This Rage will Change Our Politics

Hazare and Ramdev are comic sideshows. The real target is the pervasive greed this Congress regime is happy to condone

On 23 May, far from Delhi, in Chhindwara, two unlikely men stood together on stage and promised to fight corruption. One was of course Baba Ramdev, the other was Union Urban Development Minister Kamal Nath. This unlikely pairing should give us reason to pause, irrespective of our views on the drama that has unfolded over the past few days.

Baba Ramdev should have known that former CII (Confederation of Indian Industry) chief Tarun Das has been caught on the Radia tapes calling Kamal Nath Mr Fifteen Per Cent. Tarun Das has apologised but we have not heard from either Kamal Nath or Tarun Das about the veracity of the charge. The Baba should have known that Kamal Nath has been accused of leading a mob at Gurdwara Rakabganj, less than a kilometre from Parliament, which burnt two Sikhs to death in the 1984 massacres. So much for fighting corruption, moral or otherwise. And what was Kamal Nath thinking when he said, “Not only people from Chhindwara but people from the central government too will take part in Ramdev’s satyagraha against corruption?” We all know how that turned out. But then should we have expected anything else of such a man and such a party?

First the man. Ramdev had asked for the death penalty for those convicted in corruption cases, he had asked for war to be waged against Pakistan after 26/11 and Rajiv Dixit (who died last year), as national secretary of Ramdev’s Bharat Swabhiman Andolan, had claimed that 9/11 was stage-managed by the US authorities and the Twin Towers had been brought down by a series of controlled explosions. He had also announced that the Andolan would contest the 2014 Parliamentary elections. So much for the Baba’s claims that he has no political ambitions. Nor is the absurdity of his claims moderated by his public venture—he has now decided he will raise a private militia. “We will build an army of 11,000 men and women.’’ These men he said must be “dedicated, ready to make the ultimate sacrifice. They will be given arms training.’’

And then the party. Kapil Sibal has claimed that the Baba had permission only for a yoga shivir, a fact in letter but one difficult to believe considering the claims of Ramdev and his supporters in the lead-up to the function. It would suggest that the four senior Cabinet Ministers who spent a day and a half talking with Ramdev were discussing yogasanas. But even these are only minor charges, the real problems lie elsewhere. Take the 2G scam, it now appears the Prime Minister and his Cabinet are guilty of more than just looking away while A Raja allotted spectrum as he fancied. To stay in power, the party showed little regard for the very institutions and principles that justify the existence of a government. This was again in evidence in the decision to scatter Ramdev’s protest under the guise of preserving public order. Such methods may win it short-term tactical battles, but do nothing to tackle the larger political problems that are already evident.

Anna Hazare and Ramdev are only symptoms of an anger at the series of scams that have become public over the past two years. The support that either of them has gathered is a manifestation of that anger, not a proof of their sincerity or the suitability of their methods. In fact, the focus on personalities is blinding us to the kind of politics manifest in the people supporting them.

Under normal circumstances, it would have been impossible to see Prashant Bhushan and others —who go under the label ‘Civil Society’, their politics clearly left of centre—loosely affiliated with Ramdev’s supporters who belong to the Right. But they are tied together in their economics, not in the economics they share but the economics they oppose.

Ramdev’s links with the saffron brigade are no secret but they don’t stop there. Ramdev is backed primarily by the Swadeshi Jagran Manch and has been for a considerable length of time. It is a Sangh outfit, but one at odds with the BJP on liberalisation, a split that goes back to Yashwant Sinha’s term as finance minister. The Manch strongly opposes the process of liberalisation and globalisation that the BJP has adopted, as has the Congress. This is something it shares with much of ‘Civil Society’ and people such as Prashant Bhushan. Corruption, then, brings them together because for both these factions it is a manifestation of greed, a natural outcome of the process of liberalisation.

Consider the only other issue over the past few years that has resulted in the same kind of mass upheaval—the process of land acquisition, whether in Singur, Nandigram or Bhatta Parsaul. Like corruption, this is an expression of anger against the same process. Both land acquisition and corruption are seen as manifestations of greed and the subversion of due process that allows a few people, such as the Rajas and the Kalmadis, or a few corporates, such as those under scrutiny in the 2G scam and those targeted over land acquisition, benefitting disproportionately at the expense of almost everyone else.

In simple terms, the process of liberalisation is creating its discontents and their numbers are large. They may articulate their opposition in different ways, the peasant in Singur does not speak in the same terms as a Prashant Bhushan, but that does not mean that he is not aware of what he opposes.

So far this wide array of people is only loosely tied together in its opposition to the consequences of the growth that much of the country has celebrated over the past two decades. The actual views on the process range from a complete opposition to more nuanced suggestions to ameliorate its ‘side affects’. There is a difference between those who believe that such outcomes are inherent in the process of liberalisation and those who see it as an aberration in a process that we need. But these differences do not take away from the large numbers today that speak against the greed that has allowed a few to benefit disproportionately.

These numbers are not going to be channelled simply through public fasts and tamashas that do nothing but importune the very party that people see as responsible for what they are opposing. The fasts already show signs of becoming symbolic, from a few days in the beginning to a few hours at Rajghat. The numbers they attract do not even begin to tap into the discontent that seems to exist. Over the next few months, as more revelations surface in the 2G scam, this discontent will only grow and it can only find its outlet in the political process.

We have already witnessed this in the recent state elections. The anger against the Left in West Bengal and against the DMK in Tamil Nadu is tied to this discontent against liberalisation. In West Bengal, this was the result of the process of land acquisition, in Tamil Nadu, the result of the DMK’s unique brand of family acquisitions.

But when the same discontent is framed in terms of national politics, it will have only one target—the Congress. The question, though, is: can any party harness this public anger? The BJP certainly can’t (see Self-goal Parivar), as it finds itself more and more caught up in the contradictions of its economic policy, the fight between swadeshi and liberalisation that first led to Govindacharya’s exit from the Sangh and is now set to resurface. It is the swadeshi elements of the Sangh that are today at the forefront, and the return of Uma Bharti, who owes her position in the party to her mentor Govindacharya, is not only about the UP elections.

Neither is the Left in a position to do so. The very nature of its cadre base prevents it from adopting the role of a social democrat opposition that it now actually represents. Caught up in its own contradictions, it needs to go back to both West Bengal and Kerala and rebuild. It is no position to lead a political mobilisation on the very issues that were once central to its politics. It can only be a part of the political opposition to the Congress, but cannot be central to it.

The absence of a single party that can harness this discontent does not mean it will dissipate. This is not how politics works; if a single party does not exist, a collection of parties will come together. The discontent will create its own platform; Anna Hazare and Ramdev are only the first symptoms. We are likely, for the first time since 1997, to see a return to the kind of coalition politics many had believed we had left behind.

This coalition, though, cannot exist as a ragtag of parties that is only united in its opposition to the Congress. It will need a clear vision on issues such as corruption and land acquisition. It will need to articulate a position on liberalisation that is far less breathless than the current consensus in Delhi. And while this coalition will not come up overnight, it could well come into being before the next elections.

The Congress seems blind to this possibility. The time for National Advisory Council (NAC) band-aids is over. It is the very ease with which people such as Aruna Roy have been co-opted by the Congress through the NAC that will make them irrelevant in the political battle that lies ahead. The Congress’ short-term strategy of first cajoling and then threatening Hazare and Ramdev will only buy it some breathing space, but does nothing to counter the public anger against the party.

In some ways, the party’s current approach to tackling this anger seems unsurprisingly similar to how Digvijaya Singh dealt with the BJP in Madhya Pradesh in the 2002 elections. From mocking Uma Bharti’s desire to offer a birthday cake to Hanuman to extolling the virtues of cow urine, he tried every gimmick to unsettle the opposition but did little to deal with issues that really mattered—electricity and roads. He was routed. The party, inspired in part by Digvijaya, is today indulging in similar theatrics while ignoring the real issues; the outcome cannot be very different.

The potential defeat of the Congress, of course, is a problem only for the party, not for anyone else. But the undermining of the process of liberalisation concerns us all, whether we welcome or resent such an outcome. Pragmatically, it is clear we need growth, but in our blind acceptance of what has been done to ensure this growth, we have shrugged off many of its consequences. For the first since 1993, we see the possibility of a political backlash against the process. The question that remains is: who will do the course-correction?

Anna HazareBaba RamdevCongressgreed