sought to enforce family planning under the coercive garb of Emergency (June 1975-March 1977), contributing to her electoral defeat.

Successive governments have since shunned anything that smacks of coercion and incentives. Detailed plans are carried out, but the soul is missing. Celebrities fight shy of popularizing it. The last national icon to advocate small family norms, entrepreneur JRD Tata, died in 1992.    

If India’s physical map is imagined as an inverted pyramid, its population figures would slide from its north to south. Incidentally, the inverted pyramid is also the official symbol, a red warning signal, heeded only partially and reluctantly.

This unevenness has raised political concerns. Scholar-lawmaker Jairam Ramesh on July 4 sought an assurance from the government that five southern states – Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telengana, Tamil Nadu and Kerala — will not be ‘punished’ by reducing their representation in Parliament just because they have managed to control their population.

The South has reached replacement levels of fertility. Contrast this with the six northern states — Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh. These laggards have total fertility rates in excess of the replacement level of 2.1.

By 2050, population in the southern States will decline from the present level of 15 percent to around 12 percent. But the share of the northern states — Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, bearing appropriate acronym BIMARU (sick) — will increase from 40 percent to about 44 percent.

Political implications are clear. Under Lok Sabha’s current seat distribution, the BIMARUs send 204 members, while the five southern states together elect only 128 members. With decline in their population, the southern states’ representation could reduce further, lowering their role in driving the national agenda. The South losing representation in parliament, Ramesh warned, “will be highly unfair to the pioneers of family planning.”

Lok Sabha’s next seats review will be after the 2031 census. The present distribution among the States, at one seat for a million voters, is based on the 1971 census when India’s population was 543 million, hence 543 seats. Will baby boom be politically rewarded? India is irretrievably heading for this north-south imbalance.

This friction, visible for long, could get sharper with the repeat victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Its “one country” advocacy threatens the regional parties that rule in the south.  

During the election campaign, some southern leaders talked of forging a ‘Dravidanadu’. M K Stalin, chief of one of the oldest regional parties, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) supported it. It has swept the polls in Tamil Nadu. Will population imbalance prompt its return to separatist platform that it had shed in 1962?

A southern grouping, however, is difficult given conflicting interests among regional parties and the federal government’s capacity to exert financial pulls and political pressures — and its penchant to declare anything it disapproves as “anti-national.”

Relatively better educated and developed, the South has always felt discriminated on allocation of resources by New Delhi. Analyst Tara Krishnaawamy argues that 20 percent population of the south pays 30 percent tax, creating 25 percent of India’s GDP — which is double that of the north. But it gets only 18 percent of the federal funds.

The baby boom, however, is a national issue. Unless the rapid growth of population is contained, it will be difficult to ensure quality education, healthcare, food, housing, clean drinking water, sanitation, hygiene and a healthy environment for all.

Paradoxically, Indian families are becoming smaller as better nutrition, vaccination and healthcare ensure couples lose fewer children to malnutrition and infections, such as diarrhoea, pneumonia, sepsis and tuberculosis.

India has certainly achieved notable progress in reducing mortality rates. Life expectancy at birth increased from 44 years in the mid-1960s to 68 years today. But the child mortality rate at 38 per 1,000 births lags behind China’s rate of 11. Early marriage and pregnancy still contribute to excessive maternal deaths, and life expectancy of Indian women is eight years less than their counterparts in China.

Today, the official approach is to discourage contraceptive methods that are coercive and potentially dangerous and towards those that enhance reproductive health and empower women and families. But there is a long way to go before this way of thinking becomes a reality.

In this patriarchal society, female sterilization remains the most prevalent method of contraception in India. The procedure is more invasive than other types of contraceptives, and doesn’t allow women to space when they have children and give their bodies time to recover from childbirth.

The government has increased domestic investment for family planning. At the 2012 Summit, India committed to spend $2 billion by 2020 for family planning program and, in July 2017, India renewed its commitment to invest $3 billion by 2020. The Budget 2019-20 allocation is, however, negligible.

The UN population projections for India show different possibilities. Assuming current fertility of 2.3 births per woman remains constant, its population would grow to 1.8 billion by 2050 and 2.5 billion by 2100. Even under the instant-replacement fertility variant, assuming 2.1 births per woman, India’s population would reach 1.9 billion by the century’s close.

The oft-cited UN medium projection, however, assumes fertility will decline to below replacement by 2035 and remain at 1.8 births per woman in subsequent decades. It could, then, peak at 1.7 billion in 2060 before declining to 1.5 billion by 2100.

The low projection assumes more rapid fertility decline to about 1.3 births per woman, resulting in the population peaking at 1.5 billion around 2040 and falling to 900 million by 2100.

Things can improve only long-term and there is no time to lose. Till then, Indians should stop fooling themselves and not be smug about demographic dividend. Millions of under-nourished children born of anemic mothers are burdening the humankind.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

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In India, where people don’t easily give up office and power, Azim Premji, an all-powerful head of a global conglomerate, the country’s second-richest man to boot, will retire end-July on turning 75.

Where families rule, be they in power or out of it, he has nominated his son as his successor, but has divided the latter’s clout and responsibilities into five entities among those outside the family. He will continue as non-executive director and founder chairman.

Where people chase wealth by means fair and foul, he has followed self-imposed work and business ethics for 53 years. He drove his Toyota Corolla till recently and travels Economy. He gets upset if an associate fudges travel bills, irrespective of the amount involved, to uphold work ethics. He once berated his staff for having him upgraded to Business Class till he was convinced that it was the airline that had made that unilateral gesture.

What makes Azim Hasham Premji stand apart is his philanthropic activities. India Inc. is not particularly famous for charity, nor are the rich in general. They engage in token charity to placate their conscience and earn public plaudits. Actually, billions remain frozen in religious endowments in the form of currency, gold and jewellery. That idle wealth is beyond the reach of the society.

Roughly, 34 per cent of shares held by companies controlled by Premji are earmarked to the Azim Premji Foundation (APF), taking the total donations to over Rs 1.4 trillion (USD 21 billion). The donation includes a 67 percent stake in his IT outsourcer, Wipro, worth $15 billion, plus assets including his stakes in consumer business Wipro Enterprises and PremjiInvest, his family office.

The APF works towards improving education in over 350,000 schools in seven Indian states. It also provides financial grants to other not-for-profit organisations. In March this year, he gifted an additional Rs 52.7 billion of the company’s shares –the most generous donation in the nation’s history. This will help the foundation scale up its activities several-fold, according to Forbes.

To give an idea of the scale of Premji’s charity, suffice it to say that India’s super wealthy households, or those with a net worth of over $50 million, are expected to double in both volume and wealth from 160,600 households with a total net worth of Rs. 1.53 trillion in 2017, to 330,400 households with a combined net worth of Rs.3.52 trillion in 2022. But a vast majority of them inherit their wealth and prefer to leave their money to family.

The remarkable thing is that it is Premji’s own money, not company funds. As the company’s executive chairman and MD, he has consistently given himself salary rises to keep control over his earnings so that he can divert it to charity without being subjected to any pressures. Nobody is saying this, but speaking generally, pressures from family and associates can be overbearing when one wants to engage in charity.

In India, philanthropy is done with caste/community considerations. Premji’s charity is not meant only for his largely impoverished community alone. In 2012, the Wall Street Journal called him the world’s richest Muslim entrepreneur outside of the Gulf region.

The newspaper titled its report: “How a Muslim Billionaire Thrives in Hindu India”. It quoted Premji as saying that such success shows globalization is turning into “two-way traffic” that can bring tangible benefits to developing countries.

“We have always seen ourselves as Indian. We’ve never seen ourselves as Hindus, or Muslims, or Christians or Buddhists,” Premji told the financial daily.

This is no empty rhetoric. On India’s Partition of India, the story goes, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, a fellow-Khoja, invited Azim’s father Hasham Premji to move to Pakistan. Hasham turned down the request and chose to remain in India.   

Behind all this is the business acumen of a Gujarati and ethics of a Khoja Shia Muslim family. Hasham owned a vegetable oil product company. Azim cut short his study at Stanford and returned home following his father’s sudden death. Taking charge in 1966, at age 21, he retained Wipro, the acronym of the Western India Vegetable Products Limited founded in 1945, but transformed that small company to a $8.5 billion global tech firm. Wipro Enterprises also grew to a global FMCG, infrastructure engineering and medical devices producer with revenues of about $2 billion. It employs over 171,000 people. 

The college dropout eventually graduated in the year 2000. He completed his bachelors of Science degree in electrical engineering from the same Stanford University 34 years later.

Premji’s famous quotes include one exhorting “play to win” and another, “failure is the biggest step to success.” He has combined them when and where required.  Unlike what it should probably have done, Wipro has held off on firing all cylinders in the past few years and lost its third largest IT services firm position to HCL Technologies. Its revenues now stand at $8.12 billion as opposed to HCL Technologies’ $8.6 billion, $21 billion for TCS and $11.8 billion for Infosys.

Yet, an analysis by Mint newspaper noted that Premji was “…resolutely defiant of the Western market wisdom of sticking to a field of “core competence.” As an Indian business leader, he has always punted against the current. He was one of the first, if not the pioneering, leaders of the country s IT revolution. The opportunity was grabbed after IBM was ousted from India for selling reconditioned computers.

Steering Wipro away from business where margins were relatively secure to what was, in the 1970s and 1980s, still uncharted territory surely requires more than just gumption and a taste for risk a gift of vision.

Indeed, the story of India’s IT revolution is as much Wipro’s as it is of others. Premji rejected Narayan Murthy for a big job and the latter advanced his plans to turn an entrepreneur and launched Infosys.

Premji has been bothered about the fact that the IT business’ top managements haven’t been entirely stable and that growth has tended to plateau. Hence, he sought to consolidate Wipro’s achievements by ensuring a smooth succession. He sought out views from global management experts like late C K Prahalad and helped build the next level leadership, a younger one that can grow and think differently.

Although Wipro is not the biggest, Premji is certainly the father figure of the IT industry. Suresh Vasawani, Wipro’s former CEO, went on to lead Dell and IBM before starting his own venture capital and private equity fund.

According to a Bloomberg analysis, many industry leaders see in him the leadership style and business ethics that they want to emulate. Among them are Mindtree founders Krishnakumar Natarajan, Rostow Ravanan and Subroto Bagchi. 

With his corporate mission achieved, Azim, as announced, can plan more philanthropy.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

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Times are a-changing in Bollywood as iconic RK Studio and Kamalistan, a key part of Indian cinema legacy, make way for real estate projects

Heart bleeds as one hums “Jaaney kahan gaye wo din…” from Raj Kapoor’s semi-autobiographical Mera Naam Joker (1970) on reading about the sale of R K Studio in suburban Mumbai where this song was filmed.

It ends almost seven decades’ cinematic pursuit that began with shooting of India’s first dream sequence, “Ghar aaya mera pardesi…” for Awaara (1951) when the studio was yet to have a roof above it.

With it has disappeared the famous red logo – derived from film Barsaat (1949) with Raj Kapoor holding a violin in one hand, and leading lady Nargis on another arm. Also gone is the statue of Charlie Chaplin whom Raj copied with unapologetic aplomb.

A key part of Indian cinema’s legacy, of four generations of Kapoors, arguably its “first family”, stretching nine decades, has vanished. This is even as Kareena and Ranbir, of its fourth generation, enjoy their careers’ high noon.   

The 2.2 acre land with 33,000 square meter of saleable area reportedly went for ₹500 crores. Soon, a bunch of high-rise luxury apartments and office complex will be built.

Cineastes and city historians have wishfully proposed a modest memorial, something like “here stood…” It is likely Godrej, the new owner/developer, may oblige, given the Parsis’ penchant for cinema and the city they partly built. Otherwise, it will be “The End”.

RK Studios was a gurukul (learning ground) where Hindi cinema came into its own and acquired the strength to become world-class. Songs “Mera joota hai Japani” and “Awara hoon” are alive in people’s hearts and minds.

Cradle of some of the most iconic films, its long list must include, besides those of other banners, RK’s own Awaara, Shree 420, Satyam Shivam Sundaram and Bobby.  

Beyond films, the studio hosted famous RK parties and the annual Ganesh festival and Holi revelry, the latter with colour and bhaang. Galaxy of actors and actresses called it their home.

The Kapoors are nostalgic, but not apologetic for parting with it. Fire had destroyed the main studio floor. Running the rest had become uneconomic.

The Kapoor family, by all reckoning, is an emotional lot, bonded by their shared heritage and place in the film industry. How late Raj Kapoor might have reacted is anybody’s guess.

Even as RK Studio has folded, Kmaalistan, another iconic studio built by legendary Kamal Amrohi along with his star-wife Meena Kumari, is being sold. This was where Pakeezah (1972) and Razia Sultan (1983) were made besides Amar Akbar Anthony (1977), Naseeb (1981) and Coolie (1983), as well as all of Sooraj Barjatya’s movies.

Of recent films, Salman Khan’s mega-hit Dabangg (2010), was shot here. Today, however, it is let out for weddings and events, ads and TV shoots.

With Kmaliastan will disapper 25 acres of little idyll in a congested city. Many times larger than RK, it must have fetched a sum that nobody is talking about. For Tajdar, Amrohi’s son, the parting is a relief, leaving behind a prolonged property dispute. 

The stories of RK and Kamalistan are similar to Mumbai’s textile mills. Both required technological revamp for which the owners were/are reluctant to spend. And like the mills, the land the studios stand on is many times more lucrative for shopping malls and office complex.   

Film historian Gautam Kaul traces the history of studios integral to 121 years of Indian cinema when about 44,000 films have been created so far in only about 74 film studios, now reduced to a half.

The first attempt at building a confined space to shoot indoor scenes, according to him, was by Kolkata’s Sen Brothers — Hiralal and Motilal – in 1899 for filming The Prince of Persia.

Years later, Dadasaheb Phalke, acknowledged “Father of Indian Cinema”, shot his first film, Raja Harishchandra (1913) at his bungalow before building a studio. Most studios that sprang up across British-India since are closed down, unheard today.  

Times are a-changing in Bollywood that got its name from Bombay, now Mumbai, to rhyme – and compete – with Hollywood. According to realty consultants, two more prominent studios are planning to sell out.  

Film industry representatives blame this on the changing business of entertainment. It can no longer afford to maintain old-style studios. While the big budget movie makers go for outdoor shoots and prepare their own sets, those with fewer budgets prefer smaller rooms and outdoor locations.  

Unsurprisingly, Bombay Film Lab, Jyoti and Filmalaya have also shut shop over the last two decades.

A theatre is cinema’s end-product. Studios’ closure coincides with those of single-screen cinema theatres, among them Majestic, Kohinoor, Plaza and Hindmata that have dotted Mumbai for nearly a century.  Of Mumbai’s 130 odd thatres, 70 have gone.   

Among the marqee names, Regal, built in 1933 at the edge of Colaba, was closed to end its ₹10 million annual losses, but after saying its last hurrah as a host to the Mumbai Film Festival. This writer luckily saw the Vincent Van Gough film along with award winning film-makers Shyam Benegal and Gyan Correa.

Edward (1914) stood at Kalbadevi near Watson Hotel at Dhobi Talao where the first-ever film screening was held in 1897. Capitol that stood bang opposite the Victoria Terminus, Asia’s oldest railhead now called Chhatrpati Shivaji Terminus, succumbed to market pressures in 2011.

Eros, opposite Churchgate, another railhead, closed in 2017. Like Capitol, New Empire nearby has become a ghostly dilapidated edifice – till some builder/developer comes along.   

This is part of a countrywide trend. Of the estimated 12,000 ‘talkies’ as they were called only about 6,000 remain. While the stand-alone ones had 800-1,000 capacity each, where “Silver Jubilee”, or running for 25 weeks meant success, the multiplex come with 200-400 seats.

They run multiple shows to facilitate a film’s “initial draw”, or happy earnings, over the first weekend. They offer the best screen and sound technology, besides fast food and beverages.  

There are, however, some exceptional cases of turnaround. Metro at Dhobi Talao went multiplex a decade back after a period of closure. Its Art Deco façade with the scarlet-and-silver sign are retained — there is even a beautiful old-style wood and metal elevator in its office premises. But inside looks like any upscale cinema.

Ironically, this is at a time when the leisure industry, including Bollywood, has expanded. Though not the numbers (Hyderabad has them), Mumbai, still the unique Bollywood, is fast losing its landmarks. But then, its leading lights do not seem to care. History cannot be sustained on nostalgia of its fans. It is legacy which is neither cared for by the industry nor the city.

This is not surprising in a city where the transformation is transactional – where even bookshops are yielding place to beauty parlours and pubs. Mumbai, Urbs Prima in Indis, may have no memories to recall.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

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The newly constituted Lok Sabha marks consolidation of the political right and defeat of the Left, Left-of-Centre and the liberals

Kanhaiya Kumar, who became the young mascot of India’s beleaguered Left after he was thrashed, imprisoned and faced the worst for never-proven charges of raising “anti-national slogans” three years ago, lost last month’s election by a huge margin. The victor, a Narenda Modi Government minister is notorious for his provocative utterances against the Muslims.

The contrast is obvious. It symbolizes changed times: consolidation of the political right and defeat of the Left, Left-of-Centre and the liberals.

Ideologies apart, Kumar’s defeat in Bihar is a resounding slap for the squabbling opposition parties that went by a misleading name, Mahagathbandhan (grand alliance). Not endorsing his candidature, some of them even fought him.   

Unsurprisingly, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) where Kumar led the students’ movement, will before long cease to be the Left’s bastion. A decade back, it was called “Kremlin on the Jamuna” by an American diplomat in dispatches back home, as per Julian Asange’s Wikileaks.

The whistleblower’s own fate hangs in balance. He readies for prosecution in another sign of what is a worldwide surge of ‘nationalist’ rulers who would rather shoot the liberals.

Kumar’s Communist Party of India (CPI) is among the world’s oldest, first founded in Tashkent in 1920 and then in India in 1925. The latter coincided with the birth of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), whose ideology has triumphed, with Modi, most ministers and lawmakers across the country belonging to it.

Frequently banned by British colonial rulers, the communist activists worked under socialist and Congress banners, organising farm and industrial workers, staging plays and promoting ‘progressive’ literature and cinema.  

India’s communists contributed significantly to evolution of the Marxist-Leninist principles of the global communist movement in the last century. But while interpreting and acting upon them, they also suffered numerous splits, throwing up a plethora of rival left groups, including four Revolutionary Socialist parties, with tendencies ranging from Bolshevik, Trotskyites and Maoists, to plain vanilla Marxist.

Their bigger problem has been approach to the two principal poles – Moscow and Beijing – and the biggest at home, to the Congress. The 1964 split, following the Sino-Indian conflict of 1962, created two communist mainstreams, the CPI and the CPI (Marxist). The more radical ones, meanwhile, continue to this day to confront the State with armed revolution.

In its parliamentary journey the Left has produced some of India’s best lawmakers. It was the principal opposition in the first three parliaments. The world’s first democratically elected communist government was formed in Kerala in 1957.  

Vigorous pursuit of their different lines landed the two parties in opposite political camps.  The CPI supported Indira Gandhi’s Emergency regime. After the defeat of Rajiv Gandhi’s government, the CPI (M) and the BJP joined hands behind Prime Minister VP Singh to keep the Congress out, both losing ground nationally during this brief period.   

Claiming to be ‘scientific’ in their approach, the communists have, however, displayed serious contradictions – and they justify them. They opposed the Congress’ ‘authoritarianism’ in the past, just the way they oppose the ‘communal’ BJP today.  

The CPI (M) was the kingmaker when then General Secretary, Harkishen Singh Surjeet, one of the most down-to-earth Marxists with a mind uncluttered by dogma, helped forge alliances that formed non-Congress, non-BJP governments at a time of political instability.

But its rigid hardliners have prevailed while dealing with ideologically different forces, refusing to share unless they have the upper hand. The CPI(M) hardliners, dubbed ‘Stalinists’ scuttled Jyoti Basu’s becoming the prime minister even as CPI’s ministers performed creditably. The cooperation between Left and other democratic parties has always been problematic.

The Left’s sun shone bright in 2004 with 61 parliamentary seats and a key advisory role that helped it push multi-billion anti-poverty schemes. But it fought the Manmohan Singh Government, even tried to oust it, to oppose India’s civil nuclear deal with the chief global bugbear, the United States. Somnath Chatterjee, the only communist Lok Sabha Speaker ever, was expelled. That marked the beginning of the end of its national role.

Despite long years of internal debate, the CPI(M) that leads the Left combine has failed to resolve its original contradiction: dealing with the Congress. It persists with West Bengal (Sitaram Yechuri) versus Kerala (Prakash Karat) line. The Left’s self-inflicted isolation has in the long run allowed BJP complete advantage.

West Bengal was lost in 2011 after 33 years of Left Front rule. The Left slumped to just 10 seats in the 2014 election. And then, the BJP stormed tiny Tripura. Across the east, cadres, even legislators and now long-time-loyal voter, have transferred their support, almost wholesale, to the BJP. With vote share down to seven percent, the Left scored a duck in 2019. The once-red region has turned largely saffron.

Its pockets elsewhere in the country long gone, only Kerala remains, but under siege from the BJP that has emerged as the third force threatening what has been a revolving door arrangement between two fronts. With the Left Front in power, the Congress snatched five seats from the CPI(M), including one for Rahul Gandhi, thus damaging the Left hugely, not the BJP.

Gopalkrishna Gokhale who mentored Mahatma Gandhi once said “what Bengal thinks today, the rest of India thinks tomorrow.” Is West Bengal going the BJP way judging by the party bagging 18 parliamentary seats? And is Kerala, India’s most literate – and politically mature – state with significant population of Muslims and Christians, too, heading in the same direction?         

The combined Left tally of five is its lowest in parliamentary history. The CPI and the CPI(M) may lose their “national party” status. Worse, four of the five seats — two each of the CPI and the CPI (M) – were from Tamil Nadu, where both rode piggy-back on the regional major, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK).

The Left’s decline was foregone. A pre-poll survey conducted by Lokniti-CSDS in the last week of March correctly showed that the BJP was set to improve its performance in West Bengal as compared to 2014. It did with an impressive 18. Irrespective of the numbers, it has damaged the Left, perhaps, irreparably. The Congress’s decision to go it alone in West Bengal and fielding Rahul in Kerala seriously hampered the Left’s prospects.

The decline is all-round. The Left together claims a million members. Compare that with the BJP’s 88 million, with or without the cadres of the affiliates. It claims to be the world’s biggest political party.

As elsewhere in the world, India’s middle class has grown richer, vocal and powerful. The State treats efforts at collective bargaining as law and order challenges. As millions are displaced from their homes, the corporates-controlled media has no sympathy for farm and industrial workers who fed the communist movement.

In the past, tens of thousands of Indians turned out for communist rallies, chanting proletarian slogans and wearing hammer and sickle neck chains with their Marxist-red t-shirts and hats. But today, the movement, after a century of struggle, is fighting a desperate survival battle. The “Lal Salaam” era is over.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

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An alternative leadership takes time to emerge and the Congress high command must patiently wait for that moment to arrive

It is tempting to make an uncharitable yet apt comparison of Rahul Gandhi with Casabianca, the boy who stood on the burning deck. He wants to jump off the ship, but can’t. A ship needs an anchor, but here, the anchor needs the ship.

Most of those who sailed with him want him to stay at the helm. Blinded by a mix of loyalty and despair, they can’t visualize another captain. Before Rahul, mother Sonia, father Rajiv and grandmother Indira had led them to their electoral highs and lows. The loyalists are hoping for yet another heave out of their worst low in five generations of the Nehru-Gandhis.

ALSO READ: Is Dynastic Politics Dead? NDA Is Nursing Aplenty

It is worst because their party has lost its pre-eminence to another force that is many times more muscular, resourceful, focused and determined to stay, come what may. To some analysts, this is India’s end-of-history moment.

Those watching our Casabianca with a mix of glee and disgust that a loser invites want him out. They couldn’t care less if the ship sinks. Such is the mood after the overwhelming electoral triumph of the people Rahul fought defiantly, but lost badly. That elections come and go does not seem to occur to his friends and foes.    

This is not the first time, but yes, media and the middle class across much of India, happily listening to their own loud drum-beats, have never been so ruthless. Even if momentary, these, too, are signs of the changed times.

ALSO READ: Gandhi Or Godse? Take Your Pick

Should the ship sink, with or without Rahul and/or the Nehru-Gandhis? Risking being accused of writing an apologia, one still wants to stress the need for a strong opposition for Indian democracy to thrive. A discourse has to have at least two sides to justify itself. The Congress, although a pale shadow of the party that had inspired generations, has the biggest, if not sole, responsibility. India’s oldest party cannot and should not die.

But it is facing its existential crisis. Each time it has, groups have shifted, some even retaining the Congress label. That is how you have a beleaguered Mamata Banerjee and her Trinamool Congress in West Bengal and a triumphant YSR Congress in Andhra Pradesh.

Neglected, Congressmen have walked away. The North-East was won for the BJP by Himanta Biswa Sarma whom Rahul had paid no heed. More such shifts will take place in the coming weeks and months if the party does not put its house in order. And, to begin with, it does not fill the leadership vacuum.

See the contrast: when Rahul, having lost the Amethi bastion, was thanksgiving in Wynad, mealy-mouthing his will-respond-to-hate-with-love lines, Modi was also visiting temples in Kerala. Donning veshti and angavastram, he assured Keralites that he ‘loved’ them even if they did not vote him. Modi was already preparing ground for the next election, while Rahul resembled a snake that has gobbled a shrew (chhachhunar) that he can neither devour, not eject.

As an aside, it needs recalling how the BJP, today’s victor, managed its crises after 1984 (only two members in the Lok Sabha), 1996 (losing power by a single vote), in 2004 (losing again by whiskers on failing to win over allies) and 2009 (defeat confirmed by rivals returning in larger numbers). The party was resuscitated and guided by Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS), its ideological mentor, whose cadres filled the playgrounds and poll rallies.

ALSO READ: The Captain Who Sailed Against Modi Tide

The Congress has no such mentor and the ‘dynasty’ that has leads it is no longer the answer to a marauding BJP. Sonia is re-elected the parliamentary party chief as part of a holding operation to quell murmurs getting louder and turning into rebellion. Nineteen years the party chief, she enjoys respect within and among opposition leaders. But the latter, into a long winter for now, have no patience for a defeated Congress. The more agile among them, Mayawati and Aklhilesh Yadav, have mutually separated.        

The Congress’ problems are intertwined, which makes it hard to see.  The rot started with Indira Gandhi who had transformed the composition and political culture of her party by replacing established heads with rootless persons without self-esteem through a new culture of nomination. Today, it doesn’t have an organisation in most parts of the country, despite years Rahul wasted building it.

It has not wielded power in the bigger States for long years. It has failed to consolidate and to correct its mistakes – unlike BJP. Narrow victories in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan last December that got overturned in the parliamentary polls are examples.

The defeat has only exacerbated factionalism. A month after the elections’ outcome, Congressmen are damaging their party further by fighting among themselves. Provincial satraps are becoming silently defiant and legislators are beginning to jump off the ship.

The party also has serious ideological problems. Trying to be everything to everyone worked in the distant past – not any longer.  The slide-down accelerated under a politically inexperienced Rajiv when it swerved from pandering to Muslim orthodoxy (the Shahbanu case and undoing a modern court verdict on alimony to divorced wife) to opening the locks of the disputed Ram temple in Ayodhya. In adopting ‘soft’ Hindutva to counter the BJP’s ‘hard’ version, it has completely conceded the ideological space.

In contrast, the BJP now has become the dominant party occupying the space from the centre-right to the extreme right. The Congress has responded by trying to appropriate Ram temple and cow protection during the election campaign.

Having conceded the secular platform, the Congress can still develop a narrative of Sanatan Dharma, the essence of Hinduism, as a way of life different from the Hindutva, eschewing the aggressive political aspect. It can rescue secularism as well by first, self-belief and then, stressing, not on keeping away from religion, but by advocating equal treatment for faiths to build afresh the composite culture.  It’s long haul uphill.

Finally, the ‘dynasty’ is a matter of interpretation and expediency. The choice of retaining it or not is best left to the party. Virtually every party in India has dynasty at its core. If 31 percent of Congress candidates in this election were ‘dynasts’, as per a study, 22 percent BJP nominees also were from families. And most regional parties are notoriously family ventures. It can’t be argued that in the game of changing electoral fortunes, the families that lose must disappear while the victors can prosper.

The liberal classes whether or not they swear by the Congress, are on the back-foot and alarmed. They wishfully hope the party would throw up a new leadership – not of those remotely pitch-forked, not those who want to keep the seat warm for Rahul or anyone from the family. That would be waiting for Godot. Will this Godot arrive?  

Hence, it would be unnecessary and unwise to advocate a decision from outside. Established political leadership cannot be replaced abruptly and an alternative leadership takes time to emerge. It would be suicidal for the Congress, or any other party – and the BJP would want precisely that.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

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As Subrahmanyam Jaishankar joins a select group of diplomats-turned-politicians, a bigger challenge awaits him on the political front

It is fascinating the way the world forms a significant part of an Indian’s life, despite a vast terrain and diversity of its own. Having sailed and traded in the past, sent soldiers in the two World Wars and huge diasporas have helped in developing this worldview. Despite the traditional curse on crossing the seas, ‘Vilayat’ not necessarily the West, has always ignited aspirations.

Post-independence, it is equally fascinating that although foreign policy as such has rarely impacted domestic political/electoral discourse, foreign affairs players, including retired diplomats, belonging to one of the smaller central government services, have participated in it, rather disproportionately when compared to, say, lawyers and farmers who have dominated the political scene.

ALSO READ: Foreign Policy Challenges Before Modi 2.0

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s choice as External Affairs Minister of Dr Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, who retired as Foreign Secretary last year, is the latest move. It will majorly help in foreign policy formulation in very challenging times.

As India led the de-colonization process, first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, deeply conscious of its place in the comity of a post-war world, was his own foreign minister. His successors did have cabinet rank external affairs ministers, some of them really erudite, but the PM and the PMO have had the final word on policy matters.

ALSO READ: New Delhi’s Pragmatism On BIMSTEC Invites

Inputs coming from foreign office and their contributors have always been crucial irrespective of the PM and his/her personality. Indira Gandhi had P N Haksar as her principal secretary and Rajiv Gandhi had three bright diplomats in his PMO. Narasimha Rao piloted an India without the friendly Soviet Union and launched the Look East Policy. I K Gujral was a diplomat-politician first before becoming the premier and Manmohan Singh worked the economy at home and at global conferences before taking up the big post. He was heard with respect during the 2007-2008 global economic slowdown.

Let it be stressed that in this politician-officer combine, most officers have left final decisions to politicians. With valuable insights and inputs coming from foreign affairs practitioners, the final say, as in military affairs where men in uniform matter, has always rested with the political leadership. And that is how it should be in a democracy where the politician, unlike the official, is elected and answerable.

In that sense, Jaishankar’s task will not be very different. The difference will be in deeper, bolder foreign office inputs.  

Jaishankar joins a select group of diplomats-turned-politicians. At the top is K R Narayanan. A Nehru-pick, he moved from diplomacy to academics (Vice Chancellor, Jawaharlal Nehru University) to be a minister, then as the Vice President and finally, the President.

Hamid Ansari’s trajectory was similar, as vice president via vice chancellorship of Aligarh Muslim University. Incidentally, he held office when Meira Kumar, a middle-level officer in the foreign office, was the Lok Sabha’s first woman Speaker. She has won and lost the Lok Sahha seat her father, Babu Jagjivan Ram, represented.    

Arguably though, the PMO route to politics is discernible. A solitary M L Sondhi, groomed in Nehru’s PMO, chose to join the opposition. Kunwar Natwar Singh, once in Nehru’s PMO, was external affairs minister in Manmohan Singh’s government along with Mani Shankar Aiyar, who was in Rajiv’s PMO. Some who did not join politics, got key postings post-retirement.

Although a complete ‘outsider’ at the foreign office, Shashi Tharoor was groomed at the United Nations. He fought Ban-ki-Moon valiantly before losing the Secretary General’s post. A junior minister supervising foreign office under Manmohan Singh, he has been re-elected to the Lok Sabha for the third time.

Close to foreign office but in many ways more powerful has been the position of the National Security Advisor (NSA) — because there is only one such office! Former diplomat Brajesh Mishra, the first NSA enjoyed proximity with then premier Atal Bihari Vajpayee. He overshadowed ministers Jaswant Singh and Yashwant Sinha.

The post was ably held by two other retired foreign secretaries, J N Dixit and Shivshankar Menon. Indeed, it has alternated between retired diplomats and intelligence sleuths for good reasons. M K Narayanan held that post. Jaishankar will work in tandem with Ajit Doval, the NSA who has just got a five-year extension and cabinet rank.

New to national arena and to diplomacy when he became the PM, Modi has since befriended many world leaders, not without crucial inputs from his envoys. He also placed his faith in another retired ace diplomat, Hardeep Singh Puri, a minister in his government.

His foreign office choices during the first tenure included Jaishankar, recalled as ambassador to the US to be the Foreign Secretary, even sacking incumbent Sujata Singh in the process. Navtej Sarna moved briskly from the high commission in London to Washington and Syed Akbaruddin, the ministry spokesman moved to the higher post of Permanent Representative at the United Nations.

As the first retired foreign secretary to head the same ministry, Jaishankar will be on familiar turf and will be Modi’s chief foreign policy executioner. His USP is being son of and having learnt baby steps and more from late K. Subrahmanyam, doyen of India’s national security community.

His global perspective can be judged from the languages he knows. Besides English, he speaks Tamil, Russian, Hindustani, Mandarin, Japanese and Hungarian. His first posting was at Moscow. He worked the US as Joint Secretary (Americas) negotiating the civil nuclear treaty. When Donald Trump’s victory alarmed the world and even diplomats turned undiplomatically abusive of him, as India’s Foreign Secretary, Jaishankar advised that it was essential to “understand and assess” Trump.

He should help Modi to consolidate and further deepen Indo-US ties, something his father would have approved. He has already hit the ground running what with Trump ending India’s preferential trade concessions.

Jaishankar is also a solid China hand, having been the ambassador in Beijing and worked with other China hands, Shivshankar Menon and Nirupama Rao. With Vijay Gokhale, the current foreign secretary and one who succeeded him as ambassador to China, he should make a formidable team.

With his appointment, Modi has sent a clear signal to both Washington and Beijing amidst a fierce trade war. Jaishankar’s stints in Prague and in Singapore and at some stage, in Tokyo, should help India play its cards well in a complex world.

Along with proximity to the US and a careful balancing act with China. India will continue to stay away from Beijing’s signal Belt and Road Initiative.

The Quad framework derives its geopolitical validation from India’s association and presents a unique opportunity for India to be an active participant in shaping regional security architecture with global undertones. This emphasis on Indo-Pacific is expected to be strengthened in his second term.

Surely, the other regions will also receive his stamp. The ‘Neighbourhood First’ and ‘Act East’ policies are expected to continue with greater vigour.

As for Pakistan, Modi in his second term is bound to continue with a muscular approach. He may mend relations only if there is visible change in its current policy of exporting terrorism to India. To prevent Uri, Pulwama and Pathankot, and respond if they do recur, is the challenge for the Jaishankar-Doval duo.

In political terms, Jaishankar, the only minister not elected to either house of parliament, will need to get elected to one. And lacking political experience, will have to face the Opposition. But more important is his place in the Cabinet Committee on Security, the core policy making body that Modi chairs.

 

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

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The BJP leadership has to make a clear choice between Mahatma Gandhi and Nathuram Godse because the two are mutually incompatible

Now that dust has settled on the most contentious election India has ever had, it is time to look at a sensitive issue that cropped up during the campaign: demonization of Mahatma Gandhi and deification of his assassin, Nathuram Godse.

It is important because it has figured in public discourse in the past, even before the election and will likely recur since there seems no last word on it. It is even more important since some of the Gandhi-baiters and Godse acolytes (not necessarily the same lot) have won in the election and all belong to the party that has received an overwhelming popular mandate.

ALSO READ: Pragya Calls Godse A Patriot

It is nobody’s case that there should be no debate on the respective roles the two played and their place in India’s contemporary history. What one would hope is a bit of perspective and a semblance of grace, since Gandhi is acknowledged as the Father of independent India.

An alternative view on Gandhi’s role has always existed. His portrait in Indian Parliament’s Central Hall sits next to that of V D Savarkar, the foremost Hindutva proponent, who was tried for conspiring Gandhi’s murder, but was eventually acquitted for want of evidence.

Gandhi has been criticized for various things he did or did not, said or left unsaid during his half-a-century long public life. A decade back, for instance, then Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati had derided him as a “natakbaaz” who was insincere about improving the lot of the Dalits. For her, Gandhi was and perhaps remains, a ‘manuvadi’ who only paid lip service to the Dalits’ cause.

More recently, Malawi rejected installing a Gandhi statue. In Ghana, another African nation, the one unveiled by then President Pranab Mukherjee was removed some months later because a part of the Ghanaian academia felt that Gandhi was a ‘racist’ who worked for the European colonizers and had no empathy for the black Africans.

ALSO READ: Modi 2.0 Brings In Majoritarian Agenda

If he can be criticized abroad, viewing him critically at home is fine. But the recent criticism has come couched with praise for Godse.  It is much more than just offering the other cheek for a slap as Gandhi would have advocated.

Contesting the Lok Sabha polls as a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) nominee, Pragya Singh Thakur, who has since won, triggered a firestorm when she praised the man who murdered the founder of free and democratic India. She called Godse a “deshbhakt (patriot) and will remain so forever.” Supportive statements came from more BJP candidates and members, including union minister Ananth Kumar Hegde and lawmaker Nalin Kateel. 

A hassled BJP asked Pragya to apologize which she did. It followed up by initiating disciplinary steps against other as well. Hegde claimed that he had been misquoted and that his social media handle had been hacked.

However, there’s a larger problem here pertaining to Pragya. She is currently on trial in a terrorist bombing case, on bail on health grounds. Her nomination for the election was vociferously endorsed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah. The latter called it ‘satyagrha’ against Pragya’s branding as a “Hindu terrorist” as a result of cases pending against her.

Subsequently, Modi criticised her view and said he would not be able to forgive her for it. (“Dil se kabhi kshama nahin kar paunga”). This was his rare criticism of a party nominee, and that too, during the election campaign.

ALSO READ: Watch – The Battle For Bhopal Seat

But politics is not about personal sentiment. There can be two ways of looking at Modi’s action. It could be construed as an attempt at damage control to quell protests. But Modi must also be credited with adopting during his first tenure as the prime minister some significant Gandhian ideas in the shape of “Clean India”, advocacy of toilets for everyone and protection and education for girl child. Not paying mere lip service, from his powerful office, he initiated several measures to push the schemes nationwide.  The extent of success of the two campaigns (most likely to continue in the Modi 2.0) can be debated, but not the intent behind them.  

However, Thakur is known to hold radical views. She had courted controversy earlier during the campaign by claiming that her ‘curse’ had led to the killing of Hemant Karkare, the police officer who had been interrogating her and had allegedly tortured her. Karkare was gunned down by Pakistani terrorists who stormed Mumbai in November 2008. He has since been feted and awarded and is avowedly viewed by the society as a hero. Pragya’s remarks caused universal revulsion.  

Therefore, it was untenable for Modi and Shah to defend her candidature. But then, in an election many wrongs do get righted and vice versa. One can only pose the question at this stage if Pragya will go through the trial process.

But the larger question is for the BJP to make a clear choice between Gandhi and Godse. The two are simply incompatible – which is why Godse murdered Gandhi in the first place. This is a fact of history that is recorded, investigated, tried and concluded in conviction and punishment. Nobody, not even the BJP leadership can change this since it was confessed by Godse himself, as also others who were part of the murder conspiracy.

Pragya’s candour has opened up a vital debate on the core values of Indian polity. This puts BJP in a tricky position.  Thakur has won and so have others who are part of the parliamentary party that Modi leads. Will the party act against Pragya and like-minded others?

The issue received further currency when actor-politician Kamal Haasan called Godse “independent India’s first terrorist, who was a Hindu.” It invited protests and a Tamil Nadu minister threatened to gouge Kamal’s eyes. Undoubtedly, the issue raises extreme reactions. The threatened actions go well beyond civilized discourse.

BJP is today India’s most dominant political party having just won a huge mandate to govern the nation. Its members and affiliate organisations have political beliefs. Hence, it is both important and essential for Modi and Shah to clarify the position on Gandhi and Godse, and not leave an obvious conflict hanging and festering. Doing that would stretch the thinking in opposite directions, harming both the party and the nation as a whole.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.com

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For a coalition government at the Centre to survive, regional parties will need to shed their narrow outlook and approach to national, even international, issues

It’s a great relief to think that by the time this is posted, the last phase of polling in India’s 17^th general election will be over with everyone awaiting the results on May 23.

The inevitable question – what next? – is not easy to answer. Once the last vote is cast at 1800 hours on May 19, flood-gates of Exit polls will break open. Although none of the methods used is infallible, past records place Exit polls close to correct. Till then, anyone who claims to know is either lying or is a charlatan.

ALSO READ: Regional Parties Hold The Key

And till then, one can ignore the claims, either way, of acolytes – bhakts of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Congress’ chamchas.  These social media pejoratives indicate the negative mood, intolerant of a differing opinion. Not just politicos, but also their self-appointed supporters and opponents, are getting personal, hitting critics below the belt.    

Has the vote cast, too, been negative? It appears so. In 2014, people voted for Narendra Modi’s promise of a better future and junked a scam-tainted government. It was a mixed verdict in that Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won a clear mandate but on the lowest-ever 31 percent of votes cast.  

People then latched on to Modi’s his promises of jobs and dignity. He did start off well. But five years hence, he has scored more minuses then pluses with a faltering economy, highest unemployment in 45 years, rural distress and severe strains on the social fabric. Pushing a majoritarian political agenda, his government’s ban on beef targeted the Muslim butchers and Dalit tanners.     

His demonetization gambit emasculated political opponents economically. Nobody talks about it because all politicos’ sources of money are open to suspicion. (Hamaam mein sab nange hain.)  But the people suffered much worse and have continued to suffer.

Forget falling demand of cars and consumer goods. Forget even crises in key sectors like IT, telecom and aviation. But you can’t ignore food inflation that touches every citizen. Showing signs of heading for a slowdown, the economy could be Modi’s Waterloo — and a nightmare for the next government.

ALSO READ: Modi Still India’s Best Bet

Politically, this is phir ek baar Modi Sarkar – Modi seeking a fresh mandate. See the posters; BJP figures only as election symbol, and little more. This is unlike India, even unlike BJP that attacks the Congress ‘dynasty’.  

If negative points could be the decider, then those earned by the Congress need listed. One, Priyanka’s induction reinforces its no-alternative-to-dynasty factor. Two, it plays ‘soft’ Hindutva to the BJP’s hardcore one.

Three, like some of his foot-in-the-mouth-afflicted leaders, Congress chief Rahul Gandhi ought not to have misquoted the Supreme Court in “chowkidar chor hai” chant against Modi. Once he did, decency and common sense required that he apologise instantly, unconditionally. His lawyers filed two ‘explanations’ instead, annoying the court. Rahul apologized, belatedly, but will remain under the court’s adverse gaze till it exonerates him in July after the summer vacation.

The ‘chowkidar’ bit emanated from the Modi Government’s Rafale aircraft deal. Rahul insists that it is an election issue and cites a study indicating 68 percent voters’ interest. This is farthest from truth. But it has provoked Modi to talk of defence deals his father Rajiv Gandhi concluded.  

If Rahul failed to sell this scam without strong evidence to support to the urban voters, the majority voter in the countryside doesn’t know what Rafale is all about – and couldn’t care less.  There is no public perception about Rafale and perceptions do matter in elections.

While Rahul has made serious tactical errors, Modi’s are, in a manner of speaking, strategic ones. His ideological attack on Jawaharlal Nehru can be understood. But those made on Rajiv defies Indian tradition of not abusing a dead person. Rajiv was a decent man who meant well, whatever his flaws and mistakes, and he died a violent death.

Modi continued with accusation of security lapse supposedly entailed by Rajiv taking his Italian in-laws on a holiday on board the Navy’s aircraft carrier. Top naval officers of that era have denied it. Journalists who chased that story, including this writer, found this to be false.

His repeatedly dragging the armed forces into controversies, whether to build a hyper-patriotic narrative or to score brownie points over his opponents, even those who are long dead, threatens to disrupt equipoise in civil-military relations that India has nurtured. Unlike its neighbours, India is closer to Western democracies.

Viewing India’s election from a distance, relying on the embedded media could be misleading. For one, there is no presidential-style campaign between Modi and Rahul. Secondly, the BJP is certainly the dominant political force today, but is not omnipresent – not yet.      

Of the 543 Lok Sabha seats contested, a little over a half (275) have had a direct BJP-Congress confrontation. In 170, the BJP is confronting various regional parties, where the Congress is weak or non-existent. In 101 seats there is no BJP – not even its NDA allies. In 150 seats, neither of the national parties matters. These are swing states where regional parties will be the kings and also king-makers at the national level, should the results throw up a ‘hung’ house.

Not the only culprit though, the Congress has failed to forge an anti-BJP phalanx, both out of incompetence and due to anxiety to protect its shrinking base.

Current parleys among regional leaders, some with prime ministerial ambitions, show that the mutual distrust between Congress and its allies, made and those lost, could make post-polls alliance-making difficult.

Truth be told, all contestants are desperate to win to retain their relevance.

This has been an election like no other. There is no discernible wave. A 39-day polls timetable, allowing the contenders to change the issues and goal-posts has made it more difficult to make a coherent assessment. 

The safest bet is a coalition. The India Inc. and the foreign media prefer national parties and are traditionally suspicious of regional parties. They would need to accept, and work with them, should a loose federal coalition come to power.   

Modi, while attacking alliances, in principle, calling them unstable, now claims to know “the art of running coalitions”. His critics say this is unlike him, but the post-polls power game may have its overriding compulsions for everyone. The calculators are clearly out, but the calculations will have to wait.

Not wanting to lie or be considered a charlatan, one can still visualize an overall post-polls scenario without predicting who, and/or which combination will form the next government.  

And that is: the Congress will bounce back from its 2014 debacle and regain its position as a national political force. The BJP, irrespective of its seat tally, will certainly expand into regions where it has not mattered so far. And the regional parties will gain in numbers and clout. But to utilize the two in larger national interest, they will be increasingly pressured to shed their narrow outlook and approach to national, even international, issues.

If this reads like preference for an inclusive and pluralist Indian society the way Gandhi and Tagore visualized, well, it is.

The writer can be reached at mahendraved07@gmail.xom

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