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Email this citationCIAO DATE: 10/98
India’s 12th National Elections
February 1998
Contents
| Introduction | |
| Enormous Changes | |
| Driving Forces | |
| Secular Nationalism | |
| Religious Nationalism | |
| Social Justice and the Lower Castes | |
| Challenges and Moves | |
| The Congress Party | |
| Moderation of the BJP | |
| The United Front | |
| Economic Reform | |
| Will India Have Stable Government? | |
| Appendixes | |
Between February 16 and March 7 India is holding its 12th national elections. Who is likely to win and form the next government? Unless trends change dramatically, India is headed for another hung Parliament. However, unlike the United Front (UF) government of the last year and a half, the ruling alliance will not be a 13-party coalition. India’s next government will be a coalition government, but it will either be led by the Congress Party (the Congress) or the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). As of this writing, the odds are against a BJP-led government, though the party is likely to emerge with the largest number of seats. Instead, the odds are increasingly in favor of an anti-BJP, postelection alliance between the Congress, likely to win the second-largest number of seats, and the United Front. Economic reforms will continue, and so will India’s democracy. Democracy itself is not at stake. A period of old certitudes has ended, and a new stability is struggling to be born.
Elections were called before the 11th Lok Sabha (lower house of Parliament) could complete its five-year term. The Lok Sabha, directly elected, is the effective seat of power (the indirectly elected upper house is for all practical purposes a debating chamber). Unlike a presidential system which has fixed tenures for the legislature and executive, India’s British-style parliamentary system prescribes only a maximum, not a fixed, term for both. While no elected government can last for more than five years, a government can collapse sooner if it loses its parliamentary majority, and if no other party and its allies can form a government, new elections must be called. The life of a government is thus dependent on its legislative support. In November 1997 the existing United Front government lost its majority support, and no other parties or alliances were able to form a government.
Often called a “grand civic festival,” elections have become part of India’s political routine. However, despite the country’s established electoral tradition, the longest in the developing world, holding elections in India is a mammoth task. The size of the electorate is 600 million, whose voting is supervised by 4.5 million staffers in “no fewer than 900,000 polling stations from the high Himalayas to the deserts of Rajasthan, including areas that can be reached only on the back of an elephant,” according to Chief Election Commissioner M.S. Gill. As a consequence, there is perhaps no option but to stagger parliamentary elections over several rounds. Thus 540 of 543 constituencies are voting on February 16, 22, and 28. Three constituencies in the state of Jammu and Kashmir are going to the polls on March 7. Vote counting begins on March 2, and the first results will be announced on March 3. If the elections produce a clear winner, which is unlikely, there will be a government in place by mid-March. If, as is more likely, India gets another hung Parliament and no party and its electoral allies get a clear majority, protracted negotiations over a new ruling alliance may follow. Whatever the election results, there should be a government in place by the end of March.
All three contenders have had substantial experience running state governments, but only the Congress Party has had long stints in central government. The Congress has ruled in Delhi for all but approximately six years since independence, although it has often been out of power in several states since 1967. Different versions of a UF coalition have twice been in power in Delhi. Lacking a parliamentary majority each time, the UF has been able to rule only with the support of the BJP (1989–90) or the Congress (1996–97). However, since the late 1960s almost all parties that make up the United Front have been in power in some state.
Led by the BJP, the Hindu nationalists are the most controversial and closely observed group in India. Since a Hindu nationalist killed Mahatma Gandhi in January 1948, few Indians have been indifferent to the political fortunes of Hindu nationalism. And those who had forgotten the assassination of the father of the nation were given a taste of Hindu right-wing bigotry when a mosque (the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya) was destroyed under the public’s gaze in December 1992, followed by the worst rioting since independence. The Hindu nationalists generate strong emotions, making a dispassionate analysis difficult. But a level-headed analysis is sorely needed, for although they may not win, the Hindu nationalists are knocking at the door of national power. One must look carefully at both their ideology and their actions.
The behavior of the Hindu nationalists in government is not entirely unknown. They have run several state governments in the last decade, including some of the biggest-Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, and Rajasthan. They have twice participated in central government. In 1977–79 the Hindu nationalists were part of an omnibus anti-Congress alliance after Indira Gandhi effected an Emergency (1975–77), the only time democracy was suspended in independent India. Since she had, among other things, jailed most of her political opponents and imposed severe restrictions on press freedom, the sentiments against Mrs. Gandhi were so strong that all kinds of opposition parties, dissolving their ideological differences, came together to defeat her. About two decades later in June 1996, when the BJP became the largest party in the 11th Parliament, the Hindu nationalists were invited to form a government, in accordance with parliamentary procedures. But they failed to win a majority in Parliament, which led to the collapse of their 13-day government and to the formation of a 12-party United Front government, supported also by the Congress Party.
Two sets of issues are involved in these elections, some concerning the larger background of Indian politics, others more specific and short run. The larger issues are: Why are there three blocks of parties instead of two? Why isn’t there a two-party system, which would make it easier to get clear majorities and form stable governments? And why are the Hindu nationalists so controversial even though they have ruled several states and taken steps toward moderation? The more specific questions are: Who is likely to win and why? What kinds of policies should one expect after the elections? Will economic reforms continue, or will they be reversed? A background note on the recent changes in India’s polity and economy and a brief account of the historically enduring and recurrent themes of Indian politics will begin to answer these questions. As in so many countries, significance and meaning in Indian politics is often historically derived.
The last decade in India has been one of profound changes. Four foundations of postindependence India have been altered, or fundamentally challenged, by developments of recent years. First, secularism, a key political principle which traditionally provided considerable psychological and political security to religious minorities, has been vigorously attacked by Hindu nationalists. Secularism is shaken as a result, but it is neither dead nor likely to die. Since the destruction of the Babri mosque by the Hindu nationalists, votes for them have not risen. As a result, most Hindu nationalist leaders, if not the cadres, have steadily moved from the right-wing to the center-right of Indian politics. They have been trying to win more votes by scaling down their anti-Muslim rhetoric and forming alliances with mainstream political parties. Though right-wing Hindu nationalists want to move or destroy two more specified mosques, the BJP is unlikely to sponsor another wanton destruction of a contested holy site. However, the fact that minority rights are no longer a certainty is a mighty change in Indian politics.
Second, the caste hierarchy that marked Hindu social order for centuries is beginning to crumble. Political mobilization of the so-called lower castes 1 is undermining, perhaps decisively, the caste hierarchy, though not eliminating caste consciousness. A vast majority of India is Hindu, and a vast majority of Hindu society is lower caste. The rise of lower castes has been a remarkable consequence of India’s democracy and has changed the political attitudes of all parties. The Oxbridge-educated, upper-caste, urban politicians’so common in the 1950s and so skilled at the art of parliamentary debate—are progressively giving way to the domestically educated, lower-caste, rural politicians. This result is clearly a triumph of the democratic principle, given that, though more urban than before, India is still 65 percent rural and lower castes constitute its majority by a wide margin.
Third, India’s formerly Fabian-socialist, inward-looking economic system is increasingly giving way to a market orientation and international economic openness. India’s internal market was considered by the first generation of leaders and economists to be large enough to make international trade virtually irrelevant, and central planning was deemed superior to reliance on markets for economic development. Both mistakes have been reversed in the 1990s. Economic reforms are generating a 6–7 percent annual economic growth rate. Material comforts are beginning to reach millions of homes for the first time in Indian history, and the process, though it could be quicker, is certain to continue.
Finally, nonalignment, the linchpin of India’s foreign policy indicating equidistance from the U.S. and the USSR, has been rendered meaningless by the end of the cold war. Though nonaligned in principle, India’s foreign policy was in fact tilted toward the USSR. Since 1991 India has come closer to the United States but not embraced it wholeheartedly. India is looking for what may be called a mature friendship—a friendship that emphasizes, even celebrates, what is common between the two nations, but can also survive their differences.
Few societies rebuild their founding pillars without serious political turbulence. In extreme cases not only the political system but the nation breaks down. The former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia are the most recent cases in point. Therefore it should not be surprising that India has seen a great deal of turbulence in recent years. More noteworthy and exceptional is the fact that India’s various transformations are taking place within a democratic framework, the fifth and only foundation of postindependence India that has on the whole not only remained unchallenged but has deepened. India is widely recognized among political scientists to be the greatest exception to liberal democratic theory. Low incomes, a primarily agricultural population, and ethnic diversity are generally viewed as inhospitable settings for the functioning of democracy. India is poor, primarily agricultural, and ethnically highly diverse, but, with the exception of the 18-month suspension of political freedoms by Indira Gandhi, it has remained democratic.
Initially viewed as a gift from the postindependence political elite, India’s democracy has shifted downward. It may not have the stability and easy certitude of days when the urban and upper-caste elite dominated, but it has become more inclusive, rooted, and mature. The largest-ever survey of political beliefs and preferences of Indian citizens, conducted in 1996 by Delhi’s Center for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), found that:
- despite unhappiness with political parties, over two-thirds of respondents rejected the idea of governance without them, making it clear that a nonelected government, by the bureaucracy or military, is undesirable and elected representatives, however unsatisfactory, are the only legitimate rulers;
- about 60 percent of respondents were convinced that voting made a difference, a belief that the poor held more strongly than the rich;
- voter turnout among the poor and in the countryside was higher than the national average;
- over 75 percent of respondents rejected the claim that only the educated should vote in a country with 40 percent illiteracy; and
- finally, respondents trusted the Election Commission, the courts, and the politicians more than they did the bureaucrats and police. Politicians, in other words, have become a channel to counter the unresponsiveness of the bureaucracy and police; and if politicians violate public trust, the Election Commission and courts, it is believed, can force them to behave.
In short, compared to its past, India today is less secular, less Moscow-friendly, less dominated by the upper castes, more democratic, and more market-oriented. All of these trends are likely to deepen in the coming years, with one exception. Secularism is unlikely to have a continuing fall. Even a BJP in power will not find it easy to undermine secularism, for it is a constitutional matter and a simple legislative majority is not enough to change the constitution. More importantly, the BJP is unlikely to come to power, now or later, if it appears too threatening to the minorities and does not discipline the visceral anti-Muslim instincts of many of its cadres. The BJP’s alliance with centrist and mainstream parties in these elections is the strongest political sign so far that the BJP leadership now considers an unabashed majoritarian ideology unworkable. Why, nonetheless, does the BJP continue to be so controversial? To understand the kinds of concerns the BJP raises, we need to look at the underlying themes of Indian politics.
Of the multiple cleavages of Indian society, religion and caste have played the most important role in 20th-century politics. Religious and caste distinctions have produced the three major ideologies in Indian politics: secular nationalism, religious nationalism, and caste as a basis of social justice. These ideologies have repeatedly motivated political campaigns and mobilized the masses. They are like the issues of race, equality, and freedom in U.S. politics, appearing again and again, never quite withering away. The power of secular nationalism has declined and that of caste as a basis of social justice increased in recent years. Religious nationalism has gone through a revival since the 1980s. However, the decline of secular nationalism does not mean the end of secularism or the victory of religious nationalism.
Secular Nationalism
Secular nationalism is India’s official ideology. It guided the national movement under Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru and was later legitimated by the country’s constitution. It regards the nation as a family in which all religions (as well as languages and ethnic groups) have an equal place. In principle, none will dominate the functioning of the state. Faith does not determine citizenship nor any of the rights that go with it. Birth in India is the sole legal criterion. In electoral politics, the Congress Party has been the chief representative of this ideology. With the prominent exception of Muslim nationalists in the first half of the century and Hindu nationalists throughout the century, most political parties have agreed with this view of the nation. Their differences with the Congress Party have been over whether the party has lived up to the ideology or only paid it lip service. In the first 30 years after independence the secular credentials of the Congress were scarcely in doubt, and in the last 15, rarely in evidence.
Religious Nationalism
Religious nationalism has primarily taken two forms: Muslim and Hindu. Muslim nationalism emerged in the first half of the century, leading to the birth of Pakistan in 1947. The argument for the formation of Pakistan was that Hindus and Muslims were not two different religious communities but two separate nations. The Congress Party contested the so-called two-nation theory throughout the national movement, but failed to prevent the formation of Pakistan at the time of British departure.
Hindu nationalism is, more or less, the mirror image of Muslim nationalism. Its adherents also claim that the differences between Hindus and Muslims are the biggest cleavage of Indian society and politics. However, unlike the Muslim nationalists, Hindu nationalists claim that Hindus and Muslims are not two separate nations: rather, the Muslims need to be “assimilated.” Hinduism, according to the Hindu nationalists, gives India its distinctive national identity, and other religions, including Islam, must conform to the supposed Hindu center. According to Hindu nationalists, Hindus must have cultural and political primacy in shaping India’s destiny. Their aim is not only to emphasize the centrality of Hinduism to India, but also to build Hindu unity. The Hindus are after all a religious majority only in a manner of speaking; internally they are divided by caste cleavages. In contemporary India, the BJP and its predecessor, the Jan Sangh, have been the biggest patrons of this ideology.
The idea that Indian national identity is Hindu is deeply controversial. Few political campaigns have caused as much rancor and bloodshed in India as the Hindu nationalist mobilization to overturn India’s secular nationalism in the last decade. Although 82 percent of India is Hindu today, the religious minorities that constitute roughly 18 percent of the population (Appendix 1) have made remarkable contributions to India’s culture, life, and history. Indian arts—dance, music, architecture—represent Hindu as well as Muslim influences. The Taj Mahal, according to students of architecture, is an example of architectural syncretism merging Hindu and Persian motifs. India’s languages and literature have a large sprinkling of Muslim words, images, and metaphors from Persia and Egypt, which entered India through the Mughal courts of the middle ages. Hindi, the language Hindu nationalists favor and the first language of over 40 percent of Indians today, shares much of its vocabulary with Urdu, the official language of Pakistan, and vice versa. Other minorities have also contributed handsomely to the evolution of India. The Sikhs have been the heroes of India’s armed forces; Indian Christians have made significant contributions to India’s education system; and the Parsis (pre-Islamic Persians) have been among India’s leading industrialists.
That there have been some bitter struggles between Hindus and Muslims in India’s history is beyond doubt, but it does not follow that there have been no constructive exchanges between them. Since Hindu nationalism has traditionally emphasized only the bitterness, it amounts to a highly selective and dangerous retrieval of India’s past. Indian culture is not Hindu; it is Indian. Hinduism is undoubtedly a large component of it, but it is not synonymous with Indian culture and civilization. That is why Nehru used the term “Indo-Muslim” to characterize Indian culture. Others have used the words “salad bowl” or “mosaic.” Indian culture conceptualized as a mosaic does not devalue the contributions made by religious minorities to India’s history and culture; but viewing Indian culture as Hindu does. Hindu nationalism does not allow minorities a meaningful and justly proud role in India’s public life, especially the Muslims with whom Hindu nationalists have had an adversarial relationship throughout the 20th century. Many Indians, including millions of Hindus, find Hindu nationalism deeply disturbing, for its ideology stands for bigotry, bitterness, and narrow-mindedness. Others, however, find the BJP appealing, because they believe a salad bowl or a mosaic cannot build a strong and united India; only a “melting pot” can.
Social Justice and the Lower Castes
The caste cleavages among Hindus constitute the second major reason for the great controversy over Hindu nationalism. Of all social cleavages in India, those of caste are far and away the most varied and confusing. Of all Indian institutions, caste has befuddled external observers most. So what is caste? How does it function? Why must a caste-based ideology be opposed to Hindu nationalism?
Caste, simply put, has been the defining principle of Hindu social order. Centuries ago the Hindus developed a social hierarchy based on birth, which also became the basis of professional specialization. The Hindu social order was thus an ascriptive division of labor, to which notions of pollution and purity were also added. The social order was, broadly speaking, threefold. At the top were the priests and scholars (the Brahmins), the warriors (the Kshatriyas), and the businessmen (the Vaishyas). Peasants, artisans, and servicemen constituted the middle (the Sudras). The third category, the untouchables, ranked at the bottom and their jobs included cleaning up waste, making crafts that involved hides and other “polluting” materials, and producing crude forms of alcohol. Each caste had different social and economic rights and privileges: the lower the caste, the fewer the privileges. Like the untouchables, the middle castes were also subjected to social condescension and discrimination by the upper castes.
The description of some of these caste categories has changed. The term “upper caste” has more or less always covered the first category (Brahmins, Kshtariyas, and Vaishyas). There was a consensus among the constitution-makers that the untouchables had been victims of centuries of prejudice and discrimination. At independence untouchability was outlawed and the ex-untouchables were put in the Ninth Schedule of the Constitution for affirmative action, hence the new term for the group, “Scheduled Castes.” The middle category was also given a new name after independence: the Other Backward Castes (OBCs). While it was recognized that the OBCs suffered at the hands of the upper castes, there was no consensus on whether the discrimination practiced against them was as vicious and debilitating as that against the Scheduled Castes, and they were not scheduled for affirmative action. Finally, a fourth category called “Scheduled Tribes” was created to cover the forest-based tribes. These were put in the Ninth Schedule for affirmative action.
India’s laws reserve quotas in federal, state, and local legislatures, public employment, and institutions of higher education. But until the late 1980s only those placed at the bottom of the hierarchy—the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes—were given the benefits of affirmative action. Nearly 40 years after independence, the OBCs were finally added to the list of beneficiaries of affirmative action. Half of public employment and half of the seats in government-funded educational institutions are now reserved. The upper castes at this point are estimated to represent about 16 percent of India’s population, the Scheduled Castes about 15 percent, the Scheduled Tribes about 7 percent, and the OBCs 44 percent (Appendix 2).
This background should clarify why caste-based social justice has been a defining principle in Indian politics. The ideology aims to rectify the deeply hierarchical and unjust nature of the Hindu social order, primarily through affirmative action; its chief goal is the egalitarian restructuring of Hindu society. Moreover, advocates of social justice argue that non-Hindu religious minorities as well as Hindu lower-castes suffer from discrimination by the higher castes, so a lower caste—minorities alliance can be formed. The OBCs, the Scheduled Castes, and the Scheduled Tribes have been mobilized as new political constituencies. The lower castes are increasingly breaking their dependence on the upper castes. Instead, the emphasis is on a mobilization led by lower-caste parties and leaders.
The issue of social justice has risen to all-India prominence. The outgoing United Front government essentially represented this ideology. It should also be noted that its president comes from an ex-untouchable caste. The ideology has become so important that in 1997 all major political parties consensually supported his candidacy.
The ideology was originally confined to southern India, where it was used to mobilize the masses in the first half of this century. The lower castes of southern India ended the political and social dominance of the Brahmins in the 1960s and 1970s by democratic means. In the 1980s and 1990s the ideology of social justice for lower castes finally spread to the North and the West. The biggest state of India, Uttar Pradesh, has twice in recent history been ruled by a Scheduled Caste party, and the second-largest state, Bihar, has been ruled by a lower-caste party for nearly a decade. Both are northern states.
Lower-caste politics and Hindu nationalism are opposed in principle. Whereas caste politics is intrareligious, Hindu nationalism is interreligious. Caste politics have split Hindu society by emphasizing the mobilization of lower castes against upper castes; contrariwise, Hindu nationalism seeks to build intercaste unity and displace emphasis on caste distinctions by a Hindu–Muslim cleavage.
Over the last decade the Congress Party has increasingly lost the ideological stamina to take on Hindu nationalism. In its glory days, the Congress combined a secular nationalist ideology with patronage. Like several other parties in the world that have ruled for long periods—the Liberal Democratic Party in Japan and the Institutional Revolutionary Party in Mexico—the longer the Congress ruled, the more it attracted people because of its power of patronage, not ideology. Indeed, over the last two decades, the Congress has been surviving primarily on grounds of patronage. As the Congress has declined, lower-caste politicians have become the principal ideological adversaries of Hindu nationalism.
Whereas lower-caste parties and the Hindu nationalists have nothing in common, there are some intersections between lower-caste parties and the Congress. They share the ideology that religion should not determine the rights and privileges of citizens. But the Congress makes coalitions across caste lines, whereas the lower-caste parties pit the lower castes against upper castes in their emphasis on social justice.
Thus the lower-caste parties would like to be independent of both the BJP and the Congress Party, but if forced to choose between the two they have a partial basis for an alliance with the Congress. This has made it possible for the Congress and lower-caste parties to team up against the BJP in recent years. Their relationship has not been free of tension, but a basis for collaboration, however limited, does exist. Such a basis may also determine postelection negotiations in March. If the BJP and its allies do not win a clear majority it will be hard for them to form a government. A Congress-lower caste alliance is more likely.
Given the serious weaknesses of each of the three major contenders, the question is one of alliances. On what basis can alliances be constructed-before or after elections?
The Congress Party
The Congress is basically a victim of its own success. It kept winning for so long that it began to attract those interested only in power and the benefits of office, legitimate or illegitimate. Ideological rectitude has been a rarity in Congress politics for the last two decades, and the party’s organization has been in a state of disarray for some time.
Can the Congress win back the minorities, especially the Muslims, who constitute 12 percent of India’s population? Given the divisions in the majority community and the fact that distribution of the Muslim population makes its vote decisive in over 100 parliamentary constituencies, a return of Muslim support is more or less a requirement for the revival of the Congress. This calls for a revitalization of its secular nationalist moorings.
The Congress would also like to retrieve the support of the Scheduled Castes. As the party that initiated affirmative action for the Scheduled Castes, the Congress had relied on a solid electoral relationship with them since 1947. Of late, however, a powerful Scheduled Caste party, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), has emerged and displaced the Congress in much of northern India. Thus the best that the Congress can hope for is that the BSP’s popularity will not spread any further, or the BSP will become an alliance partner. It is unlikely that the Congress will be able to retrieve its conventional Scheduled Caste base in northern India in the near future.
These imperatives have been clear for some time, but the Congress has lacked the leadership to tackle the ideological and organizational revitalization of the party. The Congress was demoralized and desperate. It was looking for alliances to save itself in many parts of India. Its existing leaders had pockets of influence, but none had a national image or stature. Several key members left the party in December 1997 for the BJP and lower-caste parties, where the most prominent national and state-level leaders have been of late. Then Sonia Gandhi appeared on the scene.
Sonia Gandhi’s entry into campaign politics has been serendipitous for Congress Party members, who were looking for a charismatic savior. Over the last seven decades, the Nehru–Gandhi dynasty has been a virtually inexhaustible source of charisma in India. Part of the charisma is built on genuine contributions of the family, and part is based on myth. Sonia Gandhi is the widow of Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, daughter-in-law of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and granddaughter-in-law of Prime Minister Nehru.
Yet Sonia Gandhi’s charisma was not a foregone conclusion. Her marriage into the Nehru–Gandhi dynasty was a plus, but other tests remained. Could she make public speeches and establish a rapport with audiences? How would she deal with the fact that she was Italian by birth and Indian only by citizenship? How would she tackle the lingering suspicion that her family and friends were the prime beneficiaries of the multimillion dollar Bofors scandal of the late 1980s? And how would she attract minority attention?
At least in the short run, Sonia Gandhi has passed all of these tests in emphatic, though unanticipated, ways. Drawing huge crowds, making politically astute speeches, and using traditionally authentic imagery, she has thus far presented herself as an effective campaigner. Indeed, there has been such a dramatic turn-around in Congress morale that it has not sought pre-election alliances since Sonia Gandhi’s entry into politics. It is contesting 470 seats (out of 543), whereas the original expectation was that its candidates would not run in more than 400 seats.
On the suspicions of family corruption in the Bofors gun deal, Sonia Gandhi has thrown the gauntlet back to her opponents. They should prove, she says, who took money from the Swedish Bofors company when it was awarded a hefty contract for the supply of guns to India’s army in the 1980s. Her family, she argues, did not. The matter had to be set aside before she could start focusing on two objectives: getting the minorities back and neutralizing the charge that her Italian birth made her unfit for Indian politics.
To win back the Muslims, she has apologized on behalf of the Congress Party for its inability to save the Babri mosque from demolition and denied an election seat to Narasimha Rao, a senior leader of the Congress Party and prime minister when the mosque was torn down. The Congress Party has promised to create a Ministry of Minority Welfare. She has also regretted her mother-in-law’s decision in 1984 to send the army into the Golden Temple in Amritsar, the holiest shrine of Sikhs, and denied seats to party leaders who were actually or allegedly involved in fomenting anti-Sikh riots in Delhi when Indira Gandhi died in November 1984. Close to 2,000 Sikhs were killed in riots following Gandhi’s assassination by her Sikh bodyguards. Delhi’s politicians, intellectuals, and journalists have always believed that several leading Congress Party members had explicitly encouraged the rioters to kill Sikhs, though the courts have not been able to find clinching evidence against them, even as many rioters themselves have been sentenced.
Much to the dismay of India’s feminists, an emphasis on India’s traditional family values, despite her Italian birth, has been Sonia Gandhi’s second electoral theme. She is, and will be, an Indian until her death, she says, for a daughter-in-law, according to Indian tradition, belongs to the home of her husband, not her parents. Since she has maintained remarkable privacy about her family life, it is hard to judge whether her argument about traditional family values is born of convictions or strategy. She may well genuinely believe in traditional female values. In popular perceptions, at any rate, she has been a devoted wife to Rajiv and an exemplary mother to their two children, and her behavior as a widow has been dignified in the best traditional sense. She was not only visibly shaken and grieved at her assassinated husband’s pyre, a scene watched by millions on television, but there has never been a hint of scandal in her personal relationships. She did not return to Italy after her husband’s death in 1991, nor did she accept an offer from the Congress to lead the party, which would have made her a prime minister in July 1991. Indeed, she has never given the impression of lust for high office, for which she has had plentiful opportunities. She chose instead to raise her teenage children in India. Some say that her Italian family conditions were never as good as those in India, so a return was impracticable. To many Indians, however, that argument is beside the point. Whatever her Italian circumstances, Sonia Gandhi’s devotion to her Indian family, even after the death of her husband and mother-in-law, and her dignity in widowhood, carry conviction. Her disinclination to get involved in politics when she was offered the presidency of the Congress Party and her plunge into it only when the Congress seemed utterly desperate appear to have only added to her mystery and stature.
Her campaign has also disarmed BJP politicians. More than any other party, the BJP stands for India’s traditional family values and culture. So the BJP can’t really attack a daughter-in-law making an argument for traditional values. In the cultural politics of the family, it is irrelevant where the daughter-in-law came from, so long as she maintains family values.
When Sonia Gandhi announced that she would campaign for the Congress Party, the BJP had thought of undermining her by invoking the xenophobic notion of a “Rome Raj.” By presenting herself as a woman more traditional than many Indian women, Sonia Gandhi has turned the tables on the BJP. However, the surge in her favor, according to all polls, is not strong enough to produce a clear victory for the Congress Party. She has revived the party but not yet set it running. The surge is not affecting all voters in India; many remain unconvinced that Sonia Gandhi can lead.
That she is unlikely to lead the Congress back to a clear victory is not surprising. Few experts had expected such an outcome in any case; she was only expected to arrest the electoral demoralization of the Congress Party. That she would start blocking the onward march of the BJP and its allies has clearly gone against the evaluations of her potential by some of the keenest observers of Indian politics. Many who would be opposed to the re-introduction of the Nehru–Gandhi dynasty are caught in a dilemma. Should they oppose her, even though a campaign led by Gandhi is making a victory of the BJP and its allies improbable? When the choice is between dynastic charisma and a party like the BJP, which for all its moderation continues to worry a large number of Indians, it is perhaps not easy for many to form principled political judgments.
Why has Sonia Gandhi received such a popular reception? Is it that minorities are beginning to return to the Congress, or is her image as a great mother, a devoted wife, a good daughter-in-law, and a dignified widow so credible and effective as to pull large support? As more disaggregated polls come out, we will know more about the reasons for her popularity. As of this writing, the hypothesis that both of these factors are playing an important role cannot be ruled out.
While Sonia Gandhi appears to have answered the prayers of Congress Party members in the short run, the long-run issues for the party remain unresolved. The organizational health of a 113-year-old party cannot be good if none of its existing leaders can campaign effectively and they must turn to a political novice. After the elections the question of organizational restructuring can be ignored only at the party’s peril. Will Sonia Gandhi take over the leadership of the party or of the government if the Congress is able to put together an alliance after the elections? Will her charisma last, or does her popularity signal only intense mass curiosity about a mysterious public figure? If it is lasting charisma, will she be able to institutionalize it into a restructured, revived party organization? In the Nehru–Gandhi family there are two political styles. Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, used his charisma to build party organization; Indira Gandhi, his daughter, used her charisma in a personalistic way, undermining the Congress organization. Which model will Sonia Gandhi follow? It is too soon to answer these questions, but these elections may well determine Sonia Gandhi’s long-term role in Indian politics and the future of the Congress Party.
Moderation of the BJP
The political fortunes of Hindu nationalism have so far been inextricably tied up with Hindu-Muslim relations. Because of its links to nationalism, the Hindu-Muslim cleavage has an intensity like no other social cleavage. Partition of the subcontinent into India and Pakistan was the most violent episode of 20th-century India. Up to 200,000 people were killed, and anywhere from 10 to 15 million people were uprooted by migrations.
In recent years, the Hindu nationalist effort to come to power independent of a coalition has consisted of attempts to convert Hindu–Muslim divisions into a cleavage so powerful that all other identities or political issues pale into insignificance. This is arguably what the Hindu nationalists tried to achieve through the Ayodhya movement. They chose Ram, one of the most popular deities in the Hindu pantheon, as a symbol. Large numbers of people were mobilized to build a Ram temple. The first phase was to move or destroy a mosque which, according to Hindu nationalists, had been built on the site of a temple commemorating the birth of Ram as a sign of domination by India’s first Mughal emperor in 1528. Hindu nationalists hoped that mobilization for a Ram temple would unify the Hindus. But the destruction of the mosque polarized them instead. Aware that a Hindu–Muslim polarization of India would undermine their base and make them irrelevant in politics, lower-caste politicians vigorously mobilized their constituencies. Thus, even as the Congress vote declined, the BJP’s share of the popular vote did not rise, for the lower-caste parties had increased their share.
Can Hindu majoritarianism (Hindutva) really bring the BJP to power? The response to the destruction of the mosque and the inability of the BJP to progress politically have triggered considerable introspection in the party. The BJP has had a direct confrontation with three well-known constraints of Indian democracy-region, caste, and alliances. India’s extraordinary diversity produces these constraints; the BJP wants to reduce this diversity to a Hindu–Muslim binary mode. But it has realized that it cannot to do so, at least in the foreseeable future.
Region. To get a majority of seats in Parliament, the BJP must seriously penetrate the South and the East. Its power in the North and the West is not enough. To secure a parliamentary majority and form a government on its own, a party must win 272 seats. The North and the West add up to a mere 310 seats in Parliament. Therefore, to make a serious bid for power without penetrating the South and the East the BJP must win 80–90 percent of the northern and western seats. This is impossible, for most of these states have significantly large lower-caste parties fighting the BJP. Karnataka is the only southern state the BJP has been able to penetrate. There are three other states in the South, two of them considerably bigger than Karnataka. The BJP’s basic difficulty is that Hindu–Muslim cleavages do not have the same resonance as they do in the North and the West: lower-caste ideology has been a powerful force in the South for 70 years. In the East Hindu nationalists have historically had a greater say, but in the last 30 years a leftist hegemony has been established in the biggest eastern state, West Bengal, and the BJP has found it hard to undermine the leftist hold over Bengali politics.
Caste. Since the lower castes make up about 66 percent of the population, their mobilization, despite their disunity, creates serious difficulties for the BJP. Hindu unity can last only if the lower castes are treated with dignity and given prime positions in Hindu nationalist organizations and BJP-run state governments. Consequently, lower-caste politicians have been specially promoted in the BJP hierarchy. The BJP has also sought alliances with some lower-caste parties. Partly as a result of several such efforts, the BJP has managed to get a considerable share of the lower-caste vote in several states. However, accommodating the lower castes in the BJP has been a difficult affair. Their smooth absorption into the Hindu nationalist movement requires that the upper castes within the BJP show not only willingness to recruit them as followers, but also acceptance of lower-caste dominance, should it electorally happen in their organization. The upper-caste leaders of the BJP have not entirely succeeded in making the latter shift. In the state of Gujarat, where the BJP has consistently received its highest share of popular vote since 1991, caste tensions within the party were a major reason for its split in 1996.
Alliances. Finally, there is the vote-seats paradox of India’s first-past-the-post, British-style election system. One can win a majority of seats in Parliament with a mere 35–40 percent of the total vote, but the same 35–40 percent vote can yield a substantially lower number of seats if the opposition gets together. For a long time Congress versus the rest was the principal electoral axis of Indian politics: today it is the BJP versus the others. The change in axis can help the BJP (as it used to benefit the Congress), only if the anti-BJP vote splits (as did the anti-Congress vote before 1991). The Congress never got 50 percent of India’s vote, but because of the split in the anti-Congress vote it was able to win legislative majorities repeatedly. The same logic applies to the BJP now. If enough political parties are willing to come together before or after elections, they can prevent the BJP from coming to power. This is what happened after the 1996 parliamentary elections when the non-BJP parties came together in an alliance to make sure that the BJP, despite being the largest party, was unable to form a government.
In short, the logic of Indian politics has made it clear to the BJP leaders that if they want to be in power they must find enough coalition partners in the South and East, which is impossible without ideological moderation. In addition to the BJP, only two small parties in India—the Shiv Sena and the All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam—had supported the idea of a Ram temple in Ayodhya, and now there is just one, the Shiv Sena having recently withdrawn its support. The ideological passion for Hindu nationalism is not shared so widely. Despite many changes in Indian politics, ideological centrism remains its center of gravity. One must build coalitions of castes and linguistic and religious groups to come to power. There is room for a center-left or center-right coalition in Indian politics, but not for extremes.
The BJP has responded to this challenge by going for alliances with a vengeance in these elections. In the southern states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh, and in the eastern states of Orissa and West Bengal, it has allied with regional parties. In all, it has its own candidates running in 378 seats, leaving the remaining 165 seats to its various allies.
This does not mean that the moderate faction of the BJP has conclusively defeated the party’s right wing. The two camps remain in the party in an uneasy truce. The BJP’s platform attempts a tight-rope walk between both factions, but the direction of the tilt is clearly toward greater moderation. The platform includes a commitment to building a Ram temple and several other “ideologically pure” programs, such as a common civil code, which the minorities have strongly resisted. But these objectives will be achieved “only after debate, persuasion, and exploration of legal options.” To present its moderate credentials to the outside world, the BJP has withdrawn its previous commitment to nuclear testing, but it would like India to keep the nuclear option. Though the party still endorses “one nation, one people, one culture,” it also “celebrates” India’s “many diversities”—“linguistic, religious, creedal, and caste.” There have been no reports of a pronounced anti-Muslim rhetoric in the BJP campaign. Instead Muslims are being wooed-how successfully remains to be seen. The BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, A.B. Vajpayee, is a moderate without apology.
The party’s leaders must now convince the country and the world that the BJP is a responsible party, not an organization for destroying mosques, fomenting riots, and creating disorder. The BJP is trying to be a right-of-center Congress Party, not a right-wing, intolerant, Hindu nationalist organization. It is hard to imagine right-wing domination of the party, given its many mainstream-party alliances, which will tie the BJP down should it come to power with its partners.
The odds of a right-wing takeover of the BJP after the elections appear to be very low. They are not zero, for if the moderate stance fails miserably in these elections, the right wing will put pressure on the party to give up moderation. Resistance is likely to come from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the two most ideologically driven but nonelectoral organizations of Hindu nationalism. However, since the BJP owes the end of its political “untouchability” to its moderate stance, the possibility of a right-wing takeover is steadily declining. Indeed, if the BJP continues to move toward the center, a formal split between the right-wing and moderate right can no longer be ruled out.
The United Front
The lower-caste parties are the heart of the United Front. But despite their unmistakable rise, they have not been able to provide a cohesive national alternative to the other two contenders. For one thing, an internal differentiation within the presumed lower-caste unity has emerged. In some states like Uttar Pradesh, the Scheduled Castes have openly rebelled against the OBCs, calling them the new oppressors. In addition, the lower-caste upsurge has been more effective in putting political parties in power at the state level than at aggregating coalitions at the national level. A nationwide coalition did come into being in 1989, but it failed within a year. The recent United Front government was yet another coalition experiment which collapsed in a year and a half.
Why is there not a single united party representing the OBCs of all states? Because caste as a concept exists all over Hindu India, but as an experience it is local or regional. Names, histories, languages, levels of education, types of deprivation, and oppressor castes regionally differ. Similarly, Brahmins of the South may not be recognized as such by the Brahmins of the North and vice versa: each group in its respective setting has traditionally enjoyed high status and ritual privileges but each tradition may be different. Can the lower-caste parties develop cohesion and show that besides sharing an ideology, they can also run a government without fighting each other? That is the challenge for the United Front.
In the best of circumstances, these problems would be hard to solve. Outside the South, the lower-caste parties are not well institutionalized, and personality clashes have split the parties further. For reasons already outlined, the lower-caste platform will not disappear from Indian politics, but all polls suggest that the United Front will lose a lot of ground in the elections. Lower-caste parties are likely to form part of the governing coalition again, but the coalition is unlikely to be led by them.
International observers wonder whether election results will affect India’s increasing market orientation. This question has two parts: direction and pace. Will India return to the old days of protectionism? Will the reforms continue to be slow and steady, or will they pick up greater momentum?
The answer to the question of direction has been obvious for some time, and the present campaign has made it clear yet again that economic reforms in India are irreversible. There is a political consensus on giving market forces greater play in the economy. Moreover, economics is only one of several issues on the election agenda, and certainly not the most contested one. A stable government and the role of minorities and the lower castes remain the more important determinants of party alignments and election politics.
In the CSDS survey of mass political attitudes, only 19 percent of the electorate reported any knowledge of economic reforms, even though they had been in existence since July 1991. Of the rural electorate, only about 14 percent had heard of reforms, and the comparable proportion in cities was 32 percent. Further, nearly 66 percent of college graduates were aware of the dramatic changes in economic policy, compared to only 7 percent of the poor, who are mostly illiterate. In contrast, close to three-fourths of the electorate-both literate and illiterate, poor and rich, urban and rural-were aware of the demolition of the Babri mosque; 80 percent expressed clear opinions on whether the country should have a uniform civic code or separate, religiously prescribed laws for marriage, divorce, and property inheritance; and 87 percent took a stand on caste-based affirmative action.
These statistics should clarify that the raging debate over economic reforms in India is mostly confined to the English-language newspapers, college graduates, the Internet, the Bombay stock market, and Delhi’s India International Center and its economic ministries. That is the circle of India’s elite politics. Ethnic and religious disputes, secularism, caste-based affirmative action, and social justice have driven India’s mass politics over the last 10–15 years. Expressions of India’s identity politics have been far more powerful than the implications of economic reforms. Governments have fallen or risen on identity politics, but not on economic reforms. For only two parties in India are the reforms a matter of great ideological import: the Communist Party, Marxist (CPM) and the right-wing Hindu nationalists. Others will carry the reforms further.
The global side of the reforms-trade and investment-raises serious issues for the ideologically inclined cadres of the BJP and the CPM. Confined as it is to only two states of India, the CPM need not concern us here. It is unlikely to be a major player in government formation after the elections, and if it does play a part, its senior leaders, who are ideologically moderate and have welcomed foreign investment in the state of West Bengal, will determine its moves more than its younger politburo members, who are more ideologically driven and less compromising.
The BJP stance is of immediate political significance and may affect the pace of reforms considerably. The nationalist BJP has to consider its long-standing base among traders and small manufacturers. It is the most radical party on internal liberalization, but highly uncomfortable with external liberalization. It promises a further reduction of state involvement in manufacturing, confining the public sector to some industries only; a greater deregulation of the private sector; and reform of the agricultural sector by making internal agricultural trade more open.
But on foreign investment and India’s relationship with the World Trade Organization (WTO), it would like to practice greater caution. Its foreign investment priorities are to welcome direct more than portfolio investment and to channel direct investment into roads, power, and telecommunications, not cereals, lipstick, and clothes; into “computer chips, not potato chips”; into investment goods, not consumer goods. The BJP is also opposed to 100 percent equity ownership by foreign investors, advocating joint ownership with Indian partners instead. It would like to protect Indian businesses for 8 to 10 years before they are exposed to global competition. And the party would like a Japanese-style government-business partnership to lead India’s industrial transformation.
There are no fundamental differences between the BJP and the Congress and United Front on internal economic affairs. Differences are primarily a matter of detail rather than broad principle. In particular, the BJP and the Congress are speaking with one voice on scaling down public investment in manufacturing, focusing public expenditures on the social sector (education and health), deregulating the economy further, and giving states a larger role in economic decision-making.
On global matters, however, the Congress (compared to the BJP) embraces greater openness. It would wish to welcome foreign direct investment, further open up the trade regime and capital markets, respect commitments to international economic organizations such as the WTO, make a clearer case for global integration of the economy, and forge a bigger India–U.S. partnership. The influence of former finance minister Manmohan Singh, father of India’s economic reform in the 1990s, is transparent in the platform.
Alliance politics will determine policies. A faithful implementation of the BJP’s external agnosticism or the Congress Party’s international openness should not be expected. The BJP, in power with its allies, may still want foreign direct investment worth $10 billion annually (its officially stated objective when it ruled for 13 days in 1996), but it will now be more directed to infrastructure. Given how much investment is needed in infrastructure, $10 billion cannot only be easily absorbed, it would also be a significant jump over the latest annualized figures of $3–3.5 billion. Even if the BJP and its allies come to power, one should expect more foreign direct investment in India.
On portfolio capital, no dramatic turns are in the offing. Neither the BJP, nor the Congress, nor for that matter the United Front will offer capital account convertibility after the Southeast Asian meltdown. Beyond that overall constraint, which will continue for the foreseeable future and on which there is a consensus in the country, restrictions on capital movements are not likely to increase. On second and wiser thoughts, an earlier BJP proposal to “lock in” portfolio investment for a prescribed minimum of time has been dropped.
In short, given the basic soundness of India’s macroeconomic fundamentals, one should expect a continued inflow of portfolio capital, but not spectacular highs or abysmal lows. There has been a middling financial conservatism in India’s political economy. Excessive falls have been preempted, but splendid risk-taking is also absent in decision-making. It is arguable that the extreme highs and lows of Southeast Asian economies are partially precluded by the checks and counterchecks of India’s democratic political system.
Will India Have a Stable Government?
The days of one-party governments are far away, if not over, in India. Alliance politics will be increasingly critical to both elections and government formation. What kinds of alliances will be stable?
Most of India’s liberals, and many outside the country, were wrong when they thought that a more participatory government, like the United Front, meant better government. India needs a stable government for some time before its civil society and economy can be relatively self-managing or self-governing. The transition to a strong and relatively self-managing civil society and economy is clearly under way, but not yet fully accomplished. In this period of economic and political transition an effective government is badly needed. The policy record of the recent United Front government cannot be called bad. The daily confusion and discordance among the 13 parties are what made the spectacle so frustrating.
India’s political institutions may have reached a level of maturity at which even a 13-party government can function for a year and a half, but that is a mixed blessing. A 13-party government is not an effective government. Effective government is more likely when one party dominates the coalition and can provide a strong middle, not when there are five or six parties of equal weight that agree more on what they dislike and less on what they like. Thus a Congress- or BJP-based alliance is most likely to provide a stable government.
That is the odds-on scenario at this writing. India’s next government is most likely to be a coalition government, and it will be led by either the Congress or the BJP. The odds so far are against a BJP-led government, though it may continue to be India’s largest party. More likely is an anti-BJP, postelection alliance between the Congress and the United Front or some fractions of the latter. Details are impossible to predict, but the broad contours are becoming clearer.
If, overcoming the odds, the BJP is able to put together a governing coalition, it will enter the mainstream of Indian politics with greater confidence and resolution. If not, the right-wing of the party will push again, but it will probably have a greater role in BJP politics only if the BJP’s electoral performance is significantly worse than its 1996 tally. Since such a result is unlikely, the right-wing will not be more than a faction in the party.
To sum up, India’s economic policies will not fundamentally change after the elections. Nor is democracy in danger. The elections will probably not produce a clear winner, but the new coalition government is likely to be much more decisive than the outgoing United Front government.
Appendix 1. India’s Religious Profile
| Group | Percentage of Population | |
|---|---|---|
| Hindus | 82.0 | |
| Muslims | 12.1 | |
| Christians | 2.3 | |
| Sikhs | 2.0 | |
| Buddhists and Jains | 1.2 | |
| Source: Census of India, 1991. | ||
Appendix 2. India’s Caste Composition
| Group | Percentage of Population* | |
|---|---|---|
| Upper Castes | 16.1 | |
| OBCs | 43.7 | |
| Scheduled Castes | 15.0 | |
| Scheduled Tribes | 7.5 | |
| Non-Hindu Minorities | 17.6 | |
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Source: Government of India, Report of the Backward Classes Commission (Mandal Commission Report), First Part, Vol. 1 (1980), p. 56. *These figures are best estimates. The last caste census was taken in 1931. |
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Endnotes
Note 1: As India’s caste system disintegrates, the terminology is changing; justas the “untouchables” became “Dalits” or “Scheduled Castes,” the terms“lower castes” and “upper castes” will almost certainly be replaced. Forthe time being, however, we have only these terms to work with. Back.
