Allies Missing In Cabinet And Future Of INDIA Alliance

Allies Missing In Cabinet And Future Of INDIA Alliance

                                                                                     Saeed Naqvi

Zamana kiski raoonat pe khak daal gaya?

Ye kaun bol raha tha khuda ke lehje mein?

(On whose arrogance has time heaped a pile of dust?

Who was it pretending to speak the language of Gods?)

I thought this definition of hubris by Iftekhar Arif had summed it all up until I saw the Prime Minister, the great illusionist that he is, go through the swearing in ceremony as if nothing had happened. All the key cabinet posts had been retained by colleagues in the pre election government. Where were the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) partners, Chandrababu Naidu and Nitish Kumar’s nominees?

“Unconditional surrender” screamed one journalist known for his outspokenness. He does not realize that the name of the game for the two allies is “power” in their respective states not cabinet posts. Remaining outside the union cabinet enhances their capacity to blackmail. This way they strengthen their power base in the states. In any case, Chandrababu Naidu’s pet project is the capital of Andhra Pradesh, Amravati. Nehru invited Le Corbusier to design Chandigarh. Naidu is dreaming on a grander scale.

Neither Naidu, nor Nitish are secure in their regional charisma. Should their nominee acquire a high post in the Union Cabinet he may strike a profile which, in time, will begin to challenge the sponsor.

Nitish would have been a huge embarrassment at the centre. His mental balance is, by universal consent, hugely impaired. But he has the residual cunning to try and manage early elections in Bihar. He hopes to increase his JDU numbers in the state by being part of the NDA alliance.

The INDIA alliance has made history but it has to be extremely careful until its coherence survives the test of time.

Lay saans bhi ahista

Ke nazuk hai bahut kaam

Aafaaq ke is kargahe

Sheesha gari ka

(Breathe gently in this glass work;

The cosmic arrangement is too delicately balanced.)

It has been an anxious past decade which is why Mir Taqi Mir’s words of caution come to mind every time one fears a faulty step by INDIA. So far, the alliance has played beautifully but it must be careful because the media will not change overnight. Big corporates are still busy shoring up Modi. In the meantime, the media can play a disruptive hand. Election results were a vote of no confidence in the mainstream media too. With its credibility so suspect, will its moves be effective in unsettling INDIA? But it can create ill will almost imperceptibly. Some days ago front pages of newspapers and the TV channels had one photograph. Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra in one frame being repeated several times.

What is the effect of this photograph? The coterie around the party leadership sees in this projection a vindication of their dream. INDIA is, after all, Congress led. The party’s climb to 100 seats is a result of Rahul Gandhi’s incredibly successful yatras. He is now a mature leader who helped author a people-friendly manifesto, sensitive to the yawning economic inequalities.

Fair enough, but was it not the Samajwadi Party’s Akhilesh Yadav who trounced the BJP in its seemingly impregnable fortress of UP. He is the giant killer who helped win 43 Parliament seats in the most populous state. That it was Akhilesh Yadav who bearded the BJP lion in his den is the extraordinary event of the campaign which the media will not project at all leave alone with the frequency of the three Gandhis in a frame. Neither the Congress nor the Gandhis are to blame, but they should be aware that optics can be misunderstood by touchy coalition partners.

I remember a conversation I had with Akhilesh in Lucknow in 2017. He said he was let down by Rahul despite an understanding. “Yeh log hamare saath baithna bhi pasand naheen kartey.” (These people – Rahul Gandhi, etcetera – are uncomfortable even sitting with us.) He was giving vent to his caste angst. The stakes are too high for the INDIA to allow such sensitivities to create misunderstanding. Much has happened since 2017. Rahul and Akhilesh are mature leaders today. The good news is that the effort at playing spoilsport for the Alliance to shore up Modi will be undertaken by the same “Godi” media which has been roundly thrashed in the recent elections. A hundred flowers bloomed in the digital youtube media. Brilliant journalism flourished outside the compromised mainstream. This new, bubbly media threw up star journalists. It clearly had a hand in the electoral outcome.

New Delhi’s drawing rooms are misleading places to gauge national politics. The tendency of the upwardly mobile middle class is to locate connections in the emerging power equations. This class is happy that the Modi juggernaut has been halted in good time, before it could destroy the liberal Constitution in order to install a theocratic Hindu nation. That has been averted. But the alternative that is emerging is not the one this class is comfortable with.

This elite has dreamt up India as a non existent two party system – BJP or the Congress. It grimaces at the BJP’s anti Muslim excesses and finds the Congress better mannered on this count. But what this class sees on offer is not the Congress but INDIA alliance. The Congress is admittedly the largest party, but SP’s Akhilesh Yadav is an equal stake holder. The Congress contribution is quantitative by virtue of its spread across the country. Akhilesh’s contribution is qualitative. Wrenching UP away from the BJP was an unbelievable achievement. TMC’s Mamata Banerjee in Kolkata and other Alliance members deserve equal attention.

Ye maikhana hai,

Bazm e Jum naheen hai

Yahan koi kisi se kum

            Naheen hai

(This is a Tavern, not Jamshed’s Palace

Nobody is higher than anyone here.)

Just as well that a Rahul-Akhilesh dhanyawad (Thank you) yatra across UP is being put together – to begin with.

 

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Communalism Plus Nationalism, Something Like Balakot Required For Absolute Victory

Communalism Plus Nationalism, Something Like Balakot Required For Absolute Victory

                                                                                        Saeed Naqvi

Not far from Prayagraj (Allahabad) are two contiguous villages of Dadupur and Sarangapur in Chhoka block, across the Jamuna river. The two are in the Allahabad constituency. Prayagraj name is not being used for elections. Next door Phoolpur was in the news because two star campaigners were whisked away for security as unbelievably large crowds threatened a stampede. Rahul Gandhi and Akhilesh Yadav had to be protected. Such massive crowds are indicators which way the electoral balance is tilting.

Dadupur is dominated by Shia Muslims and a sprinkling of Dalits. All Muslims, irrespective of sectarian divisions are presumed to be in opposition to Modi. An aggressive Shia cleric of Lucknow, Saiyyid Kalbe Jawwad, has created some confusion. He has gone and tied an Imamzamin or an amulet on the arm of the candidate from Lucknow, Defence Minister, Rajnath Singh. Was it a signal to Shia voters?

Voting in the constituency was on May 25, but on May 22 three busloads of Shias left for Jogipura Dargah in Najibabad for the annual Urs abandoning their Congress candidate Ujjwal Raman Singh.

Meanwhile, at Sarangapur, dominated by Brahmins, events took a different turn. Erstwhile Pradhan Lakshmi Shankar Mishra received a call from the police station.

As soon as Mishra turned up, he was given an option: either cool your heels at the police station or go home and not be seen in public. Then at Karchchana police station, a worker of the same Congress candidate Ujjwal Singh’s much respected father Rewati Raman Singh, was detained. When reports reached the veteran leader, he drove to the Police station to seek his loyalist’s release. Not only did the police not release his friend, the officer issued a terse note to him: you are not allowed to step out of the thana. Word soon spread and a crowd began to menace the police station. Rewati Raman Singh was allowed to go home.

 

Going by the word of reliable journalists in Lucknow and others who travelled through the state, strong arm behaviour of the police has been something of an epidemic. As I finish writing this sentence, I receive a call from Ambedkarnagar that the police scaled the walls of the opposition candidate’s house to restrain his supporters from stirring out to exert influence.

 

Employing the police in any circumstance has become Yogi Adityanath’s almost natural habit. It may also be to make assurance doubly sure because the stakes have become high since his name has begun to circulate as a Prime Ministerial candidate should such a situation arise. Excessive police action could also be a sign of nervousness because reports from the field are not flattering.

 

In Hindutva circles, there is pronounced disappointment that building the Ram Temple has not been an electoral draw. Building a temple does not stir emotions on the same scale as pulling down a mosque does. Standing with folded hands in front of Rama’s image is a spiritual experience; breaking a mosque to build a temple is an angry emotional experience, translatable into political action.

 

If you watch the photograph of Uma Bharati clambering onto Murli Manohar Joshi’s back watching the demolition of Babari Masjid, the expression on their faces is ecstatic even orgasmic. They were celebrating a violent victory over the Moghuls. It was this kind of experience the nation felt over Balakot in 2019. It helped Modi win the election.

 

Why has something like Balakot not happened this time? What is on trial therefore is pure, undiluted communalism, a sort of Muslim hating not seen before as a means to mobilizing crowds. Mangalsutra that Hindu women wear ritually will be snatched by the Muslims. They will also be handed all the reservations meant for the lower castes. All these anti Hindu monstrosities (goes the allegation) will be the handiwork of the INDIA alliance, a band of Muslim lovers who will go to any lengths to please them. They will even do the mujra made famous by nautch girls to rouse the Muslims. All these wonderful nuggets are part of Modi’s speeches.

 

From this 24 carat communalism observers have drawn different conclusions. One school of thought suggests that plunging headlong into mindless communalism is a sign of nervousness. In other words, the venom in his utterances is rearguard action on his part because he is doing badly in the field. The second school believe the outcome will not be determined by the ballot box but by tricks and stratagems.

 

Careful attention must be given to what Jawed Laiq and Bharati Bhargava have to say after their ritual visit to the Sangam ghats. Covering the 1977 elections, Jawed turned up in Sangam: he found the boatmen and the pilgrims from every part of the country a huge resource. That is how he got a world scoop: Indira Gandhi would lose the election. He made the Sangam his regular hunting ground for election results. He came up trumps most of the times.

 

This time he has returned with intelligence not available to others, after speaking to such diverse Sangam pilgrims as devotees from the North East, tribals from Rajasthan and umpteen other places. Jawed and Bharati were surprised to discover what looked like a wave for Modi.

 

Jawed concluded that the excessive and stark communalism of Modi’s election utterance were not a function of despair and nervousness. They were part of a well crafted strategy: the more vicious his speech the greater his popularity. Muslim bating pleases this lot, but I must insert a caveat: venom alone may not translate into electoral success. For this to happen, I have maintained a consistent theory: communalism has to be tied to nationalism to give political results.

 

Mangalsutra or even the cow by itself is not enough. There has to be the menacing shadow of Pakistan lurking in the background to generate a post Balakot like election changing mood. Let me abide by my theory until June 4 when the results come in.

 

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