The pace of politics in India sometimes puts the fast-moving consumer good business to shame. There is always some state election or the other on and outside of the election calendar there are all sorts of political movements shaping up. This is one reason why I find UK politics relatively boring, even though some commentators admirably try to spice it up. If the most exciting development in British politics in years has been the formation of a coalition government then i must continue to satiate my political appetite on Indian affairs. It is not the world’s largest democracy for nothing and as people’s roti, kapda and makan needs are taken care of I think (I hope) my fellow countrymen will find time and an inclination to take to politics. Unfortunately, politics in India is still a mildly dirty word and I hope that will change and politics will been seen as the overarching framework under which governance happens. In this post, I want to write about the recent anti-corruption movements, the result of the state elections, the UPA government coming to its half way point by the end of this year and the various pulls and pressures on the fringes of Indian politics (maoists on the left, and ‘hindutva terrorism’ on the right).
The UPA government’s performance has been at best average. The good bits have been external, defence and home (in that order) and the bad bits have been finance, commerce, telecom, urban and rural development, food and other aam admi ministries. I supported the UPA government and I hoped that in its second term without the Left parties the government would be in a higher gear what with this being the first decade of our demographic dividend. I supported Manmohan Singh as our Prime minister as I saw in him a good combination of academic, foreign affairs and decades of public service. I think this government has mostly disappointed on the domestic front and the country is facing high inflation, slow lack of progress in the social indicators and no progress on other fronts (e.g. – agriculture, rural development and infrastructure). Yes some of these areas are under control of the state, but that doesn’t mean that the central government can not influence the states to do more. So while the government has sufficient majority on the floor of the parliament, inside the government is weak and divided and the floor majority doesn’t give it any incentive to be daring and innovative. The state elections have broadly played in the hands of the Congress. Even the Tamil Nadu elections have strengthened the hands of the Congress, as a weakened DMK may want to stay in the central government and have some influence rather than leave and face the music both at the centre and the state.
This inertia and a continued paralysis in decision-making makes the aam admi angry and it opens up space for other political parties and non-party players. I use the word players to represent a group of people only and not to give them any colour. The political players in the centre who could have taken advantage from the corruption scandals and high inflation situations is the BJP. However, they have a leadership inertia of their own and are probably not to keen of spending all their energy three years before the next general election. It is interesting that the floor advantage in the Parliament makes both the ruling party and the opposition lazy because both somehow assume that nothing will happen in the Centre until the next general election. So lets focus our energy on the state elections and as states go they can have diverse needs. The issues in the three main states that went to elections – TN, WB and Kerela were different. The BJP is ruled by Advani who I now call the Gordon Brown of indian politics. He, like, Gordon thinks that he has the right to be PM after Vajpeyee (Blair). Until that happens he will continue to lead the party into defeat after defeat and snuff out any growth options for the mid level talent. Other players like Nitish Kumar (my favourite), the Left and what remains of the socialists are marginal. So while there is space for political parties in the centre to be a bit more aggressive they have not really occupied that space.
That then leaves the non-party players. I’ll discuss the peaceful ones here. The non-party players are the various pressure groups of Medha Patkar/Arundhati Roy, Anna Hazare/Baba Ramdev and other RTI, journalists, activists etc. The government very smartly has ensnared some of the good ones into the National Advisory Council which somewhat reduces their credibility for campaigning outside. This is the long argument about changing from within vs change from outside. However, I want to focus on the Hazare and Ramdev phenomenon. These people have been allowed more space for two reasons – one, as discussed above, lacklustre performance of the opposition parties, and two the government didn’t quite see it coming. I think the government was too focussed on the neutralising the parliamentary opposition that it underestimated the ability of these players to tap into the public mood and ask serious governance related questions. These players also managed the media quite well. I often say that the level of the scandals is nothing new, what is new is that people’s perceptions have changed and the political parties have been slow to grasp that issue. The political parties also feel threatened by the support of non-party players as inherent in that support is the message that the voters trust these people more than their elected representatives. An excellent analysis of the Ramdev spectacle is here.
The government has a couple of options ahead – take the bull by its horns and accept that there is corruption (but at lower and isolated levels) and that it will weed it out and that will take the wind away from the Ramdevs of the world. Another option, is to deny it all or call it subjudice and that will drive the people more to Ramdev. Or the third option, is to discredit Ramdev and Hazare and talk about the supremacy of the parliament. Unfortunately, it is a combination of second and third option that is being used at the moment and that doesn’t serve the government well at all. It gives more credit to Ramdev than he deserves and gives the government a bigger mountain to climb. Instead, the MPs who talk about the supremacy of the parliament should be holding these mass contact programs to ascertain the pulse of the people. Maybe this is how it always happens in the middle of the term with the government half bored and the opposition keeping its powder dry till it gets closer to the general election and that gives space to these non-party players.
What will also be interesting is how do Ramdev and Hazare take this forward. Do they stop at the non-corruption bill or do they go onto other things and maybe even form a political party. I for one want these people to form a political parties. The political scene in India is in need of fresh ideas and the voters need a broader choice and i always need new ideas to chew upon.
