Maj. Gen. S. C. N. Jatar,
Retd
Once you hear the details of victory, it is hard to
distinguish it from defeat – Jean-Paul Sartre
Introduction
I ventured to
predict on May 15 to a few close friends that the UPA
or the NDA would form the government on their own without going down on their
knees before either the Left,
I
based my assessment on the credo of divisive politics, which has now become the
strategy for most political parties. What the Moguls practiced
and the English perfected; ‘divide & rule’, is the slogan of the
politicians. Thus originates divisive
politics, transforming into vote-bank ‘isms’ – secularism and communalism
(includes casteism). This situation has created
a crisis of identity in the Indian voter.
It is difficult to say whether vote-bank politics resulted in the
fragmentation of Indian polity based on religion and caste or it was the cause
of it.
‘Youthful
image’, ‘admiration for Rahul Gandhi’, ‘hate speech of Varun Gandhi’, ‘Advani a
bad choice’, ‘personalised & negative campaign by Modi’, ‘development
plank” etc are nebulous, ill-defined and mostly personality based assessments. Both UPA & NDA played divisive politics
nurturing vote-bank secularism & vote-bank communalism. The NDA, especially BJP, did it most brazenly
and audaciously, and lost. The UPA,
especially the Congress, did it subtly and won!
I
must sound a note of caution that the conclusions of my analysis destroy two
long-standing myths i.e. (1) Wisdom and the propensity of the Indian voter to
know what is good for the country and (2) the Indian politician has national
interest at heart. To put it bluntly,
Indian democracy will mature only if the gullible Indian public becomes aware
of the games that our politicians play.
There was a decrease in BJP vote share of 3.32
percent to about 18. It lost only 22
seats from 2004. The Congress vote share
was 30 %, an increase of only 1.99 percent over 2004. The combined vote share of the two main
national parties was 48.69 %, which decreased by only 1.33 percent.[2] Equations, therefore, have remained largely
the same; small loss for the BJP in the vote-share and seats and disproportionate
gains to the Congress vis-ŕ-vis its vote share.
There is no revolutionary change.
The Raison
d’ętre of Political Parties
Our political
parties have always used devious ‘means’ to acquire power under the guise of
doing good to the nation. They have no
regrets if it divides the country in the bargain. If the parties have to field criminals to
access their vote banks, then too there are no regrets.[3]
Publicly
candidates stress on ‘development’ but one-on-one, they acknowledge that their
survival depends primarily on ‘caste equations’, secondarily on ‘religious
inclinations’ and lastly on party politics.
As for ‘development’, Daily ‘Sakal’ from Pune reported unusual
similarities between the 2004 & 2009 manifestos of the winning candidate!
The political
parties take advantage of lack of political awareness of the common voter, and
correctly assess where the weakness of the Indian voter lies. Generally, Indians are unaware of the nuances
of politics and games that the politicians play. Even educated Indians are not aware of
Chinese manipulations to isolate
The
UPA directed its energies to woo the minority communities (especially the
Muslims and the Christians) and its allies exploited caste loyalties. Both the UPA, led by the Congress, and the BJP-led NDA
had precipitated a situation where the Congress mainly projected itself as
looking after the interests of the minority communities against the
‘atrocities’ committed by the BJP.
Towards
galvanising this crisis of identity, the UPA established Sachar Commission,
gave state-level scholarships to minorities identified at the national-level
(for Muslims, Christians, Parsis and Sikhs excluding Hindus and Jains even when
in minority in certain states), extended reservations to Muslims, increased the
Hajj subsidy, granted subsidy to Christians visiting Bethlehem, etc. During 2005-06,[5]
The worst
political ploy was to encourage Maharashtra Navnirman Sena to divide Shiv Sena
vote bank, because of which the Congress literally wiped out Shiv Sena and BJP
from Mumbai, Nashik and Pune, in spite of losing 4 % of its vote share. The nation had to pay heavily in terms of
destroying the inclusive Indian culture and unity. Congress ‘high command’, which watched
merrily when the
Left’s
propensity to ignore illegal migration from
The BJP
continued its strategy of minority bashing through its proxies, particularly in
Orissa and Karnataka.
It appears that the BJP needs a ‘trigger’ e.g. Godhra train
burning by Muslims or the killing of a Swami in Orissa, to run amok against the
minorities. BJP unduly converted the Ram
Setu and Amarnath shrine issues into religious ones. The affidavit of the UPA government denying
the existence of Lord Ram helped both the UPA and NDA. The DMK patriarch even said, “Who is this
Ram? Which engineering college did he graduate from?” UPA constituents did not denounce the crude
and unsavoury remarks of Karunanidhi.
What were the Voters
looking for & what was Irrelevant?
The common
voter faced an acute crisis of identity and was eagerly looking for a party
that would provide him or her, an identity while fulfilling fundamental
necessities of life (called ‘development’ by most analysts!), which do not
exist even after 62 years of independence.
The voter was NOT looking for corruption, security or foreign
relations. Consider a few events on the
eve of polling: Letting off Quatrochhi,
siphoning of US $ 120 million in the Indo-Israeli missile deal, bare
minimum cooperation from Pakistan on 26/11 investigation,[6]
and the Satyam scandal (largest since independence with involvement of
politicians & bureaucrats).
Religion and
caste were uppermost in the voters’ minds followed by ‘development’, that is,
the fundamental necessities for sustenance; e.g. drinking water, electricity,
sanitation and mobility (public transport).
What was Media
or Opinion Makers saying Before the Results?
The
media reflected the editorial policy.
The media based its assessments not only on the prejudices that they
have carried all along but also on 2004 results. For instance, everyone took it for granted
that the Left would again be the fulcrum on which the next government would
revolve.
Every
one criticised Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, National Old Age Pension
Scheme, National Maternity Benefit Scheme, Mid-Day Meal and Integrated Children
Development Scheme, etc. The ire was
that not even 10 paisa out of the Rupee reached the target group.
Surprisingly,
none saw Mamata Bannerjee’s ‘strike’ at ‘development’ (read Nano) overtaking the
Left vote-bank of Bangladeshi illegal migrants.
The voters did not take kindly to Karat’s “pursuit of the Third Front
chimera, whose defining feature was that all its non-Left constituents had once
been the BJP’s allies …”[7] Vote-bank secularism did matter after all but
none saw it!
Nitish won the
mandate quietly, diligently and systematically.
Traditionally, the post-Mandal politics of
The
media had gone agog criticising everyone including the Indian Navy for failing
not only to prevent the 26/11 attack but also disapproving of the
response. There was an outcry against
the National Security Advisor Narayanan for his lacklustre response (he did not
abandon his dinner appointment even after hearing of the attack), there were TV
flashes of Maharashtra Chief Minister Deshmukh visiting the Taj Hotel with his
actor-son and a film director. Crisis Management Group
was not in continuous session once there was confirmation about the terrorist
attack.
Everyone
played up Modi’s achievement in the ‘development’ of
The
media played down the rank communal statement of Omar Abdullah
in Parliament at the time of the vote on the Nuclear Deal with the
What are the
Media or Opinion Makers saying now?
After
the election results, the media is highlighting the fact that Modi has actually
lost the vote share by 3.5 % in
The
print media now say, “Left-goaded policies paid UPA rich dividends”,[9] meaning the very schemes
criticised earlier actually contributed to Congress’ success.
Everyone
now seems to have forgotten Nitish Kumar’s ‘lower backward’ policy!
The
take on terrorism now is, “Pranab hard line on
If
the Congress-NCP government had not mollycoddled the
In
Pune, the main candidates were from the Congress (Brahmin), BJP (Maratha),
Conclusion
Election
Commissioner SY Quraishi told Karan Thapar on
[1] 'A K Antony most likely to be the next PM',
ExpressBuzz, IANS,
[2] Vernier, Gilles, “Vote share of national parties
actually slipping”, jansamachar.net IANS
[3] The Telegraph,
[4] Jain, Sandhya, “L K
Advani: History to Oblivion”, www.vijayvaani.com,
[5] Website of Union Ministry of Home Affairs
[6] Singh, K. C. “Candle Burning at Three
Ends”, Outlook,
[7] Ganguli, Amulya, “Driven by Dogma”, Times
of
[8] Naqvi,
[9] (Congress) owes its resurgence to Slew of
Social Programmes Taken”, Times of
[10] “Pranab hard line
on
[11] “Opinion and Exit Polls Manipulated – EC”,
Outlookindia.com,