Austerity Raj: Lessons from travelling Cattle Class

Stories about Sonia Gandhi and the Congress's austerity drive are all around and all over. Thanks to Tharoor's generous tweeting, the mesaure got more meia coverage than it deserved. Here's Jug Suraiya's sattirical take on the situation. Does it set and example, is as ineffective or doess it genuinely make a difference.

Sarojini Naidu's remark that it cost the Indian taxpayer a lot to keep the Mahatma in the poverty he was accustomed to has gained relevance again, more than 60 years after it was originally made. Sarojini was referring to Gandhiji's habit of travelling by III class on trains, with the result that, for security reasons, an entire coach had to be reserved for him alone. Like history, austerity repeats itself. And the Congress-led UPA government has energetically been embracing conspicuous austerity to win kudos and influence the electorate.

Ostentatious austerity, or spendthrift thrift, has become politically correct in view of the deficit monsoon which is likely to adversely impact the rural economy and act as a brake on India's growth story, already affected by the global slowdown. Taking the cue from Sonia Gandhi, Congresswallas and their allies have been scurrying to show solidarity with what might be called the alms janta by flying economy class on airlines. As 'airdashing' to sundry places the farther off the better is the preferred pastime of our netas, the economy-package rule is likely to cramp their style, amongst other things.But what price such cut-price netas? Just how effective will this austerity raj prove in wooing the once and future voter? Does the average voter - whoever she may be actually want bargain-basement, cheaper-by-the-dozen desh ka netas? Or is this mythical average voter more likely to be impressed by larger-than-life, literally high-flying and big-spending brand leaders, be they political fat cats, Bollywood superstars, or cricket crorepatis?

The misapprehension that a lot of armchair ascetics make is that austerity is a virtue in the eyes of the poor; it isn't. Austerity is a virtue only in the eyes of the affluent (people who observe religious fasts or go on diets to lose the excess weight their wealth has burdened them with). For the poor, austerity is an ever-present evil, an inescapable nemesis; it's the gnawing pain of an empty belly, the skeletal spectre of despair.

The poor don't want to see people whom they know to be rich and powerful as their netas must be, or why are they netas in the first place? to enact austerity; the poor recognise this for the sanctimonious hypocrisy that it is. (Fly economy and how many of the poor can afford to fly at all, forget economy? and continue to live in a Lutyens' bungalow which costs over Rs 150 crore, which would provide a school and a hospital each for some 150 villages.)

Marie Antoinette almost got it right: if the poor can't eat bread, they can eat vicarious cake through others. Mayawati is one of the few Indian politicians who seems to have understood this. Behenji long ago realised that leave alone cake, even enabling the poor to eat bread is a task beyond her capabilities (or her inclinations, or both) as a political leader. So she did the next best thing. She enabled the poor to watch her eat birthday cake, and wear diamonds in her hair, and put up hundreds of crores worth of statues to herself.

Mayawati's political strategy is the mirror image of conspicuous austerity; it is proxy prodigality, second-hand cake. True, this strategy doesn't seem to have worked any too well, going by the results of the last polls.

But it's early days yet. Sooner rather than later, the Indian voter poor or otherwise will see through the sham of conspicuous austerity just as she sees through Behenji's conspicuous consumption. In that they both end up beggaring us, they're both the same: a pain in the austerity.

As an Indian subject to vagaries of "being Indian and staying in India", i wont care less if our ministers travel cattle class or not. What makes a difference is, how much effort and what results do they bring to this country. Austerity is good, planning is better, excution is best.

BJP Imploding (Part III): Lack of Leadership and Way Ahead

Post Reference:
Bharat Karnad:professor at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi. http://www.livemint.com/2009/05/31212229/BJP-finding-the-right-centre.html
Ramesh Thakur: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Editorial/TOP-ARTICLE--Press-The-Reset-Button/articleshow/4600720.cms

Anti-incumbency, a nondescript track record in office and an insufficiently thought through nuclear deal should have drubbed the Congress in this general election. The botch-up by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ended up increasing Congress’s margin in Parliament. But a larger truth lurks behind the BJP’s failure, beyond supposed lapses in electoral strategy and a misreading of the public mood. It even surpasses the little noticed irony of the Congress party acquiring a youthful sheen only because the dynast Rahul Gandhi hand-picked young men and women as candidates, something which L.K. Advani—heading a less autocratically run outfit—could not do. Its failures include lack of vision, leadership and strategy.

Lack of leadership
Taking a swipe at Advani, Karnad says, the problems of the BJP are manifested in the persona of Advani. An ineffably sad man who strived mightily to invent and reinvent himself—in his last stretch, as a latter day “ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity”—he was flatly rejected by the people as much for his pretensions as, perhaps, for his lack of conviction. Wanting to be prime minister is no bad ambition to have; but, tethered to a nebulous set of beliefs, it became a liability.

The likely successor to Advani, Narendra Modi, too frittered away the opportunity to influence the public consciousness positively and to position himself as a leader of substance for the 2014 general election. Rather than talk about his success in providing power and water 24x7 to Gujarat—the only state to attain this—or his well-founded reputation for incorruptibility and, as its downstream effect, a clean administration at the grass-roots level, Modi heckled the ruling party as a “budhiya” (crone).

What Could be the way ahead?
Moderating its “Hindu” image (Influenced by the Saffron led RSS Militant Hinduism), replacing its intellectually exhausted and morally compromised leadership and returning to the virtues of party discipline, conviction and values that promote national integration and equality for all; pro-growth economic policies that encourage and reward entrepreneurship yet institute compassionate social safety nets; and a foreign policy that rests on confidence in India's ability to compete with the world all of this will position the BJP to capture a significant chunk of India's growing middle class. It can then capitalise on government shortcomings and the corruption issue, by forging winning coalitions with regional parties whose loyalties between the two national parties will continue to fluctuate.

BJP Imploding (Part II): Lack of Electoral Strategy

Post Reference:
Bharat Karnad:professor at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi. http://www.livemint.com/2009/05/31212229/BJP-finding-the-right-centre.html
Ramesh Thakur: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Editorial/TOP-ARTICLE--Press-The-Reset-Button/articleshow/4600720.cms

Anti-incumbency, a nondescript track record in office and an insufficiently thought through nuclear deal should have drubbed the Congress in this general election. The botch-up by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ended up increasing Congress’s margin in Parliament. But a larger truth lurks behind the BJP’s failure, beyond supposed lapses in electoral strategy and a misreading of the public mood. It even surpasses the little noticed irony of the Congress party acquiring a youthful sheen only because the dynast Rahul Gandhi hand-picked young men and women as candidates, something which L.K. Advani—heading a less autocratically run outfit—could not do. Its failures include lack of vision, leadership and strategy.

Lack of Electoral Strategy

The BJP's blistering attacks on Manmohan Singh as a weak and vacillating prime minister taking orders from the Gandhi family, turned the election into a referendum on Singh. Manmohan Singh’s a calming influence amidst terror attacks and the financial crisis and his qualities- decent, honest, unassuming, mild mannered, soft-spoken and likeable are rare qualities in politicians that sit agreeably with voters. So too did the renunciation of political office by Sonia and Rahul in contrast to the clutch of wannabe PMs from other parties. The squandering of economic opportunities over the past five years was blamed by voters on obstructionist coalition parties, not Singh. Attacking him provoked a backlash. Rahul and Priyanka presented younger Congress faces to the BJP's 81-year-old L K Advani. The moderate majority was repelled when fundamentalist Hindus attacked Christians in Orissa and young girls in a Mangalore pub. The BJP alienated its core constituency by hypocritical opposition to the nuclear deal with the US. Strenuously opposed by China, Pakistan and the non-proliferationists, the sweetheart deal was one the BJP would have grabbed in office. Yet it joined the communists with their long history of favouring foreign fellow-ideologues over national interests. Opportunity was squandered also with 26/11 when initial unity collapsed into shrill squabbling at a time of national peril. Attacked for his record on terrorism, Singh counter-punched by recalling Advani's hand-wringing as home minister during a string of terrorist attacks, including on Parliament; release of hardcore terrorists to the Taliban in Kandahar; the year-long military mobilisation against Pakistan that led nowhere; the Babri masjid demolition; and the anti-Muslim pogrom in Gujarat.
The BJP's reputation for communalism distanced allies from the rhetoric and agenda of Narendra Modi and Varun Gandhi. The BJP's only vision was that of the rearview mirror. As India changes, the Indian voter's profile changes. The BJP could neither embrace nor repudiate Varun Gandhi's virulent anti-Muslim rhetoric. It could not reach a broader constituency while appealing to militant Hinduism. On the other hand BJP would/will have lost its core Hindu base if it diluted its ideological purity. The tension will affect its search for fresh leaders. It was entrapped also in the disastrous strategy of trying to win an election on the basis of fear and divisiveness. Hope, generosity of spirit and optimism usually triumph over grievance and negativity.

The BJP’s impressive record of good governance in Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh as well as issues where it holds the whip-hand—such as strong national defence, and an economy speedily unshackled from the remnants of the licence-permit raj—were left adrift. A sustained campaign to pillory the nuclear deal in terms of the “Indian bomb in danger” would have left the Congress utterly on the defensive. The BJP, however, talked of “renegotiating” it, leaving the Congress to walk away with the game.

BJP Imploding (Part I): The lack of a Coherent Vision

Post Reference:
Bharat Karnad:professor at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi . http://www.livemint.com/2009/05/31212229/BJP-finding-the-right-centre.html
Ramesh Thakur: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Editorial/TOP-ARTICLE--Press-The-Reset-Button/articleshow/4600720.cms

Anti-incumbency, a nondescript track record in office and an insufficiently thought through nuclear deal should have drubbed the Congress in this general election. The botch-up by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ended up increasing Congress’s margin in Parliament. But a larger truth lurks behind the BJP’s failure, beyond supposed lapses in electoral strategy and a misreading of the public mood. It even surpasses the little noticed irony of the Congress party acquiring a youthful sheen only because the dynast Rahul Gandhi hand-picked young men and women as candidates, something which L.K. Advani—heading a less autocratically run outfit—could not do. Its failures include lack of vision, leadership and strategy.

No Ideological Core apart from Hindutva / Lack of a coherent vision

That truth relates to the BJP’s having no ideological core. There is space for a centre-right national party alongside the Congress on the centre-left, around which politics can be structured and coalition governments formed. Instead of basing itself on any progress and development led idealogical core, BJP went alongwith Hindutva and Congress bashing as its electoral idealogy. After BJPs losses in the 6 state assembly elections (including Delhi), it was expected that BJP would reconsider its electoral USP and communication strategy. However, BJP clung on to its Hindutva platform and demeaning the Congress (instead of exulting its own agenda or achievements).

BJP's challenge was to preserve Hindutva loyalty and yet reach out to a broader social coalition. For the aam aadmi, Jai Shri Ram is increasingly passe. The BJP had a choice: Cling to the past the glory that was India with a shrinking voter base or embrace a vision for the future the glory that awaits India which appeals to the growing voter cohorts of the young and urban.

The Congress at least offered the solace of rhetoric, regardless of whether the condition of the “aam aadmi” (ordinary citizen) is ever bettered by the party’s exertions in power. Election slogans encapsulate the promised thrust of government. It does not matter if the end state is never reached. Recall Indira Gandhi’s “Garibi hatao” (End poverty)? It did little for the poor but kept the Congress party in clover for nearly a generation. In this context, faced with the BJP’s campaign, the average voter would have concluded that it was disconnected from reality.

Social order and stability were the preconditions for the rights and freedoms enjoyed by the citizenry as well as for a free market. It is these principles that the BJP should associate with.

Can Left and Congress align again?

As a answer to an ET debate:
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4049709.cms

The left and Congress can have a walk in the park only and only if BJP is lurking around in the bushes. The idea i am putting across is, the politics of anti BJP is the only commonality between these two parties. All earlier Congress + Left coalitions have been only studies in convenience and way for Congress to garner Lok Sabha numbers.

I am not debating that Congress is bad or BJP is. The point i make here is that, being the largest two parties in the largest democracy in the world, Congress and BJP should have an active agenda, a plan for progress, which ought to be shared with junta. More and more, these developmental agendas will decide the fate of political parties in the elections. The case in point is Kashmir, which inspite of being strife torn and terrorism plagued voted for Bijli, Sadak and Paani! After elections, in case of a simple majority eluding the winner, post election alliances can be sort with regional parties on the agenda of development as set before elections already.

As far as the political spectrum is concerned, let the Left be "Left". Personally i dont see any leadership, perspective,coherence and vision in Left. From being anti 123 to Singrur fiasco to Achutanandan's comment on "stray dogs" at martyr Unnikrishnan's house to allegations of corruption, Left has not made any significant inroads anywhere in terms of a vision for a unified and developed country.

As an end note, I was impressed by L K Advani's blogs and website. Its very Obamaesque! Congress and BJP need to take a leaf out of Obama's campaign. Both Congress and BJP will have to draft their developmental agendas with or without the Left.