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Something's rotten in the state of India
By K Gajendra Singh
While
celebrating the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP)
unexpected victory in three major states last week in
the Hindi heartland of India - Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh
and Chattisgarh - the party's jubilant leader, Prime
Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, asked: "We are called
communal and are accused of practicing communal
politics. But what about this election?" He then added:
"Hum ko bhi aisi asha nahi thi. Hum logone socha tha
two-two ayega" (Even we didn't expect this. We
thought it would be two-two). As it turned out, the
opposition Congress only managed to win in Delhi, of the
four states contested, where it had been in power.
In Delhi state, the government obviously won credit
for better governance because of Supreme Court-led
efforts to control pollution in India's capital,
traffic disarray and other such issues as rape. Which
begs the question, why have a government in Delhi state
when it fails to discharge its functions? The BJP
leadership is generally held responsible for the
ills of Delhi, made worse during its rule, and the
return of its former chief minister would have only made
matters worse.
The Congress, India's oldest
political party, founded in 1885, and led in the past by
Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi, has
mostly had things its way since 1947 post-independence
India, and it still rules in 11 states. Its chief
spokesman, Jaipal Reddy, said: "In Madhya Pradesh, we
have been in power for 10 long years. And in Rajasthan
and Chattisgarh for five years. We see the results
mostly as a product of the anti-incumbency factor."
Downplaying the debacle, he added that the Congress had
been losing and winning in these states in a cyclical
manner over the past three decades.
In the
phrases "anti-incumbency factor" - invented by ruling
parties when they lose elections as a ready excuse - and
"losing and winning in these states in a cyclical
manner" lies hidden a fast deterioration of Indian
polity. The "anti-incumbency factor" phrase is as
obscene as "collateral damage" used by militaries in
their wars. It is symptomatic of the Indian electorate's
loss of faith not only in the so-called leaders, but in
the system itself. In protest electorates have even
voted for eunuchs against party candidates, a real
cultural rebuff in Indian tradition. Other countries
don't appear to have this same factor, yet Indians seem
to take some comfort in a change of regime.
Perhaps it has to do with the fact that the
political elite across the board has imposed an
oppressive system, distorting the letter and spirit of
the constitution and molded it for its narrow ends. It
only serves the political elite and a massive political
parasitic service industry it has spawned.
The
installation of a Vajpayee-led government and winning
the first-ever vote of confidence (274 against 261) in
March 1998 brought euphoria. It represented a millennium
mark in the evolution of India's fast-churning polity
since independence towards its more natural destiny.
After Muslim Turks and others from Central Asia had
established sultanates in and around Delhi in the early
part of the second millennium, for the first time a
Hindu government, tolerant and eclectic but espousing
the aspirations of the over-whelming majority of the
Hindu community, became rulers of Hindustan.
Apart from the BJP (179), the other coalition
partners were former fiery socialist and anti-foreign
merchandise. George Fernandes of the Samata Dal (12) ,
itself a splinter from Other Backward Castes
(OBC)-dominated secular Janata Dal party; Ram Krishan
Hegde's Lok Shakti (3); and Navin Patnaik's Biju Janata
Dal (9) ; Mamata Banerjee (7), who left the Congress
more for personal than ideological reasons; Surjit Singh
Barnala , whose party Shiromani Akali Dal's (8) loyalty
to the country was once questioned, and Brahmin autocrat
Jayalalitha of the All India Anna Dravid Munnetra
Kazhagam (AIADMK-18), an offshoot of the Dravid Munnetra
Kazhagam (DMK), originally established to counter
Brahmin and North Indian domination over the south. The
DMK had even threatened to leave the Indian Union in the
mid-1960s when Hindi was sought to be imposed on south
India.
These heterogeneous groups joined the
government for power, but they diluted and kept in check
the aggressive Hindutva (Hindu dominance) philosophy as
espoused by BJP's fanatic and militant factions, the
Rashtryia Swayam Sevak Sangh (RSS), the Vishal Hindu
Parishad (VHP) and the Bajrang Dal. They also
strengthened the BJP's tolerant mainstream wing, led by
Vajpayee, which was quite happy to keep out of
contentious issues such as a uniform civil code and the
building of a Hindu temple in Ayodhya on the site of a
razed mosque. The BJP's alliances and consensual
approach highlighted that a coalition sensitive to the
diversity of religions and regions, races and languages,
castes and cultures, was preferable to an umbrella party
like Congress.
But like the Congress party
governments, the BJP government also included dynastic
progenies, and pragmatic and opportunistic newcomers,
while its pre-confidence vote maneuverings proved that
the BJP had acquired all the ills and skills of the
Congress in political horse-trading. Despite this, the
installation of a BJP-led government was a major
milestone in the unfolding evolution of Indian polity.
The big question was whether the Hindutva forces
would mellow or create total disruption in the generally
tolerant Hindu community ethos. The fragility and the
future of the BJP-led government today, in spite of its
uneven and divisive rule for nearly six years, resides
in the persona of Vajpayee himself, as no one else in
the party has his stature, credibility and acceptability
at the "all India" level.
There was unease and
fear among Muslims and even Christians whether the
BJP-led government would steamroll their sense of
security and interests. After all, the BJP had built up
its strength with rathyatras (mobile "chariot"
journeys ), including one by now Deputy Prime Minister L
K Advani from Somnath to Ayodhya, invoking memories of
the desecration, demolition and looting of a Hindu
temple at Somnath by Muslim invader Mohammed Gaznavi.
Advani's ride ended with the destruction of the Babri
mosque in Ayodhya, allegedly built on the site of a
temple built for Hindu god Rama.
The
rathyatras and the show of aggressive Hindu
fanatic force to demolish the mosque were to assert
Hindu majoritarian supremacy in the new political
arithmetic after independence.
The demolition on
December 6, 1992, was followed by serious communal riots
all over India, Bombay, now known as Mumbai, being the
most affected. Mostly Muslims, who had protested against
the demolition, were victims. So they retaliated with
revenge bombings in Mumbai, with support from Pakistan,
causing the death of hundreds of people and a terrible
loss of property. The ruling pro-Hindutva party
government in Mumbai, which had won elections by
polarizing the masses, later ignored the findings of a
High Court judge, who held police officials and others
responsible for the killings and arson against Muslims.
Evolution of Indian polity
From the
7th to the 11th century, lack of interaction between
Indians and their Iranian cousins and others in Central
Asia, conquered and dominated by Arab-led Islamic
forces, made India inward looking and fossilized its
caste-based polity. Indian polity lost its mobility,
resilience and the capacity to synthesize and assimilate
new ideas. It went on the defensive against the
conquering Islamic religion and Muslim polity. It
withdrew into its own shell and became frozen. And so it
remained throughout the Muslim rule and British rule
over Hindustan. The latter only perpetuated the static
nature of Hindu polity, reducing Indian rulers as their
aides, notwithstanding some social reform ripples.
Indians never had a revolution, like the French,
Americans, Russians or the Chinese. The Dharma (religion
and duty), put one in one's place. A headman's son could
aspire to be a headmen, an untouchable would remain an
untouchable.
The process of peaceful massive
social engineering through competitive party politics
and reservations in favor of the disadvantaged since
independence has unleased social, political and economic
forces hitherto unseen in Indian history, in the process
rearranging its polity. It shattered the Brahmin-imposed
village autonomy based on a rigid hierarchy of priests,
landowners, traders, artisans and untouchables, which
had survived Muslim and British rule.
Soon,
former bus conductors, petty smugglers, village
pehelwans (wrestlers), and the progeny of peons
could rise to the highest levels of government as chief
ministers and cabinet ministers, as shown by the Lals of
Haryana, the Yadavs of Uttar Pradesh and others. Imagine
the creative and other energies released into the
system, with the profession of politics providing an
ambitious and determined person, but poor, uneducated,
socially and economically disadvantaged, the opportunity
to work his or her way up the system.
Unfortunately, in this free-for-all environment,
many criminal elements, after first helping the
politicians in vote "gathering and controlling", like an
Arab's camel, have moved into the tent (of power). And
the system's inbuilt resilience for corrective action
now appears to have been lost. After watching the slide
into dishonesty, chicanery and total disregard for all
civic norms, first the Election Commission and then the
Supreme Court took some measures to strengthen these
independent institutions, but without great success so
far.
The "Hindu" perception of Dharma and the
rule of law is often quite ambivalent. Hindus believe
that by propitiating local deities and gods (now the
local politician, now the police sub-inspector), one can
escape punishment. It is hoped that recommendations for
an independent Vigilance Commissioner, a Central Bureau
of Investigation and an Enforcement Directorate will be
fully implemented, and that the implementation of the
rule of law will be further strengthened, with the
proper checks and balances of a truly democratic system.
The institutions of the judiciary and the media, so
easily tempted by wily politicians, have to be above
suspicion and exercise their duties without fear and
favor.
Post-independence Brahmin
dominance
Soon after independence in 1947, the
lawyer-led Brahmin-dominated Congress party, with
electoral support from the Scheduled Castes and Tribes
(dalits, former untouchables whom Mahatma Gandhi named
Harijans - children of God) and post-partition defensive
Muslims, ruled India, with the Brahmins monopolizing the
levers of power.
Soon the number of Brahmins
occupying senior government posts doubled. From the
mid-1960s, at the ideological economic level, the new
Congress elite was opposed by maharajas, big
industrialists, traders, landlords and free marketeers
through the Swantantra Party, and at the social level
this elite was challenged by Jats, Yadavs, Ahirsa and
Kurmis, that is, petty landlords and cultivators who had
benefited the most from the post-independence abolition
of zamindari (tax collection on land).
The challenge was first led by Chaudhary Charan
Singh, a Jat, and then by various Lals of Haryana,
Mirdhas of Rajasthan and the Yadavs of the cow belt. But
this process left the dalits squeezed out. Prime
minister Vishwanath Pratap Singh, leading a minority
coalition government, panicked in 1990 and resorted to
the "Mandal card" (further reservations for other
backward classes, OBCs) to outflank his deputy, the
overbearing Devi Lal, leader of the Jats (not included
in the OBC list). It was a devastating mistake.
The thoughtless reservation for OBCs has done
incalculable harm to the Indian polity and the state.
But it did initiate the loosening of the heterogeneous
OBC grouping. Disenchanted with the "Yadavs only"
policies of Laloo Yadav, the Kurmis in Bihar founded
their own Samata Party. At the lowest rung of the
ladder, the dalits, first organized by B R Ambedkar in
the 1930s through the Republican Party of India,
gathered under the umbrella of the Bahujan Samaj Party
(BSP) of Kansi Ram, and then under Mayawati (one name)
in the north. But its leadership is neither astute nor
temperate. The dalits are groaning from the weight of
the creamy layer of Jatavs, Minas and others who have
become the major beneficiary and the "new Brahmins".
Non-Brahmins in Tamil Nadu, and land-owning elements in
Telgu Desam, Kanara and the Maharathas had already
asserted themselves against Brahmin domination. And the
process of the heterogeneous and frozen polity being
split into myriad pieces of castes and sub-castes still
continues.
Is there still some hope? Only if the
political class tries to reform the system, which at the
moment seems most unlikely. It has itself become the
problem. Many people say that MP (member of parliament)
stands for maha pindari (big highway robber) or
maha pakhandi (big fraud). Many politicians would
certainly fit this description. Some say that elections
only mean one set of the pindaris replacing
another. During the state-supported pogrom in Gujarat in
2002 against Muslims, the ruling BJP would not admit to
its crimes. Instead, it brought up the issue of how
under Congress rule in 1984, after the assassination (by
a Sikh) of then premier Indira Gandhi, many thousands of
Sikhs were killed and burnt alive, mostly led by
Congress goons who remain unpunished, to justify the
murders and killings in Gujarat. And even the Supreme
Court did not do its job, with Hindu criminals let off
in collusion with a polarized bureaucracy and the
police. As a result, many Muslims in India have started
joining subversive organizations. The chickens will come
home to roost.
It is amazing that Gujaratis have
refused to learn from events in Sri Lanka, where similar
government-led killings of Tamils led to the creation of
the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and mayhem. Gujarat
borders Pakistan and has a long coastline, traditionally
used for smuggling contraband and arms. The Gujaratis
have exposed their limited social, cultural and
political acumen for short-term gains. They will pay a
heavy price, but the politicians now back in power would
already have made their millions - a Gujarati obsession.
The true nature of Gujaratis has perhaps been hidden too
long because of the persona of Mahatma Gandhi, a
Gujarati.
The same attitude prevails when the
BJP and its allies are caught with their hand in the
till. They start accusing the Congress and other parties
of corruption in the past, as if to justify their own
corruption now. And it continues unabated. The people of
India continue to suffer as they have over centuries.
The political class and their supporting "industry" have
become a burden on the poor masses. Indian democracy has
been reduced to ritual festivals and ministry
formations, both occasions for free-for-all money
exhorting. With many jaded film stars now in the
cabinet, the tamasha (play acting ) is now
complete. That is all that the electorate mostly gets.
During the recent elections, film stars were lured by
political parties to gather crowds.
And it
should be noted that the recent state election results
have nothing to do with the so-called rise of women's
power. Both Uma Bahrti and Vasundhara Raje were forced
by the BJP to become chief ministers - in Madhya Pradesh
and Rajasthan, respectively. During the election
campaigns, TV channels were saturated with
advertisements projecting Vasundhara as a sincere,
attractive and even glamorous chief ministerial
aspirant. Uma Bharati was bluntly told by law minister
Arun Jaitley to not over-exert herself and be mindful of
her appearance. She should not, it was stressed, look
either tired or disheveled.
Regardless of
whoever is in power, though, the wheel of unending
suffering of the Indian masses will continue. And after
the next elections, and the next. So apart from
defeating the current "rascals" in power, what purpose
is served? The political class has totally destroyed the
instruments of governance. And no country or corporate
organization can last without good bureaucracy or
administration. The Ottoman Empire, based on the merit
system for recruitment and promotion, lasted for 600
years. When distortions entered the system, the empire
rapidly declined and collapsed. The Roman Empire also
lasted long because it, too, was initially based on
merit. It was possible for a citizen from anywhere to
become an emperor. So the attempt by some journalists to
compare the US with the Roman Empire is incorrect.
In the Indian system, under the spreading
pernicious system of reservations, a variation of the
Brahaminical caste system, the Indian political class
has institutionalized mediocrity and decay. The loyalty
of the bureaucracy and other levers of power is to
individuals, families, caste dynasties, and not to the
state. In this situation, families and mafia rule.
One minister once even commented that the
civilian head of a government department was only a
servant of the political minister, who could ask the
latter to prepare tea. Sadly, this is what really
happens. The political class is delighted at the
humiliation of the bureaucracy (but which only weakens
the state) which it envies and hates. Now most
bureaucrats become handmaidens of politicians and become
minor pindaris themselves.
Apart from the
judiciary, the media should keep a watch on political
parties and the bureaucracy. There may be a free-for-all
among the Indian media, but they have largely lost their
mission and professional integrity. Many of them are
compromised by study grants and well-paid visits to the
West for seminars and short courses. Many media barons
have an unholy relationship with politicians, not for
principles, but for pelf and power. They feed on each
other.
Conclusion
It is a matter of
national shame that successive prime ministers during
the past 30 years have refused to pass a bill to appoint
an ombudsman, who would be empowered to look into
corruption and other charges against ministers and
members of parliament and other politicians. Quite
clearly, politicians are not interested in eradicating
corruption among themselves. Many corruption trials have
been going on for decades, with the courts functioning
at a snail's pace as politicians are involved. And these
scams are invariably used before elections to throw mud
at an opponent.
Any "feel good" atmosphere that
there might be in the country is mostly among the ruling
political classes, its support industry and allied
industrial and trading classes. The poor are still left
to the whims and mercy of corrupt politicians and
policemen.
The body of the fish rots only when
its head gets infected. Unless cabinet ministers,
members of parliament and other politicians are brought
under the ambit of the law and the guilty punished,
their ill-gotten wealth confiscated, there is little
hope of India taking its place in the comity of
fully-developed nations.
The elite talk of
looking at half a glass of water and seeing it as half
full, not half empty. Many people do not have a glass,
some have never even seen one. Those who celebrated the
recent state elections in a five-star hotel should
ponder the fact that before the arrival of the British
East India Company in the late 18th century, the
sub-continent's share in world manufacturing was 24.5
percent in 1750 ( 32.8 percent for China ). But by the
time the British had finished with India, the
sub-continent's share had fallen to 1.7 percent (in
1900) and that of the British increased from 1.9 percent
(in 1750) to 22.9 percent (in 1880) - Rise and fall
of Big Powers by Professor Paul Kennedy.
The
islands of information technology and call center
prosperity in India are like the factories established
by foreign companies from the 16th to the 18th
centuries. India cannot even assure uninterrupted power
supply to the citizens of its capital city Delhi.
Unless India transforms it polity, it will
resemble the 11th century at the time of the invasions
from the northwest, or during the last centuries of
Moghul rule, when every job was for sale and groups of
Marathas, Jats, Rohillas, Sikhs and invaders roamed
around the country looting and inflicting misery on the
suffering masses of Hindustan.
The head of the
fish is in danger of becoming seriously infected, after
which the body will rot.
K Gajendra
Singh, Indian ambassador (retired), served as
ambassador to Turkey from August 1992 to April 1996.
Prior to that, he served terms as ambassador to Jordan,
Romania and Senegal. He is currently chairman of the
Foundation for Indo-Turkic Studies. Email
Gajendrak@hotmail.com
(Copyright 2003 Asia
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