Out of My Mind: A Tragedy
In light of the just-concluded Karnataka elections and the constitutional chaos that followed, Meghnad Desai, in The Indian Express, reflects on the decline of the Congress. He briefly and despondently traces the party’s history from Jawaharlal Nehru’s time when it stood for progressive thinking and service to the nation, to Indira Gandhi’s time when the seeds of nepotism were first sowed, to Rahul Gandhi’s era, where all that matters to the party is staying in power.
Desai is convinced: one of the oldest parties in the world has been reduced to a “shadow of its former self.”
The loss in 2014, the decline to third position in Bihar and now the willingness to sink to number two despite having the larger number of seats are symptomatic of the desperate hunger of the Congress to cling on to the trappings of power. This is because it is so used to being in office that it has no knowledge of how to behave as an opposition. It has no capacity for forward thinking and no way to clarify, let alone redefine, its ideology. It has no facility to train new cadres of volunteers. The foreign consultancy engaged to reshape its image advised it to become a paler version of the BJP. Hence the temple visits and the boast of Rahul being a Brahmin.
Fifth Column: Endangered Democracy
Tavleen Singh minces no words in her weekly column in The Indian Express: “Three words that I got sick of hearing as the Karnataka drama unfolded last week were: democracy, secularism and Constitution.”
Uttered by only those who wanted to keep BJP out of south India, these words repeated like a mantra across news channels sound ironic to Singh on several counts, especially the word “Constitution.”
If “newly elected legislators would need to be locked up in fine hotels to prevent them from selling their souls for filthy lucre” is what entails upholding India’s constitutional values, then Singh is having none of it, especially having actually lived through a time when “a Dictator” actually ruled India.
This sickness in our democracy did not begin after Narendra Modi became prime minister. But, it is this storyline that has been sought to be disseminated by secular, leftist political commentators in order to disguise their loyalties to the Congress party. It is this ‘secular’ caboodle that uses words like democracy and secularism most often. Sadly, they see the weaknesses in our democracy through tinted lenses. So what happened in West Bengal’s panchayat elections last week has been almost ignored by liberal, leftist commentators. In these village elections, ballot boxes were torn out of polling booths and thrown in ponds, and gangs of armed thugs wandered about violently preventing people from voting. These events escaped the notice of ‘secular’ politicians and commentators who moan endlessly about how democracy has died in the past four years. Rahul went so far as to say in Chhattisgarh that India has become a dictatorship.
Across the Aisle: Who Will Save the Constitution?
If you’re a bit dazed at the speed at which the Karnataka elections drama unfolded, read this piece by P Chidambaram in The Indian Express.
In his main argument, Chidambaram points out what in his opinion was a travesty of justice: the governor of Karnataka going against the “last statement of law” laid down by the Supreme Court, as recently as 2017, and inviting Yeddyurappa to form the government. All this while contextualising the elections, its aftermath and its constitutional implication.
The question had been examined in the past and there were observations in several judgments. Goa presented a concrete opportunity. In an order dated March 14, 2017, and made in Chandrakant Kavlekar vs. Union of India, the Supreme Court observed: “The (Goa) Assembly comprises of 40 elected members. The party having the support of at least 21 elected members would obviously have majority. Annexure-B reveals that besides the 13 elected members from the BJP Legislative Party, 3 members from the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party, Goa, and another 3 members from the Goa Forward Party have expressed their support to the BJP Legislature Party. Besides the above, two elected independent members have also been mentioned in the letter of the Governor — Annexure B — as having expressed their allegiance to the BJP Legislature Party. It is, therefore, that the BJP Legislature Party is shown to have the support of 21 MLAs.” The Supreme Court upheld the governor’s decision and allowed Mr Manohar Parrikar (who had not contested the election) to prove his majority — but directed him to do so in two days, by March 16, 2017. So, I was wrong on the law. Mr Arun Jaitley’s view, stated in his famous blog, was held to be right.
Why the Media Was Wrong About Karnataka Results
Swapan Dasgupta also writes about the Karnataka elections in The Times of India, pontificating on the media’s tendency to acknowledge electoral waves only in hindsight and selectively. Whether it be painting Siddaramaiah as an “emerging subaltern hero who would stop Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s army crossing the Vindhyas” for all the world to see, or resorting to the old chant of “there is no [Modi] wave,” the media went wrong, again.
Maybe it is an inclination to play safe that explains this consistent misreading of ground realities. That is a charitable explanation. The reality is a little more complex. Election-watchers are inclined (by necessity) to give excessive weightage to small-town media stringers and political workers who tend to over-complicate matters with a myriad of micro details. A small anecdote narrated to me by my friend Chandan Mitra from his travels in Amethi in 1984 — a completely one-sided battle — says it all. Buttonholing a Congress worker about the prospects of Rajiv, he was given a priceless answer. “He will win easily lekin haar jaye to maaza ah jaye (but if he loses, it will be fun).”
Modi’s Clever Politics Will Dent his Clean Image
SA Aiyar has a cautionary warning for Narendra Modi – to the benefit of all: his political machinations in Karnataka could dent his votes in the 2019 elections. Writing for The Times of India, Aiyar points out that Modi’s entire charisma is based on how he is different from the Congress, specifically the latter’s track record of buying defectors after elections.
He risked that in the last week and put himself “on a slippery slope that will one day ruin his greatest asset — his clean image.”
In December, elections are due in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. The BJP is the incumbent in all three. In the general election in 2019, Modi will be the incumbent. With a really clean image, he could overcome anti-incumbency everywhere. But his series of machinations are tarnishing his holier-than-thou image, and hence votes. What so far has looked like clever politics could cost him dearly in the coming elections.
Anti-Defection Law Does More Harm Than Good
Aakar Patel examines in Deccan Chronicle the harm the anti-defection law has done, while also acknowledging its benefits. He looks at previous statements on it by the Supreme Court, the international standard for the law, the history of the law in India, and, of course, the recent Karnataka elections, to suggest that the law, as it is today, is unhealthy in any parliamentary democracy.
The anti-defection law was justified at the time it was enacted because that period saw a lot of legislators changing their party after being bribed with offers of ministries or money. In the late 1960s, a Congress legislator from Haryana, Gaya Lal, changed his party three times in a few days. This action produced the phrase Aaya Ram, Gaya Ram referring to those legislators who owed no party loyalty but were in politics purely for themselves. The anti-defection law was meant to curb such activity. And it has done so to a large extent. However, it is too sweeping a solution to what is essentially a problem of morality. If a legislator defied the party on which he was voted, surely it was the elector who should punish him and not the party.
Chanakya’s View: SC Must Set Clear Rules to Ensure Ethical Polity
Pavan K Varma, in Deccan Chronicle, writes that the “shenanigans in Karnataka” provide the perfect opportunity for the Supreme Court to lay down clear-cut rules that make the line between moral and legal interpretations based on convenience distinct. He warns that with the prospect of no single party getting a clear majority in any state and with the the 2019 elections looming large, the credibility of the world’s largest democracy is at stake.
Each political player must know that “no amount of skulduggery can change how the democratic script will play out.”
Even earlier, Parliament had passed the amendment to the 10th Schedule of the Constitution, relating to defections, to prevent horse-trading and the blatant misuse of money power to buy legislators. In 2005, some more principles were laid down by the Supreme Court in the Rameshwar Prasad case. But obviously, these are not enough. Frankly, however much legal pundits may quibble, there is no categorical clarity on what course of action has legitimacy in a hung House. Does the governor invite the single largest party first? Does he give priority to a pre-poll alliance? Or does he choose a post-poll alliance? There are precedents to support either of these choices. When it has suited it, the Congress has supported the principle of priority being given to the single largest party. This was seen, most recently, in the elections in Goa, Tripura and Meghalaya, where it was the single largest party. On that occasion, the BJP argued that a post-poll alliance has the first right to be invited to form the government, because it was not the single largest party. Now, in Karnataka, the two parties argued precisely the opposite: the BJP asserted that the single largest party must be preferred, and the Congress espoused the rights of the post-poll alliance.
Do Not Become That Which You Oppose
Quietly underlining the hectic aftermath of the Karnataka elections is Ruchir Joshi in The Hindu, with an anecdote from his teenage years when a “Raj from north India” beat him at squash by blatantly cheating, and the following colourful conversation Joshi had with an older cousin from Ahmedabad after his defeat.
This story’s morals extend from sports to war analogies to ethical and moral fields, and if you read closely, our politics as well.
The lessons I learnt — some of which I’ve had to take refresher courses in, from time to time — were something like this: in any argument, if one person is willing to throw all decency and civility into the garbage, then the person clinging on to notions of fair play will always be at a disadvantage. Being at a disadvantage, or even losing, should not mean that you respond by also throwing your civility and sense of justice on the rubbish heap. If you do this, you are playing into the hands of your opponent, who is much more practised, far better at the dirty games than you are. In sporting terms, you don’t want to play the game your opponent wants you to play, you want to make him play the game the way you want it played.
Inside Track: Fast on the Draw
Coomi Kapoor, in The Indian Express, shows a lighter tone of the Karnataka drama. From Deve Gowda’s son defying him and approaching the Congress to what the elections result means for the Congress internally, she reveals it all.
As the Karnataka results came in, some members of BJP president Amit Shah’s team were so cocksure of forming the government that they were actually relieved that the BJP did not cross the 112 halfway mark. This is because there is a superstition that the party which wins Karnataka loses in the general elections. The BJP leaders believed that by not obtaining an outright majority they had overcome the jinx. Little did they realise that in the bargain, the slight shortage of MLAs meant the state could slip out of their hands.
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