Dr. A. Prabaharan’s

The UPCC chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi’s below par statement is highly condemnable. Equally censorable is Mayawati’s harsh words against Mahatma few weeks ago. But the former’s house got torcher but the latter went scoot free. Anyway after one and half decades of peaceful politics India seems to be returning to the violent era. Along with the Lucknow episode, Congress violence in West Bengal signals this phase. It is highly worrisome.

The Times of India writes (17 July 2009)

An insensitive and condemnable remark by UP Congress chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi has BSP chief and state chief minister Mayawati hopping mad. The
Congress leader has been booked under the SC&ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act and her house in Lucknow was torched allegedly by BSP cadre. Mayawati has refused to accept Bahuguna’s claim that her remark was taken out of context. Bahuguna was wrong to reduce rape to a rhetorical debate regarding compensation and drag Mayawati’s name into it, but the UP chief minister’s over-the-top response smacks of vindictiveness. Mayawati must graciously accept Bahuguna’s public apology and arrest the arsonists instead.

The BSP chief has sought to interpret Bahuguna’s remark as an insult to Dalits and representative of a Congress mindset towards the community. Clearly, Mayawati wants to make the incident a political issue and consolidate her Dalit support base, which in recent times has been wooed by the Congress. The Congress, with Rahul Gandhi as its face, has been trying hard to regain its erstwhile Dalit vote base, especially in UP where they constitute nearly 20 per cent of the population. In the recent Parliament elections, the Congress saw a revival in the state. Its seat tally went up from nine in 2004 to 21. However, the BSP, hoping for a repeat of the 2007 assembly elections which it had won, did not do as well as expected: the party won only 20 seats and its vote share fell from 30.5 per cent in 2007 to 27 per cent in 2009.

The aggressive response to Bahuguna’s speech may, or may not, help BSP consolidate its Dalit base. But a polarisation will not allow the BSP to further its sarvajan politics. Sure, the attempt to build a rainbow coalition of Brahmins, Dalits and few other castes may not have helped the BSP in the Lok Sabha elections. Such caste coalitions are bound to unravel sooner rather than later if not backed by good administration. Mayawati must realise that the Congress didn’t gain in UP by positing an alternative caste alliance to the BSP. It won votes on a development agenda.

The BSP should take the cue from the Congress and reinvent itself as a party of governance. Mayawati needs to protect the social and economic interests of Dalits in UP but she must not forget that as chief minister her job is to ensure the social and economic development of the whole state. That’s the way forward for the BSP if it wants to establish itself as a serious player in national politics.

The ideological and practical confusions among the Indian communists have completely isolated them from the masses. The just concluded Lok Sabha election had proved that the people have rejected them electorally and given the Left body blow by giving them historically lowest tally in the Lower house. The infighting and dubious handling by the politiburo by sideing with the culprits is going to erode the communists forever from the Indian political scene.

The Times of India writes (15 July 2009)

These are not the best of times for the CPM. Its parliamentary strength is at the lowest since the party’s formation in 1964. The leadership is  divided over the factors that led to the massive defeat in the 2009 polls and the remedial actions needed to regain the confidence of voters. The confusion at the top has manifested itself in the ad hoc measures taken by the party’s central leadership to address factionalism within its Kerala unit.

The fight between two groups, one headed by the state party secretary, Pinarayi Vijayan, and the other by the chief minister, V S Achuthanandan, has paralysed administration in the state and contributed to the Left Front’s defeat in the Lok Sabha polls. However, the steps announced by the CPM central leadership are unlikely to improve matters within the party or in the state administration. This week, the CPM, after an unusual two-day session to discuss factionalism in Kerala, chose to expel VS, a founding leader of the organisation, from the party’s highest decision-making body, the politburo. However, Vijayan has been allowed to continue as state chief even though he faces a CBI case over his alleged role in the multi-crore SNC Lavalin corruption case. A truce between the two factions seems unlikely, which will be a drag on governance.

It is strange that a party should penalise a member but want him to head its government. It is equally rare for the CPM, which emphasises probity in public office, to defend a leader facing corruption charges at the risk of dividing the party and alienating sympathisers. The only possible explanation is the Machiavellian logic that while VS is relatively more popular than Vijayan, the latter has control of the party. That the CPM leadership prejudged the case against Vijayan and gave him a clean chit has complicated matters. The party failed to convincingly argue its position and defend its leader without obstructing the investigation. It lost credibility over the Lavalin controversy and that was a major factor in its electoral loss. Now, the party leadership finds it awkward even to ask Vijayan to step down till the case is concluded.

By so blatantly favouring one faction, whose leader is an accused in a corruption case, the party’s central leadership has gone against its own interests. While the Left’s withdrawal of support from the UPA government was packaged as an act of morality and ideological purity, it will be hard to maintain that appearance in the face of the expulsion of VS. Prakash Karat, general secretary of the CPM, was the key mover behind both those decisions. His authority is bound to be eroded when the party comes face to face with their consequences

Madness has crossed all levels in the head of Mayawati. without this symptom she cannot be building statues of her own, Kanshiram and elephant all over Uttar Pradesh. Not only she is wasting the public money but also the golden opportunity provided by the voters of her state to a “Dalit ki bheti” to rule the country’s biggest state. If she is not going to change her governing style by mending ways, BSP will be routed in the next assembly elections. The first jerk was given in the concluded Lok Sabha elections.

The Hindu editorial writes (3 July 2009)

The Supreme Court’s notice to the Mayawati government for its spending on memorials and statues, drawing heavily from the Uttar Pradesh State exchequer brings welcome public scrutiny to an emphasis that has attracted considerable controversy. Constructing memorials for Dalit icons has long been an article of faith with the Bahujan Samaj Party, with the Chief Minister according high priority to it in all three of her earlier tenures. Yet thanks to her image as an able administrator enforcing discipline and bringing a sense of purpose to governance, the memorial building drive received little public attention. But in contrast, Ms Mayawati’s fourth term as Chief Minister has been shadowed by controversy even as she is criticised for what is seen as an obsession with statue and memorial building. In the two years since Ms Mayawati assumed office, the BSP government has not only acquired hundreds of acres of fresh land in the name of memorial construction, but also ordered the reconstruction of many projects already completed. A Public Interest Litigation petition, in response to which the Supreme Court has acted, alleged an expenditure of Rs.2,000 crore on the constructions, among them a memorial each of Babasaheb Ambekdar and Kanshi Ram and dozens of statues of Dalit icons, including of Ms Mayawati herself.

The U.P. government justified the constructions in court, citing the example of the Nehru Memorial Centre in New Delhi. The comparison is dubious. The Nehru memorial is a leading centre of research in social sciences and houses one of the finest libraries in India. The point of stressing this difference is not to belittle Ambedkar or Kanshi Ram but to underscore the greatness of the two men. Ambedkar was a leading visionary who gave India its Constitution. Kanshi Ram took the Dalit movement to iconic heights. But the excesses currently on display in Lucknow and other U.P. towns only serve to detract from their phenomenal achievements. In May 2007, Ms Mayawati exceeded the wildest expectations to form U.P’s first majority government in 16 years. Regrettably, by 2009, she appeared to have squandered the goodwill, with her party finishing third behind the Samajwadi Party and the Congress in the Lok Sabha election. It was 14 years ago that Ms Mayawati brought a strong sense of empowerment to a community grievously wronged by history. It is her historic task to ensure that the collective sense of empowerment is consolidated through programmes designed to increase the social and economic clout of this historically deprived community. Ms Mayawati must remember that her voters will feel truly empowered only when she goes beyond the politics of symbolism.

Politics means publicity and selfishness. The BJP was a different party decade ago. Now after tasting power in the centre and few states it has bred many selfish leaders who are keen to score points to achieve their own mobility. At this cross road it should allow some people inside the party to hijack. It should bring back its sincerity and honesty to serve the public. The minority bashing should be abandoned and inner party reforms should be fully implemented. Without these there is no scope for BJP in the future.

The Hindu editorial writes (24 June 2009)

The Bharatiya Janata Party went into its two-day national executive meet — the first since its defeat in the 15th general election — as a bitterly divided house but emerged from it in somewhat better spirits and shape. The situation was redeemed by a near-consensus on redefining Hindutva as an ‘inclusive, tolerant’ ideology suited to modern, changing India. The meet expressed itself against the virulent brand espoused by Varun Gandhi, with some members virtually scapegoating the Philibhit speeches for the BJP’s poor performance in Uttar Pradesh. The shift to lower-key Hindutva was led by Lal Krishna Advani, the veteran of many campaigns and the ideologue of the BJP’s ‘cultural nationalism.’ In his valedictory address, he declared that the party could not and would not accept “any narrow, bigoted anti-Muslim interpretation of Hindutva.” The Advani imprint was also visible in the political resolution’s characterisation of “theocracy or any form of bigotry” as “alien to our ethos.” The part-positive, part-stoic note struck at the conclusion of the meet helped mitigate the impression that the BJP was on an irreversible descent into chaos.

After all, the internecine war that saw a group of formerly powerful members trading accusations and shooting off letters charging the leadership with a lack of accountability, favouritism, and what not had left little to the imagination. BJP president Rajnath Singh’s opening remarks at the national executive meet further muddied the waters. He reiterated the party’s commitment to Hindutva, underlining the core issues of the Ram temple, Article 370, and a Uniform Civil Code. This combined with Maneka Gandhi’s stout defence of son Varun — she was quoted as saying Muslims did not vote for the party anyway — raised the question: was the party heading back to its unapologetic Jana Sangh days? The answer came in the form of loud protests: State leaders such as Shivraj Singh Chauhan and Sushil Modi argued that in Madhya Pradesh as in Bihar the party had successfully practised a ‘more inclusive’ politics. The BJP’s Muslim face, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, added his weight to the proposition, and finally Mr. Advani himself offered a sharp counterview to Mr. Rajnath Singh’s ‘back to the basics’ speech. Nobody of course seriously expects the party of Hindutva to change its nature, although it does not lack the skill to paint over its spots. It is too early to say whether the new line will find favour with the BJP’s rank and file — or for that matter with the party’s minder in Jhandewalan. But Mr. Advani, who in this hour of crisis has displayed the fortitude and shrewdness of a redoubtable defeated general, can be satisfied that he has given it his best shot.

In every election political parties and leaders promise betterment of aam aadmi’s life. On the contradictory it worsens. This general election is not going to be different. Although there a pot full of poll promises it is going to be empty ones. We need new energy and vision for rejuvenating the nation.

Risabh Bhandari writes in the Times of India, 11 May 2009,

The general election for the 15th Lok Sabha unfolded with a customary hullabaloo expected of it. Sloganeering politicians, quixotic campaigns and maverick pronouncements have all contributed to a burlesque extravaganza intended to enthuse or even entertain the electorate. Meanwhile, psephologists and astrologers alike speculate feverishly over the results. Yet irrespective of the next administration’s shape, there’s no escaping the enormous challenges that await it. And prime among these will be tackling India’s worsening fiscal deficit.

Earlier this year, the financial services firm Goldman Sachs noted that India’s fiscal deficit, including the Centre and states, ranked among the highest in the world and was likely to exceed 10 per cent of GDP in the current fiscal year. The sums involved are staggering. In the interim budget presented in February, the government admitted that in 2008-09, the deficit at the Centre had swelled from an initial estimate of Rs 1,33,287 crore (2.5 per cent of GDP) to the boggling reality of Rs 3,26, 515 crore (6 per cent of GDP). As a consequence of this profligacy, the prudential obligations imposed by the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act had to be ‘relaxed’.

The real question posed by such stupendous borrowing is whether this political addiction to debt is sustainable in the long run. Who should be especially concerned? The middle class on whom the brunt of repayment will fall through taxes certainly ought to be. It’s time they began asking some hard questions of their elected representatives.

At a time when the global financial crisis has left governments elsewhere in the world bracing themselves for a post-fiscal stimulus era of austerity with public spending freezes and an overdue return to prudent book-keeping, what’s noticeable in this general election is that neither the BJP nor the Congress have articulated a coherent response on this front. Instead, both parties have preferred to side-step issues relating to detail in favour of regurgitating pious humbug.

Their respective manifestos are far from illuminating. With a fine sense of historical irony, the Congress manifesto declares that the party “promises what it can do and will do what it promises”. It extols flagship expenditure initiatives over the last five years including the NREGS and the Rs 65,000 crore farmers’ loan waiver scheme, inviting voters to believe in their efficiency as an article of faith and tempting them to forget the many reports of systemic leakages and operational failure. A list of well-intentioned expenditure schemes for the next five years is outlined. But in typical fashion, no details on funding are offered. The inconvenient truth that these will have to be paid for somehow is overlooked entirely.

Yet if the Congress manifesto can be faulted for its uncosted assumptions, can the BJP manifesto be far behind? After a frightfully tedious lament for India’s past, the BJP manifesto turns to the present day by promising “massive investments” and listing some proposals without bothering to address costs. On the one hand, it fulminates against the Congress party’s reckless spending. But on the other hand, it also advances plans of its own which resemble much the same. For instance, the party affirms its intention to waive agricultural loans but doesn’t spell out where the moneyfor this will come from. Neither does it indicate whether it will be prepared to rethink or even revoke existing Congress spending plans where it disagrees with them. For all its criticisms of the NREGS, the BJP balks at taking a specific policy stance in relation to it. That indecision or timidity comes through quite clearly.

The unacknowledged truth is that the next government will not have the luxury of choice that its predecessor had. An era of high economic growth and revenue buoyancy allowed the Congress party to spend unheeded as it fancied. But that time has passed. Contracting growth and diminishing revenues mean that public expenditure will come under strain. Neither the Congress nor the BJP have alluded to this inevitability. If the intention is to carry on borrowing, it has not been disclosed. This reluctance is driven by the populist exigencies of an election campaign. But it places too low a premium on a voter’s intelligence and this opacity diminishes public life.

At a deeper philosophical level, the issue is that both parties remain wedded to the idea of state control. It is now generally assumed that the onset of liberalisation in the early 1990s marked a fundamental reorientation in Indian politics. Liberalisation came to India not as the apogee of an intellectual movement but merely through the nadir of necessity. It has not supplanted the Congress party’s essential instinct for centralism and intervention. Nor has it led the BJP to an alternative vision of localism, individual autonomy and smaller government.

Nevertheless, despite such ideological misgivings, the reality is that the next government will have to curb expenditure to effect a much-needed fiscal course correction. Hopefully, it may have little option but to shrink the state by cutting waste, exercising restraint and encouraging private enterprise. From the ashes of this financial tumult, if a fiscally conservative phoenix arose eventually, it would not be such a terrible outcome after all.

More than politics the people good quality life. If the politics is not going to provide that, politics is going to suffer irreparable damage in the future.

The former vice president of India and a RSS stalwart Bhairon Singh Shekhawat stirred several political controversies. The man known for party discipline and gentleness had overturned his image overnight.  He is firing one political missile after the other. First he expressed his open interest to contest the upcoming Lok Sabha poll. This was not well received by the BJP top leaders including the president Rajnath Singh. He ruled out that the former president should not degrade his August position by contesting any election. Of course there is a valid refrain in what Rajnath said.

Shekhawat ran a strong anti-Vasundhra Raje campaign in the recently held Rajasthan assembly election. The internal factions triggered by the former vice president and Jaswant Singh are considered to be win killer for BJP in the state. After openly demanding a enquiry commission into the bribery allegations against Vasundhra Raje Scindia, Sekhawat rakked in the missing Rs.2.5 cash in the BJP central office. Indirectly he is demanding his place against L.K.Advani for the prime ministerial chair. Apart from the personal power hungry of Sekhawat, BJP’s opponent parties may be playing the inducer role. There is less chance for other parties to play such a role because all others are in the same trouble. Pranab Mukherjee raised Rahul crowning as Prime Minister in 2009.

There is a total decay in the political culture of the country. Any one, any where any time can contest has come into force without ethics and moral standard in public life. Although Shekhawat has ethical standards he should demean his previous position – vice president of India by jumping again into the electoral fray. Certain offices are highly valued and respected despite the person occupied demits office. President, Vice President, Supreme Court Chief Justice, chiefs of armed forces, election commission chairpersons, governors and other high positions. These posts require unbiased handling and utmost sincerity. Sekhawat handled his Chairpersonship of Rajya Sabha and vice presidentship despite his lifelong opponent party Congress came to power.

Now he should safeguard his respect and dignity by not contesting any elections in the future. This will set a bad precedent for the future leaders. A seasoned politician and long old hand in the Indian politics, Sekhawat should set good example for others. He can involve in socio-cultural activities. If his health permits he should tour the country as former vice president and inspiration people in the national developmental activities. So far no other presidents or vice presidents have jumped into the electoral contest after demitting office. Shekhwat should not occupy the dubious distinction of the first August office holder to break this age-old high tradition.

Sooner or later the government should bring a legislation banning the high profile constitutional office bearers from contesting elections. Especially the high profile election commission, judiciary, public service commissions, apart from president, vice president and governors should be barred from contesting elections and occupying posts lower than their previous ones.

Naturally most human beings are not inclined towards safeguarding their previous status. They will go down to any level when they are power hungry. Only strong legislation and strong enforcement can check these high standard violations.