The Daily Times, 20 November 2010
by J Sri Raman
Both corruption and communalism have proved to be of considerable electoral use to the BJP. It has gained significantly in one parliamentary election and one state poll by its communalist campaign. It has profited, as part of an alliance, in a parliamentary election from a corruption issue
Any time of the year, whatever the season of the political calendar, you will find India’s main opposition party — the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) — engaged in either of two crusades: against ‘corruption-in-high-places’ or for religious communalism of the lowest order. Right now, the party is furiously engaged in the former, its saffron flags fluttering defiantly in defence of the taxpayers’ money allegedly to be recovered from “tainted” politicians of the ruling camp and not of the majority faith’s holy land lost to foreign hordes who have left a fifth column inside.
Before we proceed further, an important disclaimer: none of the following paragraphs means that all leaders of the ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) are paragons of virtue. Nor is it the claim of this columnist that looting of the people’s money should be allowed without let or hindrance, or that the media should not question the manipulation of public funds, or that investigative agencies and ‘courts’ should not catch and punish the culprits.
Corruption, however, is not, repeat not, one of what the BJP itself calls its “core issues”. Communalism is certainly one of them, even if it is deceptively described as “cultural nationalism”. Indeed, it heads the list of such issues, providing the rationale for the rest including militarism and fierce opposition to social justice that is synonymous with casteism.
Corruption, on the contrary, figures prominently on the party’s list of what we may call its ‘convenient issue’. It helps the BJP frequently to forge an alliance with parties that would otherwise avoid any association with it like the plague. An anti-corruption campaign can cover a multitude of sins including murderous communalism.
Both corruption and communalism have, of course, proved to be of considerable electoral use to the BJP. It has gained significantly in one parliamentary election and one state poll by its communalist campaign. It has profited, as part of an alliance, in a parliamentary election from a corruption issue.
As for communalism, it played the Ayodhya card in the late 80s, transforming itself in the process from a two-member party in the Lok Sabha (the lower house in India’s parliament) into the country’s main parliamentary opposition. In 2002, the BJP cashed in on the Narendra Modi-organised pogrom with the resultant communal polarisation leading to a landslide victory for it in an election to a state. It realised the electoral potential of a corruption issue when the ‘Bofors scam’ gave it a big enough slice of influence at the Centre under the V P Singh government, leading on to better and better days for the party in New Delhi.
The consequences of the gains on the two grounds offer a study in contrasts. Barely an inch of progress has been made on Bofors ever since the issue decided an election by non-Congress governments, including successive BJP-headed regimes. The Ayodhya issue, on the other hand, has been kept alive to date, with the party hoping to carry its old campaign to its illogical conclusion after a recent court verdict that has controversially put faith above law. In Gujarat the party under Modi has kept its pogrom-time promise to its communal constituency by doing its best or worst to prevent justice for the victims and the return of survivors to their homes and occupations in the state.
The BJP was not involved in another state assembly election decided by the corruption issue. In the southern state of Tamil Nadu, the issue led to a change of governments. Former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa of the All-India Anna DMK lost to the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) of M Karunanidhi and its allies. A series of alleged scams (besides an ostentatious wedding of Jayalalithaa’s adopted son) were behind the DMK’s landslide victories.
If this deserves recollection today, it is because the same Jayalalithaa is in the forefront of the current anti-corruption campaign, targeting the DMK and one of its ministers in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s government. Details of the telecommunication scam, which has led to the minister’s virtual dismissal, need not detain us here. What may be noted is the possibility of the issue bringing Jayalalithaa back into the political camp of the BJP, though she was instrumental in bringing down its government under Atal Bihari Vajpayee back in 1996.
There are many lessons for political parties to be learnt from the long series of corruption issues and episodes. We will not be surprised, however, if the only lesson they are prepared to learn is about the importance of indulging in corruption without getting caught.
For the people, the lessons are obvious. The first is about the need to beware of the forces seeking to use corruption issues as a camouflage for a communal-fascist agenda. The electorate should have also learnt by now not to expect an end to corruption by changing parties in power and not any part of the system. Corruption can be combated only when the people refuse favours to the political-bureaucratic-big business-rentiers who abuse their positions to enrich themselves at the common man’s expense in every conceivable way.
The writer is a journalist based in Chennai, India. A peace activist, he is also the author of a sheaf of poems titled At Gunpoint
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