Is the BJP losing its momentum?

Behavioral scientists have many a times noted that human beings tend to attribute success to one’s own efforts while blaming every possible factor (other than the self) for any failure. Like any other aspect of human behavior, this tendency too is not without exceptions. At the same time, these exceptions, when people rise above their frailties and share credit of success and own blame for failures are rare indeed. It is hence, not without reason, that individuals who display such behavior in a consistent manner and considered a class apart among their peers.

Likewise, human psyche is wired to accept tidings which seem favorable and discount omens when they deem unfavorable. History is replete with instances where a people had to pay the price for ignoring dire tidings of doom.

As a rule, political parties across the world, tend to accept findings of opinion polls only when they favor them. This approach of trashing an unfavorable poll cannot really be faulted for not only have polls proved erroneous on numerous occasions, accepting the validity of opinion polls as a given would ipso facto do away with the need to conducting real elections altogether.

Yet, in spite of all limitations associated with opinion polls, political parties of all hues rely on them heavily, if for nothing, they do provide a window on the prevailing sentiment. Given their utility, it is quite strange to witness a scenario where the BJP seems to be ignoring / dismissing the warning messages being delivered by the current set of opinion polls.

A consistent trend while all the polls across Jan, Feb and March 2014 have thrown up, is the stunting of the BJP/Modi wave. In state after state, particularly Bihar, the projected vote share of the BJP is either slipping or barely holding. Even at the risk of being called an alarmist, I would submit that something, somewhere, of the BJP’s electoral strategy is not working. The Modi wave was supposed to continuously gain strength till the last vote was cast. Here, it would seem that the BJP plateaued in January and the consistent attacks from all its opponents is gradually, but steadily chipping away on its gains. While the latter conclusion may still be questioned by the faithful, can it not be conclusively said that no further support is accruing to the party. After all, if the polls were kosher when they showed the party going from strength to strength, they cannot become treyf only because they are not as positive any longer.

In 2004, when elections were initially announced, the BJP was expecting to easily cross the 200 seat mark on its own. Almost all opinion polls projected a spectacular return for the NDA. However, as the elections progressed, the number kept on declining. Yet, when the NDTV published a 255-260 seats projection for the NDA, it was simply dismissed by the BJP. It cannot be possible that the top leadership were completely indifferent to the public mood. AB Vajpayee’s declaration that there was no difference in between the SP and the BJP was nothing if not the BJP veteran’s uneasy reaching out to the SP for support in case the NDA fell short of the majority. Yet, while Vajpayee may have felt the undercurrent, the BJP as a whole was impervious to any idea that it could lose. We know what the final results were. 

Even otherwise, the most positive opinion polls need to be viewed conservatively. A case in point would be the projections in Uttar Pradesh. For the last many elections, all opinion polls have consistently projected BJP performing better than what the final results have been. At the same time, hardly has any poll captured BSP's strength. If the trend holds true even this time, the projected BJP performance of 40 seats may turn out to be a measly 25! From where will the gaps be filled then?

If our Nation has to be delivered from the mess of the last 10 years, the ruling party needs to be in a comfortable majority. A BJP with 180-190 seats will be anything but comfortable. For those who forget, NDA 1 was led by a 182 seat BJP, but was hobbled by the AIADMK. For that matter, even 210-220 seats are 62-52 seats less than the majority, a number which cannot be reached with the current set of allies. The BJP owes it to the Nation to provide fresh impetus to its engine which seems to be slowing down. It cannot behave as if it has won the elections already. If it behaves like the victor, people will vote on the merits-demerits of Modi alone and not on the merits-demerits of the UPA. Why should the misdeeds of the UPA be allowed to become a distant memory when those misdeeds, when effectively highlighted, can by themselves provide much of the fuel required for the final lap. Further, victories become difficult to achieve when you substitute your foot-soldiers with mercenaries. Have mercenaries by all means, for they provide the effective force multiplier. But, please do not make the mistake of imagining those people as your core supporters.

The first vote is yet to be cast and it is still a long race. Can the BJP really afford to relax and not take corrective actions, when very clearly, its lead over the competitors is shrinking?

The battle is not won yet!

Indian history is replete with tales where the Indian army seemed on verge of a victory just before some event decisively changed the course of the war. Sometimes it was sheer bad luck, at times bad strategy and in a few instances, complacency. Nothing could illustrate Indian complacency better than the image of Rama Raya directing the Vijayanagara – Bahmani war (Battle of Talikota, 1965) in a luxurious palanquin, right in the battlefield. The inevitable happened. Mobility severely hampered, Rama Ray was caught and decapitated by the Bahmani forces (some accounts say that he was burnt while still half alive) and glory of the Vijayanagara Empire was snuffed forever.

Closer home and in a totally unrelated field, we have been made to believe as to how Milkha Singh lost out on an Olympic medal on account of lessening his speed/looking back, inspite of leading the first lap. At more personal levels, each one of us, at some or the other point in life, would have witnessed a proverbial ‘slip in between the cup and the lip’.

If the above proverb holds true, then why would the BJP leadership embark on an electoral strategy which might lead to their doom again? It would seem that having succeeded in capturing the pole position or at least in public perception, the BJP seems to have started believing that the battle is already won. Howsoever well placed its confidence might be, a handful of factors might still result in the final results being very different from the party’s expectations.

·    Modi: Make no mistakes. The BJP’s perceived lead is a result of Modi’s leadership. A spell of ‘collective leadership’ or the image of a karate chop wielding LK Advani would have excited the people the way it did in 2009!. Yet, the focus on Modi has meant that rather than the issue being why Congress/UPA should be kicked out, the central issue of these elections is now Modi. At one level, while this may enthuse the faithful, at another plane it may make the undecided voter and the fencesitter forget that these elections are an opportunity to punish the Congress for its sins and an opportunity to rescue India from the mess she has been placed in. These voters, when bombarded with allegations seeking to puncture holes in the Gujarat growth story, on Modi’s vision, his suitability for the PM’s post, is more likely to develop a skepticism of Modi and miss out on the reality that while Modi may be not be the most optimal option, will a Rahul, a Mamata, a Jayalalitha, a Mulayam, a Laloo, a Chidambaram, or any other Manmohan/Gujaral clone, even remotely be a better option? How long will people remember that a vote against Modi, be it to any party, would in effect mean a vote for sustaining the disaster the Nation has been facing for the last one decade! After all, the BJP still does not have a slogan for Modi which could resonate as well as “Main kehti hoon – Garibi hatao. Woh kehte hain Indira hatao”!

Unidimensional Image: The entire campaign around Modi has been focused on painting him as a decisive leader. What we see from posters is the image of a man smirking, seelingly focused but carrying a haughty demeanour.

Worldwide, even dictators do not project a single persona. Totalitarian states like China and North Korea direct huge efforts in promoting their leaders as having a well-rounded personality – people who are decisive and firm but still blessed with warm human qualities. Indira Gandhi was not seen as a Durga alone. She was also seen as Indiramma by millions. For the Congress, we have a campaign built around the humane aspects of a photogenic fair-skinned Rahul Gandhi. Can it really be said that many, particularly the women, the elderly and the villagers, will not be attracted by the image of a Rahul Gandhi of soulful eyes and emotional bearing when compared to a smug looking Modi?

Does it really take that much to project a smiling, a laughing Modi, mingling with children, the women and the elderly, not as a speaker on a podium, but on equal terms? If this seems a stretch – well, Indians have a fetish for symbolism and imagery. The person who understood it the best is still deified as the Father of our Nation!

·     Turncoats galore: Historically, the BJP has seen 3 phases of ingress within its ranks. The first was in 1991, when riding high on its 1989 electoral performance and the 1990 Rath Yatra, it seemed to promise a new means of Governance. The second was in 1998, when the Congress seemed doomed to oblivion and the BJP was seen as the party whose moment had arrived. The third phase was 2004 when the NDA seemed poised to return to power. It is interesting to note that except for a few, most who joined the BJP in the early 90s have either retired or do not hold important positions within the party any longer. Whether it is a result of the party’s dilution of its ideology or a combination of other factors, is not known. Leaders who joined in the late 90s continue to be in the party and hold important roles, moulding its viewpoints / mode of governance. Interestingly, quite a few of those who joined in 2004, silently and not so silently, left the party when they realized that the Congress was here to stay. These were the people who were purely creatures of power and would move wherever they could cling to it. A BJP in opposition was hardly a good enough option for them.

Like any organization seeking to grow big, a political party too, has to tap both organic and inorganic sources. Hence, there is nothing wrong in the BJP absorbing erstwhile rivals in its ranks. However, a line has to be drawn when these erstwhile rivals are of the likes of those who have joined the party in the last few weeks. Some of them are:

• Ramkripal Yadav – a life-long secularist who had nothing but abuse for BJP all along. The only reason he has joined the party was denial of an election ticket to him
• Udit Raj – This self-proclaimed leader of Dalits has been in news only on account of his tirades against Hinduism, the RSS, the BJP and so on. A person devoid of any electoral base, what exactly does this anti ideologue bring to the BJP’s table?
• Satpal Maharaj – if the Uttarakhand BJP was short of factions, we now have the 10, Janpath ultra-loyalist Satpal Maharaj in the BJP now. A lifelong Congressman, he left the Narasimha Rao led Congress along with ND Tiwari, demanding to make Sonia Gandhi the Congress President and Prime Minister. A religious leader with large following, he has been at loggerheads with the BJP on both political and ideological issues
• Jagdambika Pal – a political lightweight, who was anointed as the UP CM by Romesh Bhandari. Has usually had only the choicest of abuses for the BJP 

The above notings are only illustrative as the intent here is not to make a list of people who should not have been in the BJP. The issue on absorbing turncoats is two pronged:

Are those who have toiled for years for the party subordinated to those who only had expletives for the BJP till the other day? Can it really be expected that a voter would not be disgusted by the sight of a Ramkripal Yadav standing on a BJP ticket? Will the committed BJP voter really vote for him?

While a Jaswant Singh may not be the greatest of political assets for the BJP, can there be any doubt that he is a much better BJP candidate than a Sona Ram who had lost even the assembly elections. Forget the voter, can the BJP/RSS worker really have heart to work for a Sona Ram or a Satpal Maharaj’s victory when he sees leaders, who had been with him for years being sidelined and humiliated for the sake of those who had little standing even in their own parties?

·     Voter outreach: Compared to the 2004 and 2009 elections, the BJP certainly seems to have improved its voter outreach. However, it seems to be relying a little too heavily on three factors – Modi rallies, online campaign and the RSS. However, this skewed focus on high visibility campaign modes may not necessarily result in desired results. The reasons are simple. Rallies are attended by the party cadre, the committed, the curious and the paid. Modi rallies have achieved what they could, i.e., a strong buzz in favor of the party. However, not only is the reach of rallies limited, they do not cover the last mile, i.e., of ensuring that even the rally attender actually ventures out to vote. As regards online campaigns, except for segments A & B of the society, does it really reach the voter in an effective manner? Certainly, the impact of online campaigns in city segments could be high. But while they will reach the voter in an Akola or a Rourkela, will it create an impact enough to reach a critical mass of voters? As regards RSS, well! Where they are known, its swayamsevaks are seen more as social workers and are not necessarily people who can influence voting choices. Also, given their very nature of training within the RSS, it is difficult for them to be engaged in ferreting people from their homes to the polling booth, on the day of the voting.

Unlike the Marxists and the caste identity based parties, the support base of the BJP are politically conscious part time alone. The summer heat, prospect of a day’s rest or simple household chores may be motivator enough for many of the supporters to feel that they have completed their duties by pressing a ‘like’ button on Facebook or engaging in an online spat with some rival party supporter.

One misses the zeal and enthusiasm which the RSS/VHP/ BJP workers displayed in mobilizing support in the elections of 1991, 96, 98 and 99. It is these people who ensured that latent support was translated to votes. The model was simple – continuous communication and aggressive follow up till the vote was cast on the election day. Indian elections are won and lost at booths. If the BJP’s campaign does not manage to make its supporters come out and vote, there will be a large mis-match between expectations and actual performance.

  

Some BJP leaders might be salivating at the prospect of the party ending with 160-180 seats, which would rule Modi out and give them a shot at power. This may have prompted handing over of tickets to many who stand no chance at the hustings. What such leaders may not realize is that today’s Congress with even 140 seats is much better placed to form a Government as compared to a BJP with 180 seats. A third stint in the opposition will ring a death knell to the BJP as a National Party. Like the Janata parivar, it will disintegrate into numerous regional parties, leaving only the Congress with a pan India presence. Even more importantly, does India have any more capacity to absorb any more blows, existential blows which are certain corollary to a UPA 3 or a 3rd Front Government?

It is no 'Alternative'

“This book is cleverly and powerfully written. The carefully chosen quotations give it the false appearance of a truthful book. But the impression it leaves on my mind is that it is the report of a drain inspector sent out with the one purpose of opening and examining the drains of the country to be reported upon, or to give a graphic description of the stench exuded by the opened drains. If Miss Mayo had confessed that she had come to India merely to open out and examine the drains of India, there would perhaps be little to complain about her compilation. But she declared her abominable and patently wrong conclusion with a certain amount of triumph: 'the drains are India'.”

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi – on Katherine Mayo’s Mother India

Katherine Mayo was an American researcher and historian. Her fame or rather infamy in India rests with her magnum opus ‘Mother India’ in which she attacked the Hindu society and religion, alluding to the treatment of its women, the Harijans (as known then), the animals, the dirt and the character of its politicians. As was expected, the British welcomed and enthusiastically propagated the book. Even more expectedly, the book outraged Indians and over fifty books/pamphlets were penned in response. Some of these highlighted the gross errors and inaccuracies in the book while others sought to denounce the ‘conclusions’ of Mother India on more polemical grounds.

Unfortunately, Ms Mayo’s work proved to be a powerful influence on the American view of India. A simple testimony to it would be the fact that Mother India is known even today and hardly any of its rebuttals elicit any recall.

Katherine Mayo was neither the first nor the last foreigner who looked at India and the Hindu society with suspicion and disdain. While the Indian society will remain indebted to those who discovered and propagated the wealth of Indian thought, we, as a Nation, cannot but ignore the immense damage the numerous ‘drain inspectors’ have inflicted on our psyche and the way we are perceived by the ‘others’.

James Mill wrote an authoritative ‘The History of British India’ without ever visiting the country. Yet, this book, published in 1818 brought him fame as an expert on India and within a year, he was appointed to the India house. The book and his seventeen years of association with India effected a dramatic change in the way the Nation was perceived by the British and consequently, on how it was governed. No longer was the Hindu seen as a descendant of a noble and cultured race, now enslaved. It was declared "under the glosing exterior of the Hindu, lies a general disposition to deceit and perfidy.” (chapter titled General Reflections in 'Of the Hindus', The History of British India). It will not be an exaggeration to say that this highly influential work, particularly the section 'Of the Hindus' comprising ten chapters, played a huge part in cementing Indophobia and hostility to Orientalism.

Why so much of history?

Because history is repeating itself – both as a tragedy and a farce. The banshee like wailing over withdrawal of the book by Penguin India is turning bizarre and ‘bizarrer’. Not only have the protestors been labelled Taliban, Penguin’s act has been linked to the likelihood of the BJP coming to power. Some worthies have condemned it as being grievously harmful to Hinduism while others lament on how the protesters are not true Hindus ala their inability to live the liberal ethos of their religion

How much merit do these arguments have when the self proclaimed liberals declare this voluntary withdrawal a ban? How can their painting of book protestors as fascists be taken seriously when these protestors have engaged in a very civil, legal and constitutional mean of registering their protest?

Yet, since even the most well meaning may get swayed by magical wordsmithery of the Arundhati Roys and Ramachandra Guhas of the world, it will do good to analyse the ‘real’ arguments surrounding this controversy.

1. Prof Doniger is an academic. Academic works have to be accepted.

Do academic credentials provide immunity from inspection and criticism? Or is it rather that a tenured academician has a higher responsibility towards ensuring rigorous scientific enquiry before reaching conclusions?  

The criticism of ‘The Hindus...’ is based on its factual inaccuracies. Detailed chapter wise listing of these errors has been shared by many scholars/laypersons. Yet, Prof Doniger’s response to all criticisms has been a haughty ad hominem dismissal of the critics as Hindutva torchbearers. Even if all the critics were communalists, how does it validate Ms Doniger’s countless errors and inaccuracies? If we don’t have qualms in questioning and revisiting scriptures, which millions believe to be divine revelations, how can some output of a mere professor be above scrutiny?

2. The Hindus…’ is fruit of laborious labour. It provides an alternative view to the Hindu history

For a view-point to be seen as alternative, the original/mainstream must be known. What exactly is the original Hindu history as per Prof Doniger? Her book makes no reference to any such creature. It is her conclusions alone which are both the alternative and the mainstream!

The above statement may sound rhetorical. It is not, when you consider that the learned Prof uses twentieth and twenty first century ‘works’ to analyse Ramayana and Mahabharata.

3. Prof Doniger is being targeted because she is uncovering uncomfortable facts regarding our deities. She is being targeted for she is white.

KM Munshi’s stellar work, Krishnavatar narrates the life story of Krishna and the Pandavas. Though a devout Hindu (a revivalist and communalist as per the Marxist school), Munshi’s Krishna is not God. Iravati Karve declared Ramayana to be work of fiction and concluded that Yudhishthir was the son of Vidur through Niyoga. Recently, Amish Tripathi’s Shiva trilogy depicted a somewhat hippie like mortal as Shiva. Numerous texts, both ancient and medieval have commented and criticised gods over acts which are seen to have digressed from the path of Dharma. Yet, none of the above has been deemed offensive. It is because these alternative viewpoints stand subordinated to the spirit of enquiry and a general respect for the larger belief system.

Prof Diana Eck, another of the ‘white’ professors has been writing on Hinduism for long. Prof Eck too, has tried to analyse the roots of many practices of Hinduism. But, challenging her views might be, they are not offensive, if only because Prof Eck seeks reasoning and does not seem to be on a mission of invent and degenerate!

4. Hinduism has withstood numerous challenges over the last two millennium. How can a mere book harm it?

A three pronged answer to the above

One - The Hindu faith survived not because people comforted each other that it is too strong to be uprooted. It survived because across ages, great men and their followers took it upon themselves to defend their way of life and worship. At times, this meant taking up the role of missionary philosophers, at other times, military warriors, at times, bhakti saints and yet at some other times, social reformers.

Two – Works like ‘The Hindus…’ Kali’s Child or ‘Oh Terrifying Mother’ are not unique. Right from the time the missionaries identified India as the dark land, fit for an enormous harvest, many critiques of the Nation, its people, its faith, its culture have kept churning out with amazing frequency. But, even till the early twentieth century, each ‘Mother India’ had at least fifty responses. We do not have that luxury now. In fact, we don’t even need a Katherine Mayo to write another ‘Mother India’ for we have many Indians who will gladly do such hatchet jobs now.

Three – Our perception of self is to a large extent driven by how the others perceive us. The emerging ‘scholarship’ from the West, sired effectively by the likes of Wendy Doniger, Sarah Caldwell, Jeffery Kripal, et al and aided even more effectively by our own ‘useful idiots’, has successfully turned Hinduism studies as a study of the kinky, the exotic, the bizarre and the revolting. Works like ‘The Hindus…’ threaten the very space of practitioners for any attempt by the latter to correct the misrepresentations are denounced as fascism. It the invented ‘alternative’ becomes the mainstream, how exactly will the displaced original survive? If it sounds hyperbolic, just think of ‘Tantra’ in the western context. The immediate imagery is of ‘Tantrik sex’ and not of an alternate means of worship. How much respect will others have for Hindus if all their awareness of the faith is underlined by such abominations as ‘the red dot is symbolic of menstrual fluid’, ‘breaking of coconut is a proxy for human sacrifice’, ‘the handing over of a staff as the time of the sacred thread ceremony is symbolic of the father handing over his penis to his son’. This list can go on and on. Do people, or at least who believe, not have both a right and a duty to contest such portrayals of their faith?

Overall, ‘The Hindus…’ is just a ghastly work. It is a sad commentary on the moral and intellectual bankruptcy of some of our academicians that they are fighting for restitution of mischief and falsehoods.

PS

In a previous post, I had shared my views on why Prof Wendy Doniger’s – Hindus, An Alternative History is a bad book! In another post, I had commented on the Supreme Court upholding the ban on RV Bhasin’s book on grounds of social peace. In yet another post, I had expressed my anguish on the systemized muzzling of contrarian views. Hence, I have attempted not to repeat myself in the above note.

But they are ours...!

‘Yahya maybe a bastard but he is our bastard’.

A supposed comment made by the US President, Richard Nixon, when the facts of the Pakistani army’s war against the Hindus and Awami League supporters in East Pakistan became known.

To the genteel, such comments may seem horrifying, particularly when this b****** was committing a genocide in East Pakistan. However, what gets missed is that even if in varying degrees, each one of us is blessed / cursed with such sentiments. For one, parents are supposed to be oblivious to shortcomings of their children, friends are supposed to stand up for each other even when in wrong. After all, what are bonds if they are so weak that they cannot stand the strain of some human frailty!

Yet, human culture celebrates as heroic those acts, where actions and their consequences are weighed for their intrinsic worth. Those instances where a mother overcomes her maternal instincts to turn over a renegade progeny aka real life Mother Indias, where a wife kills her husband for his crimes, where one overcome your patriotism and attempt to kill a monster aka Count Stauffenberg, are stuff which legends are made of. The very fact such instances are few indicate that ordinary humans find it easier to turn a blind eye or rationalize acts which seem condemnable when committed by others.

Very soon after the Indian National Congress (not the current namesake but the vanguard of National struggle for Independence) had tasted power in the provinces, it was clear to both the leaders and the general public that the Indian office bearers were not very different when compared to their British counterparts as far as arrogance and a proclivity to enjoy the fruits the fruits of power were concerned. In fact, many of the office bearers saw no harm in using their new found powers to indulge in acts which even in the politest forms, would be called acts of nepotism and corruption. While these developments dismayed Gandhi, other leaders with a high moral quotient and the general public, there was little which they could do. At one level, there wasn’t any alternative to the INC and probably even more importantly, condemning the rogue acts would have been an admission that their beliefs in greatness of their leaders was misplaced.

Such trends continued and with hardening of political identities, party supporters very frequently find themselves indulging in all sorts of reasoning theatrics in attempting to defend the indefensible. This does not necessarily mean that all these supporters have a misbalanced sense of the right and the wrong. The reason could be as mundane as one’s perception of lack of better alternatives, belief in a particular ideology or a probably a deeper instinct of self preservation which makes people unwilling to accept that they had made bad choices. However, the ability of a human being to condone faults and overlook mistakes being limited, it does not take long before a vocal defence makes way for a sullen indifference.

For those who supported the Hindu Mahasabha, the RSS, the Jana Sangh and even the Swatantra Party, BJP’s ascendancy to power was seen as culmination of a decades long struggle. Hence, all these people who supported this political stream with all their might even in years when it had no chance to come to power, were willing to condone a tactical stepping back on those issues which made the BJS/RSS/BJP different from all the other options available in the market. However, which each passing blunder – Tehelka arms sting, the Kandhar hijack, China border agreement give-away, the erstwhile unalloyed support started giving way to convoluted reasoning, chiefly around a comparative logic – ‘Just look at the Congress, they are much worse’. What happens when such logic is stretched to the extremes? You start resembling the one you despise.

Most of the time, exceptional performance in the field of arts, sciences and sports are not a result of a breakthrough but of incremental improvements – a tweak here, a betterment there. It is the collective impact of all minor but continuous improvements spread over a period of time, that differentiate the exceptional from the ordinary.

What holds true for incremental improvements, holds equally true for decremental changes too. A compromise here, a mis-step there, a blunder at yet another occasion – all these together ensure that your USP is lost. The same way, the six year old Vajpayee government, though better in relative sense (vis-à-vis the current dispensation), came to be seen as a Congress clone. The result was a silent disassociation of its core support base and loss of its innate appeal to its natural constituency – the youth, the middle and the intermediate classes.

What we are seeing today is a manifestation of the same phenomenon. The AAP surge was powered by the youth, inspired by its promise to fight corruption. Today, the party is seen to have started adopting those very practices which it stood against – pandering to communal and casteist emotions, tokenism, readiness to grab loaves of office, willingness to compromise with corruption etc. The very vocal volunteers, who have invested so much in making the party a success, are even more vocally defending the party against criticism. The point is – for how long? AAP is running the risk of diluting its core plank of corruption and be seen as another clone of the Congress. If only its supporters realize even if the transgressing b****** is our b******, some course correction is required, for its own good and for the greater good of the country!

Maid, Diplomacy and Nationhood

With the Khobragade affair having had its moments under the sun for quite an extended period, it is unlikely that any further development in the case will be highlighted in the way her arrest was.

The facts of the case are pretty simple. An Indian diplomat was arrested for a crime, which by no stretch of imagination, can be considered so grave as to warrant the arrest. For once, the habitual anti-US jholawallahs were right in denouncing the US for its hypocrisy.  The US extends the principal of diplomatic immunity to a CIA agent who murders two people in Pakistan and to a Kenya based diplomat who kills people through rash driving, but declines it to the Indian diplomat on the spurious ground of the immunity being limited to ‘consular duties’.  This is duplicity enough. Period.

While commentators sympathetic to the current Government have gone ga-ga over its supposed muscular response in form of removing security barricades and withdrawing airport privilege passes, the issue has rent the curtain on many a disturbing practices and huge faultlines in public opinion.

If diplomatic relations are based on the principle of reciprocity, why exactly are the US and many other embassies offered such benefits which are not available to their Indian counterparts? The Indian Embassy in US does not even have a reserved car park forget about security barricades. Our ambassador, ex-president and serving ministers are patted down while even the family members of the US diplomatic staff seem to carry non-photographed transferrable security passes which allow them access to even restricted areas of our airports. They are allowed to run provision stores, import provisions and liquor duty free while our diplomats have none of these benefits. So, why and when did we start extending these ‘courtesies’ to those who do not reciprocate? Is it because, as some foreign affairs observers have suggested, that our establishment has huge interests in pandering to American policy makers – for Ivy League seats and plush jobs, green cards, citizenship etc for their children and their willingness to turn a blind eye to their money laundering activities from India? Even in the Khobragade affair, this lady is married to a US citizen.  A diplomat is expected to work for her country and place its interests first. How can a person, even if of impeccable integrity, be seen as working in an independent manner when her spouse is a citizen of the country she has to deal with? How was she even deputed to that country?

So far as our muscular response is concerned, how exactly does withdrawal of additional benefits count as reciprocal reaction? Maybe, it only requires a state dinner for some minister and all these benefits would be restored again!

India must be the only country in this world which has mutely stood by when its Diaspora has been trampled upon by much lesser Nations. In the last 65 years, Indians were expelled or made to leave many countries – Burma, Ceylon, Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, Fiji, but each time our response was either empty bluster or stony silence. We are a Nation where even the highest court of the land does not find anything amiss in allowing white-skinned murderers to be released so that they can celebrate Christmas at home! When China transgresses and eats up our territory slowly, our only response is to pretend that such events never happened. Next we know, our Prime Ministers and Foreign Ministers are falling our backwards to give more and more concessions to China. At the time then the NDA was in power, Colin Powell visited Delhi before landing in Islamabad to declare Pakistan a major non-NATO ally. He did not deem it important enough to inform the Indians of the impending declaration. Surprise, surprise – rather than the US trying to explain on why this piece of information was missed, we had the spectacle of Indian ministers and officials trying to drum up excuses for the US.

Is it any wonder that we get treated the way we are?

Unlike in past events where International slights had served to unite public opinion, the general reaction to Ms Khobragade’s arrest has been mixed. A large section of people seem to believe that the diplomat got her just desserts. Some have questioned the riches obtained by the diplomat and her father, seemingly much above their known sources of income, and see her arrest as karma. Many posts on social networking sites speak of the snootiness of the bureaucracy and how those who believed they were above the law, have been justly brought down to the ground.

Such comments are unfortunate for they do not talk of the same issue. The diplomat here is an official representative of India and her ill-treatment is, in many ways is symptomic of the host Nation’s contempt for India itself. The point on the individual belonging to a class which is seen as being haughty, corrupt and disdainful of law is a different issue altogether. Yet, if the general public is moving towards divorcing its identity from the artefacts of the Indian Nationhood, we are heading for much more disturbing times.

Only a couple of centuries back, western historians had noted with bewilderment, the indifference of the Indian peasant to his rulers.  In battle after battle, they would see the Indian peasants going around their daily routine, tilling their land, grazing their cattle, only miles away from the battlefield where the native forces were getting worsted. This state of affairs had come along for the Aam Aadmi of those days had recognised the rulers for what they were –a self indulgent, corrupt and parasitic lot. It hardly mattered to them if the name of that ruler changed. It was in this context that Goswami Tulsidas had commented – ‘Raja bhaye koi, hamra ki hani’, i.e., whosoever is the ruler, what difference does it make to my plight?

Maybe these are too early days and hopefully, our sense of Nationhood is more robust. But still, it would do good if the ruling classes understand that if the distance between the rulers and the ruled increases too much, there generally comes a day where there is nothing left to rule.

AAP aaye bahaar aayi

The election debacle of 1993, when the BJP could win only two of the five assemblies, was in effect a decisive turning point for Hindutva politics in India. Even though the BJP later broke new ground by forming the first saffron Government in Maharashtra, the reality of its limited geographical reach across vast swathes of the country, made the dream of a BJP Government seem very distant. True, the PV Narasimha Rao led Congress Government seemed thoroughly discredited in that summer of 1996, and all polls pointed to BJP becoming the single largest party in the Parliament; still, there seemed little chance of Atal Bihari Vajpayee becoming the Prime Minister, on account of the BJP’s ‘majestic isolation’. Hence, the act of the then President, Dr Shankar Dayal Sharma, in going by the rule-book and inviting Vajpayee to form the Government, was seen differently by different shades of opinions.

For the secular establishment, it was a travesty of constitutional politics that a party with no chance of obtaining majority being asked to form a Government, for the non-committed, an open invite to the worst forms of political bargaining, and for the BJP supporters & sympathizers, a shot at fulfillment of a decades old dream!

On a personal note, I recall watching the live telecast of the swearing in ceremony, with tears in my eyes. Those were of course, tears of joy for even though a BJP supporter ever since my political consciousness took shape, I had not really thought that a BJP Government was possible for the next many years. Many newspaper reports of those days record wild celebrations and emotions mirroring mine. In many ways, this swearing-in was a proof to people that the BJP, which promised hope, a different governance, could indeed come to power!

It was a short-lived government. Snide comments like ‘Inhone to sirf tareekh mein naam darz karane yeh sarkar banayee thi’, abound and many within the BJP had started talking about the ‘blunder’ and how it had harmed the image of the party.

Hindsight proved that forming that Government, even if for a fortnight, was a masterstroke. By providing the masses with a teaser of a full-fledged government and more importantly, proving that the BJP was a serious contender to power, BJP polled incremental votes from those who were unsure about it. The party’s vote-share, which hovered at around 20% in both the 1991 and 1996 polls, shot up to over 25% in 1998, which incidentally, remains its best showing till date.

How relevant is reminiscing on a decade and half old events?

Very much relevant, because, on a smaller scale, history was repeated at Ramlila Maidan on Saturday, December 28, 2013.

While some may compare the exploits of NTR with that of Arvind Kejriwal, the fact remains that the 1983 victory of Telugu Desam was driven on the wheels of a charismatic God-like personality, who promised to salvage the wounded Telugu pride. On the other hand, the Aam Aadmi Party was led by a virtually faceless individual with a campaign built around mundane issues of corruption and civic amenities, hardly the stuff which manage to arouse passion in voters.

Thank God that Arvind Kejriwal had more sense than the numerous ‘specialists’ found in abundance in television studios. Had he listened to them, he would have buried his movement many a times over: first when he co-shepherded the anti-corruption movement, second, when he launched his solo fast, again, when he launched his political party, once again, when he campaigned against high electricity tariffs, yet again when he decided to run against Sheila Dikshit, over again when he committed the ultimate sacrilege of asking people’s opinion on accepting Congress’s support! Many of these experts have denounced the last act to be a mockery of democracy. If democracy is indeed the will of the people it belies understanding on how can reaching out to people for their opinion be declared a mockery? Is it that we have become so attuned to being treated as vote-casting machines that any exercise of opinion in between those five years seems so much out of the ordinary?

Whatever be the story a few months or years down the lane, as of now, we have lived through a defining moment of our lives when a rank outsider, riding on support of those disdainfully dismissed as non-consequential, has achieved which only weeks back, seemed an impossible dream. As of now, it is difficult to visualize that politics, the way it is practiced will not undergo any change in the days to come.

Had it not been for the AAP, it is quite likely that the insipid Vijay Goel of the BJP would have won the race to the chief ministership. Given that its 15 years exile from power has been extended yet again, it s understandable that much of the BJP’s vitriol has now been directed towards the AAP. Perhaps it fears that the success of AAP, if replicated even on a limited manner Nationally, would seriously impair its quest for power.

What the BJP seems to be missing out is that its attacks on Arvind Kejriwal and AAP more and more resemble the establishment’s campaign against Narendra Modi. Many BJP sympathizers claim that Modi is despised more because he does not ‘belong’ to the inner circle and his coming would draw curtains on many a cosy arrangements within those hallowed groups. If a four term chief minister who had even otherwise spent decades in those byzantinian lanes of Delhi could be termed as an outsider, then someone like an Arvind Kejriwal could well claim to be an alien from the outer space!

If constant tirades, ill founded in logic were a weapon enough to sway voters, then BJP has certainly adopted the right strategy. However, if that be true, then the BJP risks losing much more as the Congress, JDU and many others have adopted precisely the same strategy against it.

The BJP would do well to recognize that the vote for AAP was not a vote against Congress alone. It was a strong rejection of the BJP as well. The masses who voted for AAP did so amidst genuine fears of a Congress comeback on account of the anti-Congress votes getting split in between the AAP and the BJP. That people took this risk in their stride should be a powerful enough indicator to the BJP top brass that in public imagination, it was seen as being in cahoots with the Dikshit Government. In the last 15 years of Delhi and the last 10 years at the Centre, what exactly has the BJP done to prove that it is truly an opposition party? Which major decision of the UPA has the BJP opposed and opposed till its logical conclusion? Its campaigns against the UPA have seemed half hearted and fought more in television studios and in form of Parliamentary disruptions, rather than getting manifest on the street, fighting for issues impacting the common man.

In the recently concluded Parliament session, the BJP had a good chance to bring down this Government by pushing for a no-confidence motion. But for reasons known only to a few, it decided that the Government had lost its ‘moral majority’ and hence was as good as out of power. Is it so? And now, when the UPA comes up with another fiscally disastrous budget/vote on account or manages to promulgate some anti national ordinances, can the BJP really claim that it was not a party to those acts?

An opposition which does not function like an opposition does not deserve to be ever in power. The BJP has a clear choice – of identifying the ‘enemy’ and going for its jugular or of falling back to the act of a loyal opposition. It cannot continue to act as if Nuclear Deal, 2G, Coal Scam, Vadra, CWG, Black Money, are issues one moment and non-issues the other. Blessed with such an opposition, is it a wonder that we have had UPA 1 followed by UPA 2?

In the next few months, the Nation too will have to weigh two choices when opting to boot out this disgrace of a Government; one – voting for a sub-optimal choice in form of the BJP, and two – of voting for AAP and many other parties who one believes are best suited to resolve the Nation’s issues.

If a large chunk of the electorate opts for the latter option, it would be fair to say that the Congress has a very high chance of returning to power. Neither AAP nor any other contender has even a truncated all-India presence and all these entities would find it much easier to prop up a Congress led Government. For all our faults, India certainly does not deserve a UPA 3 and it would be an understatement to call this a tragedy if it thus happens.  

It is for the BJP to decide if it wants to be perceived as a worthy alternate to the UPA. It is neither AAP nor any motley group of activists, but its own sense of hubris, which is standing in its way to power.

AAP and the BJP

'First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, and then you win.'

MK Gandhi

If viciousness of attacks is borne out of intense fear then the fledgling Aam Aadmi Party clearly unnerved the BJP. For a party which had hoped that the public disgust with a grossly corrupt administration would make it a natural claimant to power, this pretender on the block came as a shock.

Once the growing buzz around AAP made it difficult for the BJP to maintain its haughty disdain for this gate-crasher, it unleashed the worst form of calumnious attacks on the former, ironically resembling the ad hominem attacks which it itself has till now been subject to from the ‘secular’ establishment. At one level, the BJP proclaims that shrill attacks on Narendra Modi, rather than impacting his popularity, enhances it. If that be the case, why has it adopted a similar line of offense against AAP?

No issue was too trivial to be raised, no stick to hollow to beat with - be it the supposed three voter registrations for Arvind Kejriwal, his so-called betrayal of Anna or the ‘wealth’ of the AAP candidates. Some leaders even tried to project the pendency of some criminal cases against AAP’s top leaders as a proof of the latter’s duplicity!

The BJP’s reaction to AAP has been more like that of a spoilt brat which believes that some usurper has snatched away its birthright. A little introspection would probably make it realize that AAP gained traction because the BJP spectacularly failed to fulfill its duties. That the BJP did not become a natural beneficiary of the Anna movement was symptomic of the middle class’s lack of trust in the party and its leaders. Those professionals, who are now volunteering for the AAP were at one time the natural constituency of the BJP and if they are no longer with it today, no one else but the BJP itself is to blame.

It is amusing that a supposed ‘right-of-centre’ party with an agenda to reform business and governance has an issue with some candidates being well off! Or is it that they believe that it glorious to be poor so long as they themselves do not lie among ‘glorified’ masses? Or is it that they believe that the middle and upper middle classes should not aspire to join politics at all?

The chatter around criminal cases against Arvind Kejriwal and a few other AAP leaders are yet again a warning to all those who bemoan the criminalization of politics simply because some ADR report lists the criminal cases against candidates. In our quest for instant solutions and our propensity to paint everything with the same brush, we miss the point that public agitations invariably result in criminal cases being lodged. If some sections of our public continue with this mindless quest of getting all people with any pending criminal cases debarred from contesting elections, we run the risk of turning the country into a completely closed cozy club, run by a handful of entities who will ensure that while their crimes never result in any complaints, any challenger gets defeated by the application of law.

True, the AAP is not God’s gift to India.

The way the party has used ‘participative psephology’ to increase its salience is hypocritical and amounts to befooling the public. Its agenda, to a very large extent, does not seem to differ from the Congress, so far as being a maai-baap sarkar is concerned. From being an ideology-agnostic party, it is slowly morphing into a me-too left-of-centre entity, ready to play the politics of appeasement with gusto. Rather than offering an institutional solution, it seems to be presenting a god in Arvind Kejriwal. And gods do not have a place in democracy.

But! It still is a party which is pushing for a strong legislation against corruption. It has a vision of public education and healthcare. It is probably the only party which talks somewhat about police reforms. And certainly the only party which does not talk of caste based reservations.

Most importantly, this is a party which carries the hope of those countless youngsters who have been working against all odds and canvassing for the party in Delhi. True, Delhi alone is not India and certainly AAP does not have similar presence across the country. But, is that reason enough to be contemptuous of those who believe that they can change India’s destiny with their efforts? 

The biggest risk which AAP runs today is its inability to live up to the hype on December 8. The vagaries of our Westminster style ‘first past the post’ system ensure that in a multi cornered contest, a party needs at least around 27%-30% of votes to come within sniffing distance of power. No one had given AAP a serious chance till they went around projecting survey results showing them on top. Unfortunately, for all the groundswell of support, the AAP may still come up short if that support does not translate into a sufficient number of votes. If the results are on expected lines, i.e., the AAP winning around 15-20% votes but failing to win more than 6-10 seats, there is a great risk of the party losing momentum and its core support base of the youth moving away from it.

With both the BJP and the Congress forming a part of the political establishment, there can be but little hope of any major reform in the way governance happens in our country. It is only when that an outsider makes an impactful entry in the political arena, can there be a real hope of a long lasting change in our polity. Yes, we run the risk of moving in a sub-optimal direction or more likely, getting unsettled by the nature of change. But, if status quo condemns us to entropy, then let there be change. If there were ever a vote cast for hope, let it be cast for this new kid on block.