Competitive intolerance can fragment the Indian Union

November 18, 1962 may not mean much to someone like Raj Thackeray who was, in any case, born six years after that date. Since he is not a student of history he can’t be expected to understand its significance. But it is one of the blackest dates in modern Indian history.
A famous and well-entrenched division of the Indian army was overwhelmed in battle against Chinese invaders leading to the death of hundreds of officers and jawans, and a greater number wounded or taken prisoner of war. The dead are too many to list, but here is just a random selection of the names of the long forgotten heroes: Captain J.A. Dalby, Second Lieutenant Gurcharan Singh Kochar, Lance Naik Mushtaq Khan, all of the 5 Field Regiment, Havildar Raman Pillai, Lance Naik Armugam of the 6th Field regiment, Havildar Jai Singh Yadav, Naik Vishnu Gawade, Gunner Sambhaji Jadhav of the 36 Mountain Regiment, Jemadar Namdeo Kadam, Jemadar Pritam Singh, and Sapper Abdul Hakim of the 18 Field Company of the Bombay Engineer Group, Guardsmen Ram Sarup and Chandgi Ram of the Brigade of Guards, Sepoy Kuttian Kannan and Madhavan Thampi of the Madras Regiment, Sepoys Pal Singh and Gian Chand of the Dogra Regiment, Naik Kirpal Singh Negi of the Garhwal Rifles, Lt Col D.A. Taylor and Captain B.B. Ghosh of the 2/8 Gorkha Rifles, Lakshman Tanksale and Domnic Topno of the Corps of Electrical and Mechanical Engineers.

Defenders
As is clear to anyone familiar with names in India, these people hailed from every part of the country and died defending a part of India that was hundreds, if not thousands, of kilometres away from their homeland. They were not defending the Marathi manoos, or the UP bhayya or the Tamil thambi, nor for that matter were they fighting for the tribesmen of that far-off land where their remains lie today. They were defending the idea of India.
In the past weeks, as the idea came under assault in Mumbai there appeared to be few defenders of that India. Not the Prime Minister, nor the leaders of the Congress party whose ministry is supposed to govern the state. The leader of the Opposition took a somewhat roundabout route of saying Thackeray’s stand went against the Constitution of India, but not the idea of India. I suppose we should be grateful that he did invoke the Constitution in a generally positive way, because the shouts of politicians demanding that the compact be amended to reflect their sectional interest has been increasing in both decibel and frequency. Thackeray wants changes to prevent “outsiders” from coming into Mumbai, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi wants it to enshrine the reservation of government jobs beyond 50 per cent, Mayawati wants the changes to extend this reservation to the private sector, and the Congress wants to do it for the most tawdry reason — ensure that its hand-picked Election Commissioner is not thrown out of office.

Tribalism
This idea of India may be as old as Alexander the Great, but it is also new. It was created in the space of three months in the summer of 1947. In those months, eleven provinces and nearly 600 princely states were left largely to their own devices to shape themselves as nations. India succeeded, and in the short space of a decade established itself as a republic and a functioning democracy that worked on the basis of an elaborate Constitution. Pakistan remained, and in some senses remains, a work in progress. It shed its eastern wing to give birth to Bangladesh later and is today in the throes of a profound struggle to work out its own identity.
Yet, political India is not quite as solid as one would like to believe. From the outset it has been dogged by separatist demands in the North-East, then Tamil Nadu, followed by Punjab and Jammu & Kashmir. The DMK’s Eelam fixation was resolved by the creation of a linguistic Tamil Nadu, but it remains just below the political skin of the Dravidian movement. The militancy in Punjab was crushed by brute force. J&K continues to fester despite tens of thousands of deaths, as does the North-East. Successors to Nehru and Patel have squandered their legacy not just by their ruthless desire to gain, or retain, political control, but by their sheer solipsistic incompetence. The secular, rule-based system that was in place till the end of the 1960s has now given way to one where secularism means something quite different from what it means in the English language, and as for rules, they are strictly for others.
The sudden upturn in India’s economic fortunes has created another set of faultlines. Even as older ones widen, newer ones seem to be created. Till 2007, Rajasthan was seen as a state with a generally peaceable reputation. Then came the crisis relating to the Gujjar demand for Scheduled Tribe status. As for the Dera Sacha Sauda, it seems to have emerged from the special Pandora’s box in a state where sectarian strife goes back to the 19th century.
Growth has been regional, and this in turn has triggered migratory movements that seem to be generating tensions, as such movements do anywhere in the world. But where countries can, and do, erect barriers to keep out nationals of other countries, can a democratic country do so against people of its own country? Nehru’s India managed the issue with pragmatism. To prevent unconscionable pressures it banned the transfer of land to non-state residents in J&K, Himachal, and several north-eastern states. Protecting minorities was a key to holding this diverse republic together. But where do you draw the line ? As sociologist Dipankar Gupta argued in these columns last week, majorities are now discovering that they can suddenly become minorities.
Competitive intolerance and a certain kind of tribalism now appears to be taking hold of the country. In these circumstances, crises and calamities can emerge out of nowhere. So instead of wondering whether we can match China’s GDP in 2050, it is worth asking whether India will be able to survive as a national unit. For those who think this to be a ridiculous question, one needs only to look at two recent events.

Black Swan
Belgium was created in the 19th century by a merger of the Dutch speaking region of Flanders and the French areas of Wallonia. Today, the country, though flourishing and, indeed, the capital of the European Union bureaucracy, is in the throes of a political crisis that could lead to its partition. Another slow-motion birth took place last week when Kosovo was born. The country still has to find a seat in the United Nations, but it is almost certain that it will as the 193rd state in the comity of nations. It is not likely to be the last new state either. Today if people like Thackeray have their way, Maharashtra, too, may become independent. After all, at 307,713 sq km it would be larger than Italy, and nearly as big as Malaysia. The secular, rule-based and democratic India that emerged in the 1950s was based on a compact that promised to protect diversity and the rights of religious minorities. But the political players of today demand changes that would undermine the basic structure of the Constitution and our polity. Some would give primacy to Hindus, others to people of a caste. Most would deny any right to people they deem different from themselves.
Nassim Nicholas Talib’s brilliant Black Swan would suggest that the break-up of India should not occasion surprise. Talib’s theory takes off from the western belief that all swans were white till black swans were found in Australia. A Black Swan event — the collapse of the Soviet Union or recently and most infamously Nine-Eleven — is one which occurs defying common belief that it cannot. In our times, the improbable is often confused with the impossible.
This article appeared in Mail Today February 20, 2008

"Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall"

Can the UPA be put together again ?


Once upon a time, six months ago to be exact, there was a government that was moving full steam ahead. The economy was flourishing, the allies quiescent, and the Opposition dead beat. The ruling party had managed to get its nominee appointed President of the Republic — a sign of its commanding position — the Sensex had breached the 15,000 mark in the space of just half a year, and India’s traditional bugbear, Pakistan, was in the midst of a deep political crisis brought on by the sacking of the Chief Justice of its Supreme Court and the Lal Masjid affair.
Then suddenly the ground started slipping. And in the space of the next six months, Humpty Dumpty was pushed off his perch, ironically by his own friends, and has come apart. Now the proverbial King’s men are exerting mightily to put him together again to fight the next general elections, but somehow the glue does not seem to stick.

War

It is not as though the warning signals were not there. The defeat in the UP assembly elections in May came despite an enormous amount of effort by the crown prince Rahul Gandhi. But the rapidity with which the whole picture changed in August and September was staggering. It began with the revolt of the CPI(M). For two years since the Indo-US nuclear deal had been announced in July 2005, the party had gone along with the government probably in the belief that the deal would not really come through. Then at the end of July it became clear that the impossible had been achieved, that the country had managed to get a generous 123 Agreement with the US. Suddenly the Left attitude changed and CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat launched a major campaign to derail not just the deal, but question the entire foreign policy track of the United Progressive Alliance.
Buoyed by its success till then, the Congress was initially inclined to fight and tell the Left where to get off. In early October, Sonia Gandhi declared that those attacking the deal were “enemies of development”. There was talk of a possible general election. And then came the craven U-turn: Sonia said her reference was specific to Haryana and Manmohan Singh declared that if the deal did not come through it would not be the end of life. The Congress’ enthusiasm to fight the Left came a cropper when close allies like M. Karunanidhi and Lalu Prasad Yadav said that they were not for elections and could even break with the UPA on the issue.
Coincidentally just as the UPA relationship was hitting the nadir, the Sangh Parivar got out of its trough. Confronted with the possibility of general elections, the RSS and BJP sorted out their differences in quick time and formally anointed L.K. Advani as the leader of the party. This came with the important electoral victory of the party in Gujarat, and then Himachal. There has been a great deal of hand-wringing and analysis over the BJP’s success and the Congress’ defeat.

Casualties

But not many have considered asking as to why the average voter in Gujarat and Himachal, even if they were no votaries of Hindutva, would have voted for the Congress. First, the advocates of anti-communal politics had muddled their message by associating with a range of BJP rebels, some who were no less communal than Narendra Modi. Second, the sight of the great anti-communal warriors fighting each other to death on the specious issue of “American imperialism”, would not have been the most reassuring for a voter.
Having humiliated the Congress, the Left could hardly expect it to look tall and fight the BJP in Gujarat. Purely coincidentally, these developments came at the very time that the Left got the worst drubbing of its recent political life on the Nandigram issue where, among others, it confronted the Jamiat-ul-ulema-e-Hind, the powerful organisation of Muslim clerics.
So here we are at the beginning of 2008, surveying the ruins of a once proud alliance and wondering whether it can be put together again. With elections just a year or so away, the Congress and its allies, which includes the Left, must ask the question: Just what have they achieved in the past three years? On what basis should the people vote for them the next time around?
True, the UPA has given us a stable government whose record is not marred by a Gujarat-type pogrom; its competent handling of foreign relations has enhanced India’s standing in the world. But economic growth has come on its own, or at least, without any significant government intervention, and despite the best efforts of the Left to sabotage it. Let’s not tarry on the still cooking nuclear deal. What about the National Rural Employment Guarantee scheme? According to a report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, it is not working. The government has hardly shown itself as an exceptional protector of the country, or a fighter against communal violence.
This is not to say that the condition of the other parties is any better. The coming year will see a bonfire of the vanities of other political formations as well. The BJP may send out its new poster-boy Narendra Modi to sup with Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu, but it remains to be seen whether he gets the same kind of reception with Chandrababu Naidu or Nitish Kumar. Nandigram has yet to play itself out, not so much in terms of Mamta Banerji’s antics, but the alienation of the Muslim community from the Left.
Both the Congress and the BJP have been out of the Uttar Pradesh playing field and they don’t know how to get back on. The Congress’ chosen method is throwing sops that elude the targets and land up in the pockets of middle-men; as for the BJP, it is whistling in the dark hoping that Sethusamudram will do for them what the Ram Mandir did not. Turning up the communal temperature by using terrorism as the issue remains its most visible option.

Choice

Almost all political formations, barring Mayawati, want elections to take place at their assigned time in the first half of 2009. But that may not be possible. After its political mugging by the Left, the UPA does not look like it has the stamina to carry on for another year. If it does try, it could make the situation worse for itself. So, patchwork solutions are being attempted. In the coming weeks the Congress and the Left will try to pretend that their no-holds-barred battle never happened. Pranab Mukherjee’s declaration that the Congress would itself not like to proceed with a deal minus the Left’s support could be the beginning of an effort to revive the coalition. The effort would be to forget the August-December 2007 period.
There are straws in the wind to suggest that the Congress will again surprise the Left with a draft IAEA safeguards agreement that meets their somewhat extravagant demands. The Left will have the opportunity to reconsider. In the meantime, Mr. Karat may speak of the new Third Front and the Congress may dream of a modified UPA with Mulayam Singh, but time is not on their side.
As they confront the next general election, the future course of our political parties will be shaped by habit and vanities, rather than any deterministic unfolding of events. Choices exercised now could still make a difference, but just about.
This article was published in Mail Today January 16, 2008