According to Michael Ignatieff, Harvard professor and now Canadian politician, “In politics, learning from failure matters as much as exploiting success.” What lessons does the Congress need to learn from its defeat in the Gujarat state assembly elections, and what does the BJP need to do to exploit its success ? Obviously the most important thing for the former is to deconstruct its election campaign and see where it went wrong.
Learning from your errors is always a good thing, but easier said than done. There is little unanimity in determining what the Congress’ mistakes were. Was it the lack of an identified chief ministerial candidate, or was it in playing footsie with BJP rebels, including the likes of Goverdhan Zadaphia, whose record in dealing with the 2002 massacres as state Home Minister was shameful, and possibly criminal. Could it have been the “maut ke saudagar” taunt, or the flip-flop thereafter that showed the Congress to be weak-kneed in front of Modi’s fighting retort ? Or was it the inability of the party to put forward boldly a coherent ideological programme, emphasizing its secularist beliefs and aam admi (common man) approach ?
Secularism
But then we are assailed with even more questions. Does the party have the capacity to admit its mistakes? Only if it does, can it correct them. As of now, the Congress is hamstrung by a culture that declares that the leader—whether it was Jawaharlal Nehru in relation to China in 1962, Indira Gandhi and the Emergency in 1975, or Narasimha Rao and Babri Masjid in 1992— is never wrong. Neither, for that matter, is the heir-apparent. Both Sonia and Rahul Gandhi have been beneficiaries of this phenomenon in the past couple of years to the detriment of the party.
The Congress is now confronting a revitalised BJP which is determined to press on with its Hindutva project. Despite its victory in 2004 general elections, the Congress has not displayed any special strategy, or leadership to deal with it. As Gujarat revealed, all that the party did was to try and exploit the BJP’s inner divisions and make a fleeting reference to the 2002 events. Beyond that there was neither intention and nor effort.
Given the Indian tendency towards self-flagellation in defeat-- and boast in times of victory—there is a tendency to overstate the lessons of a single state assembly election. Understand that even before Modi came to the scene, the BJP was the dominant party in the state having won the elections of 1995 and 1998 by a near two-thirds majority, now the Congress has added eleven seats and the BJP lost ten. Even though it has wrested more seats to compensate, its losses of sitting seats have been significant. What Modi has done is what the Left has done in West Bengal—become the vessel for the pride of the citizens of the state. Yet the bald fact is that the Congress was defeated in an election it could have won, and one that took place at a critical time in relation to the dynamics of the UPA government at the Centre.
This must be seen as a defeat of secularists and not secularism, of their ability to deliver their message, not the message itself. Any strategy for an umbrella-party like the Congress which has an all-India, all community spread, must be based on a determined enunciation of secular politics. Secularism is a good intellectual notion, worth pursuing and indeed endorsed by our Constitution. But trying to master the political grammar of secularism in semi-literate country like India is more complex as Rajiv Gandhi, himself no doubt a secular person, realized.
Two decisions by his government in 1986—the opening of the locks of the Babri Masjid and “balancing” it with the Muslim Women’s Act to counter the Shah Bano judgment were both seen by the Congress as their version of secularism which emphasizes equal respect for all religions. But this peculiar definition of secularism has brought disaster for the party. Perhaps the ideal needs to move back to what it was in Jawaharlal’s time—strictly separating state and religion.
Leaders
What the party needed to do in Gujarat was to understand the reality of a state that was, rather than what it should be. Given the fact that the Congress has allowed its secular ideology to erode over the past decades, it could not have pushed a hard secular line overnight. But it needed to make the line itself clear in the first place. The way to take on the BJP was not by trying to outflank it on Hindutva, or make adjustments for it, but to categorically contest that vision and bear with the consequences.
In the coming months, the Congress will have to make many decisions. Whatever some American dons suggest, decision-making is not a science, even of the social variety. Experience does help, but as TS Eliot pointed out, “it imposes a pattern and falsifies.” It pushes you into well-trodden and sterile paths, and prevents you from looking at “out of the box” solutions. So, there is no substitute, really for leadership which is a compound of instinct, experience, intellectual integrity, courage and ruthlessness.
Effectiveness requires all these to be present in the compound. The Congress does not lack experience, but it does have difficulties with the other elements of leadership. Part of the problem is diarchy and part the nature of the party. Manmohan Singh is Prime Minister, while the real leader of the legislature party is its leader, éminence grise and principal campaigner, Sonia Gandhi. No one is clear as to how decisions are taken, in the party but we all know that the process is labyrinthine.
In Singh and Sonia Gandhi, we have prudent and good leaders. But people, whether in India, or elsewhere, also want leaders with vision and daring. They are ready to overlook mistakes, provided the leader is seen to have made them with seeming conviction. In any case as Mao and Indira have shown, bashing on regardless of your mistakes, too, has been the hallmark of great leaders.
The problem, however, is also in the nature of the Congress. If the BJP has a retrograde social and political message, it has a sophisticated management style, one that encourages merit, naturally within certain bounds. While the Congress is a party with a progressive political orientation, but its organizational approach is at present feudal, if not tribal.
Ruthless
The Congress cannot easily change its nature. It is no longer the party of Jawaharlal, but of Indira who changed its DNA irrevocably. It is a family proprietary company and like such firms in the business sector in India and around the world, it continues to have a unique relevance.The problem for the proprietors is that security compels them to remain somewhat isolated and so it requires uncommon instinct to understand issues and take decisions, which in turn need a base of expert ideation and solid conviction to be efficacious. But the firm has yet to get the right mix in combining proprietary concerns with furthering corporate interests. The result is a perception that its top management does not have the kind of autonomy that is desired, and perhaps also not the right mix of executives. Keeping family retainers like Arjun Singh and Shivraj Patil in key appointments, for example, betrays a certain lack of ruthlessness.People have called Sonia many things, but never ruthless. But that missing attribute seems to be the key factor in the Congress’ present make up. This quality runs through the government many of whose principal officers and numerous advisers are sinecure holders rather than shop-floor performers and street-fighters. Three years after the party assumed power, it has taken the lost election in Gujarat to tell us how much things have remained the same, even when they were supposed change.
This article appeared in Mail Today December 26, 2007
Showing posts with label Bharatiya Janata Party. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bharatiya Janata Party. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Sunday, December 16, 2007
He is only past his first hurdle
L.K. Advani, the BJP’s PM-in-waiting carries the huge burden of his past, of NDA’s failings and his advancing years
Lal Kishen Advani has been anointed leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party after many trials and tribulations — and a great deal of humiliation. Yet the party's war trumpet signaling its readiness to face another general election has been unusually muted, and somewhat out of tune. Coming as it does on the eve of the first round of Gujarat polling, the designation of Advani as Prime Minister-in-waiting is a complex one. The decision has been pending for quite a while and an announcement was expected on his 81st birthday on November 8.
Some say that the decision is aimed at showing that it is not connected to the outcome of the Gujarat state assembly elections — whatever it is. Others argue that it could be seen as a means of getting some bump out of the electorate, because Mr. Advani represents Gandhinagar and has carefully cultivated his constituency, even though reports from the state indicated that attendance at his rallies was thin.
It is more than likely that the real reason is to put Narendra Modi in his place. In many ways Modi's persona and age seem to be better tailored to lead the party of Hindutva than that of the ageing Mr. Advani. But Modi’s style that brooks little dictation from the Sangh Parivar or anyone else goes against the grain of the Rashtriya Swyamsevak Sangh that prides itself in keeping its pracharaks and sympathisers on a short leash.
Sangh
Mr Advani has come to the fore also because he is the last man standing in the group of leaders who have had their hat in the ring for the past three years. Mr. Atal Bihari Vajpayee's reluctant retirement has been brought on by chronic illness in the past year. Mr. Murli Manohar Joshi's presence at the ceremony indicates that for the present, at least, he has conceded Mr. Advani's claim to primacy. Both he and the hapless Mr. Rajnath Singh became lame duck ever since the party was decisively trounced in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls earlier this year.
What remains to be seen now is whether there is a similar shift in the RSS. As long as Mr. K.S. Sudarshan remains Sarsanghchalak, the BJP will be forced to adjust to his eccentric demands and not be able to set its own agenda. As of now it would appear that the RSS wants a dual party-government type system where it can retain control through the party president who owes his position to the organisation. But this has not proved to be a workable proposition. Mr. Vajpayee's success lay precisely in avoiding the Sangh dictation. On the other hand, the manner in which the RSS savaged Advani on the “Jinnah was secular” remark indicates that the new leader has much less room for manoeuver.
Advani brings to the party a number of strengths. He is clear-headed and a good networker with regional parties which is needed to establish a new National Democratic Alliance. He has the loyalty of the younger crowd of leaders. But given his long innings, his weaknesses are also manifest. Primary among these is that he is cynical and self-serving.
He tailored his personal beliefs to ride a chariot across the country for the cause of building a temple for Lord Rama at Ayodhya. He did the same last year when he visited Mohammed Ali Jinnah’s mazar in Karachi and declared him secular. Cynicism is a pre-eminent trait of all successful politicians, but in Advani’s case it has been a source of weakness and brought disaster for the country and himself. Its latest manifestation is his opposition to the Indo-US nuclear deal, something that the pro-American Advani knows is good for the country, but he cannot get himself to say so because he sees no advantage in it for himself.
Rival
And, of course, there is the issue of age. Though he is in excellent health, he is 81. That is an age when infirmity steals up with ruthless speed and unpredictability. More important, he will be pitted with the Congress’ Rahul Gandhi who has recently been anointed crown prince of the Congress. Besides Rahul, there is the relatively young Sonia (61), who is increasingly assertive and sure-footed because the “Italian origin” slur has found little footing with the electorate. While Rahul has yet to make his mistakes, and will any way be given a long rope because of his inexperience, Advani has already made his, and will be judged on their basis.
Mr. Advani saw the moment of his greatness wither a long time ago. If it did not do so after his Babri Masjid movement destroyed social peace in the country, it certainly did so with his indifferent performance as Union Home Minister. The repeated instances of terrorism — Parliament, Akshardham, Kaluchak and the humiliation of exchanging a plane load of hostages in Kandahar for three top terrorists — are damning. His failure to formulate an effective strategy beyond talking tough marked out Advani as the non-Sardar Patel. A former intelligence chief's assessment was that “Mr Advani is incredibly shallow”. He showed an unusual appetite for accessing intelligence information, but he did little with it.
His remarks on Pakistan just after the nuclear tests were downright irresponsible and his predilection towards the US nearly got India caught into the Iraqi quagmire. The handling of a law to tackle terrorism, POTA, was so partisan that it prevented the enactment of an effective anti-terrorist legislation. He was completely swamped by the Intelligence Bureau and Home Ministry bureaucracy and did not provide the kind of ministerial leadership that was expected from the strong man of the BJP.
Beyond his own person, Mr. Advani has to contend with the problems of his party. While it does not have the stultifying leadership culture of the Congress which is dominated by a family, the BJP is a house divided everywhere. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s relationship with his Cabinet colleagues, including Deputy Prime Minister Advani, were just a shade better than that of Shah Jehan with his sons.
The basic problem that Mr. Advani and the BJP have to confront is that they are a party espousing Hindutva, and by and large subsist on upper caste Hindu votes, but their potential allies come from a variety of parties, some based on caste, some on ethnicity. They do not see Hindutva as their lodestar, and neither do they necessarily demonise Muslims. The issue of Muslims has gained considerable salience considering that the National Democratic Alliance almost certainly lost the 2004 general election because of the Gujarat massacres of 2002. In the UP Assembly elections earlier this year, the BJP’s sorry showing was not just because of the state of the party organisation and leadership, but the fact that across the state Muslims made it a point to support the candidate most likely to defeat the BJP nominee. Alienating a bloc of voters is not a recipe for success in elections, except perhaps in the special conditions of Gujarat.
Hindutva
Advani and Vajpayee know that a pure Hindutva party does not have much traction with the electorate. Advani has himself publicly spoken about how the Jana Sangh had to become the “Bharatiya Janata Party” and later constitute a National Democratic Alliance before it could wield power at the Centre. Both Vajpayee and Advani had boasted that their government had a riot-free record in relation to Muslims, and then came the Gujarat cyclone and all pretensions were blown away.
Vajpayee’s attempt to sack Modi was defeated. And the consequence was the defeat in 2004. Vajpayee’s efforts to woo the community through a Dalit party president Bangaru Laxman, too came a cropper when he was caught in a sting and Bangaru’s remark that Muslims were the “blood of our blood” forgotten. Advani’s elliptical, though clumsy effort in hailing Jinnah nearly ended his career with the Parivar.
No two general elections are ever the same, and neither do issues that dominated one transfer to the other. The coming elections, whether in 2008 or on schedule the year after, will also be no different. To become Prime Minister, Mr. Advani will have to go beyond Lord Rama, rath yatras, terrorism or Pakistan. He has been a resourceful, if ruthless, politician in the past; what the future holds now for him only time will tell. But his margin for error is already that much thinner.
The article appeared in Mail Today December 12, 2007
Lal Kishen Advani has been anointed leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party after many trials and tribulations — and a great deal of humiliation. Yet the party's war trumpet signaling its readiness to face another general election has been unusually muted, and somewhat out of tune. Coming as it does on the eve of the first round of Gujarat polling, the designation of Advani as Prime Minister-in-waiting is a complex one. The decision has been pending for quite a while and an announcement was expected on his 81st birthday on November 8.
Some say that the decision is aimed at showing that it is not connected to the outcome of the Gujarat state assembly elections — whatever it is. Others argue that it could be seen as a means of getting some bump out of the electorate, because Mr. Advani represents Gandhinagar and has carefully cultivated his constituency, even though reports from the state indicated that attendance at his rallies was thin.
It is more than likely that the real reason is to put Narendra Modi in his place. In many ways Modi's persona and age seem to be better tailored to lead the party of Hindutva than that of the ageing Mr. Advani. But Modi’s style that brooks little dictation from the Sangh Parivar or anyone else goes against the grain of the Rashtriya Swyamsevak Sangh that prides itself in keeping its pracharaks and sympathisers on a short leash.
Sangh
Mr Advani has come to the fore also because he is the last man standing in the group of leaders who have had their hat in the ring for the past three years. Mr. Atal Bihari Vajpayee's reluctant retirement has been brought on by chronic illness in the past year. Mr. Murli Manohar Joshi's presence at the ceremony indicates that for the present, at least, he has conceded Mr. Advani's claim to primacy. Both he and the hapless Mr. Rajnath Singh became lame duck ever since the party was decisively trounced in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls earlier this year.
What remains to be seen now is whether there is a similar shift in the RSS. As long as Mr. K.S. Sudarshan remains Sarsanghchalak, the BJP will be forced to adjust to his eccentric demands and not be able to set its own agenda. As of now it would appear that the RSS wants a dual party-government type system where it can retain control through the party president who owes his position to the organisation. But this has not proved to be a workable proposition. Mr. Vajpayee's success lay precisely in avoiding the Sangh dictation. On the other hand, the manner in which the RSS savaged Advani on the “Jinnah was secular” remark indicates that the new leader has much less room for manoeuver.
Advani brings to the party a number of strengths. He is clear-headed and a good networker with regional parties which is needed to establish a new National Democratic Alliance. He has the loyalty of the younger crowd of leaders. But given his long innings, his weaknesses are also manifest. Primary among these is that he is cynical and self-serving.
He tailored his personal beliefs to ride a chariot across the country for the cause of building a temple for Lord Rama at Ayodhya. He did the same last year when he visited Mohammed Ali Jinnah’s mazar in Karachi and declared him secular. Cynicism is a pre-eminent trait of all successful politicians, but in Advani’s case it has been a source of weakness and brought disaster for the country and himself. Its latest manifestation is his opposition to the Indo-US nuclear deal, something that the pro-American Advani knows is good for the country, but he cannot get himself to say so because he sees no advantage in it for himself.
Rival
And, of course, there is the issue of age. Though he is in excellent health, he is 81. That is an age when infirmity steals up with ruthless speed and unpredictability. More important, he will be pitted with the Congress’ Rahul Gandhi who has recently been anointed crown prince of the Congress. Besides Rahul, there is the relatively young Sonia (61), who is increasingly assertive and sure-footed because the “Italian origin” slur has found little footing with the electorate. While Rahul has yet to make his mistakes, and will any way be given a long rope because of his inexperience, Advani has already made his, and will be judged on their basis.
Mr. Advani saw the moment of his greatness wither a long time ago. If it did not do so after his Babri Masjid movement destroyed social peace in the country, it certainly did so with his indifferent performance as Union Home Minister. The repeated instances of terrorism — Parliament, Akshardham, Kaluchak and the humiliation of exchanging a plane load of hostages in Kandahar for three top terrorists — are damning. His failure to formulate an effective strategy beyond talking tough marked out Advani as the non-Sardar Patel. A former intelligence chief's assessment was that “Mr Advani is incredibly shallow”. He showed an unusual appetite for accessing intelligence information, but he did little with it.
His remarks on Pakistan just after the nuclear tests were downright irresponsible and his predilection towards the US nearly got India caught into the Iraqi quagmire. The handling of a law to tackle terrorism, POTA, was so partisan that it prevented the enactment of an effective anti-terrorist legislation. He was completely swamped by the Intelligence Bureau and Home Ministry bureaucracy and did not provide the kind of ministerial leadership that was expected from the strong man of the BJP.
Beyond his own person, Mr. Advani has to contend with the problems of his party. While it does not have the stultifying leadership culture of the Congress which is dominated by a family, the BJP is a house divided everywhere. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s relationship with his Cabinet colleagues, including Deputy Prime Minister Advani, were just a shade better than that of Shah Jehan with his sons.
The basic problem that Mr. Advani and the BJP have to confront is that they are a party espousing Hindutva, and by and large subsist on upper caste Hindu votes, but their potential allies come from a variety of parties, some based on caste, some on ethnicity. They do not see Hindutva as their lodestar, and neither do they necessarily demonise Muslims. The issue of Muslims has gained considerable salience considering that the National Democratic Alliance almost certainly lost the 2004 general election because of the Gujarat massacres of 2002. In the UP Assembly elections earlier this year, the BJP’s sorry showing was not just because of the state of the party organisation and leadership, but the fact that across the state Muslims made it a point to support the candidate most likely to defeat the BJP nominee. Alienating a bloc of voters is not a recipe for success in elections, except perhaps in the special conditions of Gujarat.
Hindutva
Advani and Vajpayee know that a pure Hindutva party does not have much traction with the electorate. Advani has himself publicly spoken about how the Jana Sangh had to become the “Bharatiya Janata Party” and later constitute a National Democratic Alliance before it could wield power at the Centre. Both Vajpayee and Advani had boasted that their government had a riot-free record in relation to Muslims, and then came the Gujarat cyclone and all pretensions were blown away.
Vajpayee’s attempt to sack Modi was defeated. And the consequence was the defeat in 2004. Vajpayee’s efforts to woo the community through a Dalit party president Bangaru Laxman, too came a cropper when he was caught in a sting and Bangaru’s remark that Muslims were the “blood of our blood” forgotten. Advani’s elliptical, though clumsy effort in hailing Jinnah nearly ended his career with the Parivar.
No two general elections are ever the same, and neither do issues that dominated one transfer to the other. The coming elections, whether in 2008 or on schedule the year after, will also be no different. To become Prime Minister, Mr. Advani will have to go beyond Lord Rama, rath yatras, terrorism or Pakistan. He has been a resourceful, if ruthless, politician in the past; what the future holds now for him only time will tell. But his margin for error is already that much thinner.
The article appeared in Mail Today December 12, 2007
Saturday, December 08, 2007
The Modi Trap: He may win in Gujarat, but the BJP will lose everywhere else
The ghosts of the Gujarat dead will not lay quiet. Those who thought that the massacres of 2002 — that of Godhra and its aftermath—will fade from public memory are mistaken. Murder, especially mass murder, is not something that ever has a closure, especially when the guilty remain unpunished. The Bharatiya Janata Party’s stand on the killings is striking for how it reveals the hollow moral core of the party.
Whether or not the party’s government was guilty of complicity in the massacre of Muslims, we would have expected some expression of remorse. L.K. Advani has claimed that the Babri Masjid’s demolition was the saddest day in his life. Yet neither he, nor Narendra Modi have ever expressed the remotest sense of shame that during their watch — the former was the Union Home Minister and the latter the Chief Minister of the State — hundreds, if not thousands of people were killed by mobs led by goons belonging to the party and its fraternal organisations — the VHP and Bajrang Dal. The consequences of such a moral vacuum are usually severe. If unchecked they lead to the kind of excesses committed by Adolf Hitler, Stalin or Mao Zedong.
Root causes
Advani and Modi are a real and present danger for our polity. Intelligence agencies are not willing to say so openly, but their actions — Babri Masjid demolition of 1992 and the Gujarat killings of 2002 — gave the biggest fillip to terrorism in the country. Terrorists may need no motivation, but those who believe that a grievance does not play a role in fertilising the ground for recruiting terrorists are deluding themselves. In 1991, when Pakistan wanted to incite Indian Muslims, they sent Manjit Singh alias Lal Singh to Aligarh, Ahmedabad and other places disguised as a Muslim, Aslam Gill, because they had no reliable Indian Muslim agent. He found the ground sterile and was arrested in 1992. But that same year, Advani and his cohorts brought down the Babri Masjid and spurred horrific riots across India, especially in Surat and Mumbai. The result? There has been no shortage of recruits thereafter.
The elections in Gujarat are important, maybe, the BJP even has good reason to believe that they are crucial. But they are only one state elections in a very large country. Recent elections and political trends have indeed shown that the hard Hindutva line of the BJP may give dividends in Gujarat, but nearly everywhere else it will cost the party heavily.
The reason is that while Modi’s personality and Gujarat’s history may be tailor made for a chauvinist campaign, the rest of the country is marching to a different tune. This was manifest in the UP state elections recently where the BJP suffered a humiliating defeat. In almost every constituency, Muslims, who may constitute anywhere between 50 per cent and 15 per cent, voted only to defeat the Bharatiya Janata Party.
The BJP should not have forgotten the lesson of 2004 when it lost what was an almost shoo-in election. Allies like Chandrababu Naidu squarely blamed Gujarat for the defeat. Andhra’s Muslims are numerically less than those in UP, but if they vote en bloc against a party aligned to the BJP, it makes a difference. In the divided polity of the country, a bloc vote of 5, 10 and 15 per cent is enough to spell disaster for a party.
The BJP’s tallest leaders — Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Lal Kishen Advani — are well aware of this. It was the former’s acceptability with constituents that made the National Democratic Alliance possible. Not for nothing did Vajpayee seek to have Modi dismissed in the wake of the Gujarat happenings. Advani, too, is aware of the national ramifications of the Gujarat BJP’s near-homicidal attitude towards the Muslims and sought to square the circle by praising Mohammed Ali Jinnah, only to fall afoul of the RSS leadership. So the challenge before the party remains — be inclusive and go against the RSS’s Hindutva lakshman rekha; be exclusive and run the risk of being dumped by the
electorate.
Moral vacuum
The Modi position on Sohrabuddin Sheikh killing lacks any kind of ethical or moral foundation. In his fulminations, Modi does not refer to the “collateral” murder of Kausar Bi, Sohrabuddin’s spouse. If she was killed only because she was the wife of a bad man, the logical extension of the argument could be that we have the licence to kill the family of a terrorist, and, perhaps, members of the the community from which the terrorist hails. Those who laud Modi because he is only advocating a tough line against terrorists need to carefully look at the slippery slope ahead.
In our Constitutional scheme of things, only the judiciary has the right to punish wrong-doers. Neither the President, Prime Minister nor Chief Minister have this right, most certainly not police personnel like D.G. Vanzara, or for that matter S.S. Rathi and the other murderers in uniform who the media insists on calling “encounter specialists”.
Modi and Advani have perhaps not thought about this, but the only other set of individuals who believe that they have the right to decide whether or not “wrong-doers” shall live or die are terrorists. Modi’s posture is no different from that of a terrorist.
The trap
A great deal now depends on the Congress party. Its hands are not clean, though they are cleaner than that of the BJP. But for a brief flurry of “when a big tree falls” rhetoric, the party has steered clear of arrogantly defending the Sikh massacres of 1984. That it has kept politicians like Sajjan Kumar and Jagdish Tytler in the margin is proof that there is some sense of guilt in the party. But it has everything to gain, and nothing to lose by taking a hard line against religious, ethnic and caste fanatics. There may be losses, but in the long term there can only be gains. Nothing, in any way, could be worse than its fate in the last couple of decades. It has pandered to forces of casteism, chauvinism and fundamentalism and still remains unrewarded by the electorate.
As the clock ticks for the next general elections, it is clear that neither the Bharatiya Janata Party, nor the Congress will come near to a working majority on their own. Both will need support of substantial chunks — Left parties, TDP, AIDMK/DMK, BSP, SP, various factions of the Janata Dal and so on. Look at the list. None of them are likely to back a party that has a hawkish anti-Muslim stand.
Given the usually craven behaviour of the Congress, I may be over-interpreting the signs, but BJP and Modi may be walking into a trap of the Congress party’s making. Sonia’s “maut ke saudagar” comment immediately got Modi’s goat and his hard-line response has now set the tone for the party’s Gujarat campaign. The Bharatiya Janata Party may yet savour temporary success in the state, but hriday samrat Narendra Modi’s victory will spell disaster for the party elsewhere.
The article appeared in Mail Today December 7, 2007
Whether or not the party’s government was guilty of complicity in the massacre of Muslims, we would have expected some expression of remorse. L.K. Advani has claimed that the Babri Masjid’s demolition was the saddest day in his life. Yet neither he, nor Narendra Modi have ever expressed the remotest sense of shame that during their watch — the former was the Union Home Minister and the latter the Chief Minister of the State — hundreds, if not thousands of people were killed by mobs led by goons belonging to the party and its fraternal organisations — the VHP and Bajrang Dal. The consequences of such a moral vacuum are usually severe. If unchecked they lead to the kind of excesses committed by Adolf Hitler, Stalin or Mao Zedong.
Root causes
Advani and Modi are a real and present danger for our polity. Intelligence agencies are not willing to say so openly, but their actions — Babri Masjid demolition of 1992 and the Gujarat killings of 2002 — gave the biggest fillip to terrorism in the country. Terrorists may need no motivation, but those who believe that a grievance does not play a role in fertilising the ground for recruiting terrorists are deluding themselves. In 1991, when Pakistan wanted to incite Indian Muslims, they sent Manjit Singh alias Lal Singh to Aligarh, Ahmedabad and other places disguised as a Muslim, Aslam Gill, because they had no reliable Indian Muslim agent. He found the ground sterile and was arrested in 1992. But that same year, Advani and his cohorts brought down the Babri Masjid and spurred horrific riots across India, especially in Surat and Mumbai. The result? There has been no shortage of recruits thereafter.
The elections in Gujarat are important, maybe, the BJP even has good reason to believe that they are crucial. But they are only one state elections in a very large country. Recent elections and political trends have indeed shown that the hard Hindutva line of the BJP may give dividends in Gujarat, but nearly everywhere else it will cost the party heavily.
The reason is that while Modi’s personality and Gujarat’s history may be tailor made for a chauvinist campaign, the rest of the country is marching to a different tune. This was manifest in the UP state elections recently where the BJP suffered a humiliating defeat. In almost every constituency, Muslims, who may constitute anywhere between 50 per cent and 15 per cent, voted only to defeat the Bharatiya Janata Party.
The BJP should not have forgotten the lesson of 2004 when it lost what was an almost shoo-in election. Allies like Chandrababu Naidu squarely blamed Gujarat for the defeat. Andhra’s Muslims are numerically less than those in UP, but if they vote en bloc against a party aligned to the BJP, it makes a difference. In the divided polity of the country, a bloc vote of 5, 10 and 15 per cent is enough to spell disaster for a party.
The BJP’s tallest leaders — Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Lal Kishen Advani — are well aware of this. It was the former’s acceptability with constituents that made the National Democratic Alliance possible. Not for nothing did Vajpayee seek to have Modi dismissed in the wake of the Gujarat happenings. Advani, too, is aware of the national ramifications of the Gujarat BJP’s near-homicidal attitude towards the Muslims and sought to square the circle by praising Mohammed Ali Jinnah, only to fall afoul of the RSS leadership. So the challenge before the party remains — be inclusive and go against the RSS’s Hindutva lakshman rekha; be exclusive and run the risk of being dumped by the
electorate.
Moral vacuum
The Modi position on Sohrabuddin Sheikh killing lacks any kind of ethical or moral foundation. In his fulminations, Modi does not refer to the “collateral” murder of Kausar Bi, Sohrabuddin’s spouse. If she was killed only because she was the wife of a bad man, the logical extension of the argument could be that we have the licence to kill the family of a terrorist, and, perhaps, members of the the community from which the terrorist hails. Those who laud Modi because he is only advocating a tough line against terrorists need to carefully look at the slippery slope ahead.
In our Constitutional scheme of things, only the judiciary has the right to punish wrong-doers. Neither the President, Prime Minister nor Chief Minister have this right, most certainly not police personnel like D.G. Vanzara, or for that matter S.S. Rathi and the other murderers in uniform who the media insists on calling “encounter specialists”.
Modi and Advani have perhaps not thought about this, but the only other set of individuals who believe that they have the right to decide whether or not “wrong-doers” shall live or die are terrorists. Modi’s posture is no different from that of a terrorist.
The trap
A great deal now depends on the Congress party. Its hands are not clean, though they are cleaner than that of the BJP. But for a brief flurry of “when a big tree falls” rhetoric, the party has steered clear of arrogantly defending the Sikh massacres of 1984. That it has kept politicians like Sajjan Kumar and Jagdish Tytler in the margin is proof that there is some sense of guilt in the party. But it has everything to gain, and nothing to lose by taking a hard line against religious, ethnic and caste fanatics. There may be losses, but in the long term there can only be gains. Nothing, in any way, could be worse than its fate in the last couple of decades. It has pandered to forces of casteism, chauvinism and fundamentalism and still remains unrewarded by the electorate.
As the clock ticks for the next general elections, it is clear that neither the Bharatiya Janata Party, nor the Congress will come near to a working majority on their own. Both will need support of substantial chunks — Left parties, TDP, AIDMK/DMK, BSP, SP, various factions of the Janata Dal and so on. Look at the list. None of them are likely to back a party that has a hawkish anti-Muslim stand.
Given the usually craven behaviour of the Congress, I may be over-interpreting the signs, but BJP and Modi may be walking into a trap of the Congress party’s making. Sonia’s “maut ke saudagar” comment immediately got Modi’s goat and his hard-line response has now set the tone for the party’s Gujarat campaign. The Bharatiya Janata Party may yet savour temporary success in the state, but hriday samrat Narendra Modi’s victory will spell disaster for the party elsewhere.
The article appeared in Mail Today December 7, 2007
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