Manmohan hits the ground running
By Santwana Bhattacharya
NEW DELHI - A long "second honeymoon" has been scripted for Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh - his government goes into a crucial session of parliament
kicking off on July 2 in such a dominating position that the one thing that can
conceivably go wrong may be the sheer surplus of comfort.
There's no mistaking the looming crises: the very real constraints on the
economy, the task of pursuing growth while simultaneously evolving a
functioning welfare state, the traumatic India-Pakistan relations, the trouble
spilling over on the streets of Kashmir ... a long roster of problems that are
the rightful bequest of any government.
But the contrast between the atmospherics of 2004 and 2009 - the relative
freedom of movement available to the United Progressive Alliance government's
second avatar - can hardly escape anyone's notice as the system prepares for
the passage of finance bills after the ceremonious presentation of the
economic survey, the railway and the general budgets, in that order.
One indication of the high level of confidence is the willingness to take on
something that, at any other time, would have been a red rag to a bull in
parliament: the report on an incident that deeply divided India and impacted
its politics for over a decade. The Liberhan Commission - set up to investigate
the infamous 1992 demolition of the medieval Babri mosque by Hindu
fundamentalists in the Uttar Pradesh town of Ayodhya, believed to be the
birthplace of the revered mythic hero Rama - submitted its report to the prime
minister on Tuesday.
The report itself was in danger of becoming a myth. It took all of 16 years, 48
extensions, 399 sittings and an equivalent of almost US$2 million to be ready.
Manmohan will be tabling the three-volume report, which could prove rather
embarrassing for senior leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), including
leader of the opposition in parliament, Lal Krishna Advani. For years, both the
commission and the government have approached things timidly - mostly with
another extension to postpone the trouble - but not this time.
One can only gasp at the change in the political climate. Compared to the
dramatic disarray in the opposition camp, the comfort zone Manmohan and his
Congress party currently inhabit is enviable. It shows in the tone and content
of official pronouncements, the messianic zeal being exhibited by some cabinet
ministers, the swashbuckling manner in which they are unveiling radically
transformative plans for sundry sectors.
After the Manmohan regime decided it had to give the impression of hitting the
ground running on its second coming, it borrowed from the Barack Obama
dispensation the idea of setting short-term, capsule-like targets - the whole
framework and metaphor and hoopla of 100 days.
In itself, it's not a bad addition to the Indian vocabulary: it invests
governments normally seen as lethargic with a sense of purpose, an illusion of
speed. Government sexed up, in pursuit of the sheen of private-sector
efficiency. In response, Manmohan's ministers have gone into an almost
competitive overdrive, each eager to exhibit not just how quick they are on the
draw but how straight they can shoot.
Education Minister Kapil Sibal drew first. Foremost on his brief, as was
becoming clear in a gathering press campaign, was to consider allowing foreign
universities to participate in India's higher education sector - likely to be a
stormy issue. Instead of broaching that directly, he let loose a slew of
"radical reform" proposals: collapsing all of India's school boards into one
unified board, scrapping the traumatic Class X board exam and shifting from
marks to grades, junking the existing regulatory and accreditation bodies for
university and technical education, going in for the public-private partnership
model in primary education ... all of that in 100 days.
New Law Minister Veerappa Moily, meanwhile, gave notice: "The next five years
would be an era of judicial and legal reforms." He spoke of measures to
radically trim the huge pendency of cases - new civil and criminal courts to
fast-track a notoriously sluggish process, to deliver "affordable and
accessible justice to the last man in the queue". He promised a systematic
attempt to fight the creeping evil of corruption in higher judiciary - making
it mandatory for judges to disclose assets, taking a more serious look at an
impeachment law that has never ever been used.
Also on the anvil were laws to strengthen witness protection, a less severe
attitude to allowing in foreign law firms. In the midst of gay pride rallies in
three big cities, he even made a bold promise to reevaluate a law that still
criminalizes homosexuality in India.
On Thursday, in a historic judgment, the Delhi High Court went ahead and struck
down section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, decriminalizing homosexuality. This
judgment is particularly surprising, given the revisionist thinking that
followed the groundbreaking nature of some of such controversial
pronouncements.
After Islamic and Christian groups expressed loud reservations, the law
minister had to famously renege on his own casually offered pledge to amend
Article 377, the law authored during Lord Macaulay's time that makes "unnatural
sex" a punishable offence. It was hardly, if ever, used punitively on
consensual homosexual activity, but gay rights activists have long wanted the
"criminal" tag to go.
The education proposals too are now slowly finding some opposition - primarily
on the grounds that a subject that's on the concurrent list (with equal
decision-making powers for Delhi and the states) cannot be approached in such a
"unilateral and cavalier" manner, without wide-ranging consultations with all
the stakeholders. The BJP's M M Joshi, a former education minister, hinted that
"in the hurly-burly of 100 days", the UPA was indulging in radicalism for the
effect, without no real transformative intent.
Another backward step came early in the UPA's second life: new Environment
Minister Jairam Ramesh, on the day he took office, said his brief was to ensure
that "environmental clearances do not become an obstacle to growth". Realizing
from the reaction that this was quite an alarming statement to make, he has
since been making elaborate amends - visiting tiger sanctuaries in holiday
attire, getting himself photographed atop an elephant at Corbett Park, while
saying he only wanted to ensure transparency.
For all the welfarism the UPA boasts of, there is an undeniable "neo-liberal"
tinge to it, a clear residue of the Manmohan of old, the man comfortable with
the Washington Consensus. A lot had been said about how, unencumbered by the
left this time, he can have a free run.
A subtle reaction came to it this week when Congress president Sonia Gandhi
decided to reform the National Advisory Council (NAC) - a body of experts,
academics and voluntary sector activists that formulated policies "informally"
outside the pressures of government. The national rural employment guarantee,
the right to information ... these showpiece legislations had first been
drafted by the NAC before it got caught in a technical controversy and had to
be dissolved. Its rebirth gives notice that the Congress party wants a tighter
grip on the reins of policy.
Still, Manmohan is a much freer man now than he was five years earlier. Almost
surprised to find itself in the opposition benches, the BJP had taken out all
its rage via regular disruptions of even routine parliament proceedings.
Manmohan could keep the wounded side at bay only by abjectly surrendering to
his domineering ally - the left bloc. The internecine political warfare, with
little trust on any side, made parliament look more like a bazaar than a
congregation of serious lawmakers.
But in totality, the people appeared to see the BJP and the overbearing left as
obstructionist forces, bent on hounding a suave, soft-spoken Manmohan's image
as a serious economist, not to the manor born but self-made, a picture of the
meritocracy that everyone wanted to see up against a class of egoistic
politicians, worked for him. The times were such that Manmohan was seen as
someone trying to take governance out of its fire-fighting mode to long-term
metamorphic policy initiatives.
Also, the first four years of unprecedented growth that India witnessed during
his first tenure, averaging at 9% of the gross domestic product, largely
benefited the burgeoning middle class, while the left-inspired welfare policies
secured his bottom tier. The smart pre-election move of massive loan wavers to
distressed farmers and pay hikes for the salaried class and the armed forces
under the Sixth Pay Commission and pro-minority measures imparted a humane and
competent look to his government.
The nature of the mandate he got in response has given Manmohan a honeymoon
period he missed out on in 2004. In real terms, it translates into a political
space he never had in his first stint as prime minister. As the curtain goes up
for the first prolonged session of 15th Lok Sabha (Lower House), the government
is in a position to push through its agenda. A Congress functionary quite
flippantly told this correspondent, "Now, it is a Congress-led coalition, not a
government of coalition parties merely headed by Congress. So, the Congress
manifesto is the new Common Minimum Program [CMP]." The jibe was about the CMP
that the left had literally dictated to the previous UPA government.
In contrast, the chief opposition - the BJP and the left - are in dramatic
disarray and trauma. Neither seems to be in a position to put the government to
test in parliament. As the Maoist siege in Lalgarh in the left-ruled West
Bengal showed, the left, though bitterly estranged, is now dependent on the
Congress-led Delhi to bail them out of crisis. Worse still, caught in intense
intra-party struggles, both the BJP and the left are busy with themselves,
leaving the Congress free to consolidate its position politically.
It is worrisome for any democracy to have an opposition in self-destruct mode.
After losing out on power for two consecutive terms, the BJP does not seem very
far from such a path. Take the ridiculous spectacle of a temporary leader of
the opposition, and the game of musical chairs that was on for the seat next to
him when parliament met briefly the last time - different leaders jockeyed to
sit next to Advani on each day, to signal their relative seniority.
The octogenarian Advani, no more in a position to realize his dream of becoming
prime minister, wants to take a final bow from the political arena. That he has
to make way for the next generation has also been made clear by the Rashtriya
Swayamsevak Sangh, the BJP's parent body that controls and regulates it. But
the mutual sniping in the next tier of leadership is so intense that Advani has
to babysit the BJP in parliament for at least six months, till they can settle
on someone who can, by consensus, play this crucial constitutional role.
Not that it stopped the murky public spectacle of BJP leaders - former cabinet
ministers like Jaswant Singh, Yashwant Sinha, Arun Shourie, Sushma Swaraj, Arun
Jaitley or party chief Rajnath Singh - slugging it out in the open. The
skirmishes went on at press conferences, through signed articles in the press
and via sarcastic and dissenting letters to the party leadership that curiously
always found their way to the public eye.
Adding to the decibels were ideologues like Sudheendhra Kulkarni on the one
hand and old dissenter Govindacharya on the other, who has come back from
anonymity to let loose his voluminous critiques on the party leadership. Or
even party sympathizer-cum-journalist Swapan Dasgupta. They are all writing
reams about who and what exactly should be blamed for the party's poll debacle.
In a detailed article, Kulkarni blamed the party's anti-Muslim image: "The BJP
snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, while the Congress managed the
opposite feat." Even now, the party is not willing to look at policy issues
that could have led to their defeat.
While Jaswant Singh, Arun Shourie and Yashwant Sinha blamed Jaitley, the
party's election strategist, Jaitley passed the buck on to the likes of
Kulkarni and other "Advani cronies" who advised him to mount a
presidential-style election targeting Manmohan. Indira Gandhi's other grandson,
Varun Gandhi, who is in the BJP and gave unbelievable hate speeches against
Muslims in his constituency, is also being blamed by one and all. Perhaps, his
speech is the only issue on which there is unanimity in the BJP.
Things came to such a pass that a slew of leaders openly challenged Advani's
decision to name Jaitley as leader of opposition in the Rajya Sabha, the Upper
House, as an attempt to "reward failure". In the process, a crucial
constitutional position has been undermined in a house where the ruling
coalition does not have a clear majority and the BJP could actually have
mounted a healthy vigil. Now every time Jaitley (by all standards a fine
speaker in parliament) gets up to challenge the Treasury benches, the latter
can take it easy knowing that he has no support within his own party.
The Lok Sabha is no better. Senior BJP leaders like M M Joshi and Jaswant Singh
do not like it one bit that Advani has named younger Sushma Swaraj his deputy -
for this virtually means she has been named his successor in parliament.
The situation in the left is no better. The biggest of them, the Communist
Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)), in its post-poll analysis report, has
admitted that certain sections of the party leadership had "lost touch with the
people" thanks to their "corrupt lifestyle" that do not suit communist leaders
in India.
The party boss, general secretary Prakash Karat, has just about fobbed off a
challenge to his leadership, and only because everyone else too is in trouble
and the status quo is the least risky path. But his own political misjudgments,
pulling out of the UPA on the nuclear deal issue and then chasing a Third Front
chimera during the polls, are being debated within party circles, even if in
whispers, and will surely come to haunt him at a later time.
The shambolic state in which these two poles of India's politics - the BJP on
the right, the CPI(M) on the left - find themselves will surely be temporary.
Both are cadre-based political organizations with a relatively democratic party
structure - unlike the pyramidal Congress party with a ruling family on top -
and will find ways to manage their rivaling impulses. And though both were hit
especially hard by the electoral loss and are coping badly with the
repercussions, with varying degrees of dissension, it is the future trajectory
of the Manmohan administration that will likely supply them with oxygen.
Santwana Bhattacharya is a New Delhi-based journalist who writes on
politics, parliament and elections. She is currently working on a book on
electoral reforms and the emergence of regional parties in India.
(Copyright 2009 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved. Please
contact us about
sales, syndication and
republishing.)
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
