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For Politicians, April Is The Cruellest Month

April is definitely cruel in India, as the summer is upon us suddenly, without warning, and the cool days of the winter are but a distant memory. The plains bake under the relentless sun; the orange-red Flame of the Forest blooms; and the beautiful tree whose name I do not know lays a carpet of purple flowers down in the freshness of the morning only to have them lifeless, withered, and covered in dust by nightfall.

And it is also, for me personally, a time to remember ancient sorrows (see my column "Remember Jallianwallah Bagh!"). This year, of course, I was happy to see on Baisakhi day the tercentenary of the Sikh Khalsa -- for I admire the Sikh values of dignity and valour, so sadly lacking in many other Indians.

But the Ides of April brought Tax Day; and the shameful political drama that left no winners. We have all heard of zero-sum games, but here was one that was massively negative for all players.

For, the sordid scenes of the last few weeks have hurt every one of the participants:
· The BJP-led government: by miscalculating the depth of its support and not managing the numbers, the government showed its political incompetence. But it is also true that there is a widespread sense amongst the electorate that the government was unfairly overthrown in what amounted to a constitutional coup. However, trust the BJP, with its utter lack of media savvy, to dissipate this goodwill by the time elections actually roll around, probably by the expedient of various foolish statements and actions by its hotheads.

·The Congress and Sonia Gandhi: Madame Gandhi the Younger's well-cultivated facade of "responsible opposition" and "reluctant politician" went straight out the window. The hunger for power, the imperious expectation that all Opposition parties would fawn upon her as her courtiers do, the naked grab for the prime ministerial chair, the singular inability to answer a single question without reference to crib-sheets. The poor judgement in choosing advisers who suffer from group-think. All these showed her up for what she really is: someone who has absolutely no qualifications for political office -- not even the requisite low cunning -- other than the good fortune to have landed a Nehru dynasty scion as husband.

She cut a sorry figure indeed, kowtowing to the likes of Jayalalitha; she also humiliated herself by showing up at Rashtrapathi Bhavan with only 233 votes on her side despite the generous amount of time available for horse-trading, a far cry from the 272 she guaranteed. And the 'foreigner' tag will stick -- the BJP will make sure of that; the dissimulations about how 'Indian' she is makes nationalists go ballistic.

For we all know how living in, say the US for even thirty or forty years still doesn't take the Indian-ness out of an NRI -- it is a matter of race, religion and culture; so why should a Non-Resident Italian not retain her Italian-ness? Even after fifty years in India, Sonia Gandhi will be a white, Catholic Italian, an outsider.

·· The Marxists: for a day or two, there was the nightmare possibility that these moribund agents of the Chinese might actually form a central government. And I say that advisedly -- for there are members of the CPI-M top ranks who refuse to accept that the Chinese invaded India in 1962. The Marxists' unseemly haste to get in bed with the Congress showed them up to be mere opportunists.

For, the Congress has always been their primary enemy: remember Indira Gandhi's coup that brought down the Namboodiripad government in Kerala in 1959? But power -- India must be the only place in the world where they have any chance whatsoever of coming to power now -- must have been tempting. How low the once-principled Marxists have fallen!

· J Jayalalitha: if she weren't for real, she would be comical. She has 'achieved' the overthrow of the government, but general elections were the last thing she wanted. It is not clear that anybody in Tamil Nadu is unaware of how despicable she is. Perhaps the only reason she won any seats in 1998 was the sympathy vote for the BJP following the Coimbatore blasts -- since she was their ally, people voted for her. It is likely that the Puraitchi Thalaivi will have no seats at all after the next elections.

· Subramanian Swamy: The Shakuni of Indian politics, wielding enormous destructive powers. It is likely that this one man-party will lose his deposit in the general election. His megalomania is astonishing -- apparently he was some minor staff member at Harvard, and he claims that means he could have won a Nobel Prize in economics! And apparently his horoscope says he will be prime minister! I dread the day.

· Mulayam Singh Yadav: strangely enough, the one person who did not dissemble about his selfish personal interests. It was clear to Yadav that allying with the Congress, his mortal enemy in his home state of UP, would sound the death-knell of his own Samajwadi Party. Therefore, he made no bones about his personal vested interest, and you have to give him high marks for honesty.

Of course, he has alienated his 'secular' Leftist friends, including the redoubtable Laloo Prasad Yadav, and the 'progressive' press, which has been baying for his blood. He may also have taken a beating amongst the Muslims of UP.

· Laloo Prasad Yadav: every now and then a politician comes around who is a figure of great entertainment. Remember Raj Narain in the old days? Laloo Prasad seems to have taken on Raj Narain's mantle: his statement about forming an alternative government in all of five minutes will haunt him for a long time. Not that he minds. He fiddles while Bihar burns all around him; he repaid his personal debt to the Congress for continuing to keep him in power.

But he stands isolated, essentially untouchable, because of the mayhem he has allowed in Bihar. Also, the latest attack in Jehanabad district, on Yadavs (whereas in the past the victims of massacres were only Bhumihars and Dalits) brings an additional factor into play that might affect his power base amongst his own caste.

· Mayawati: 'mercurial' is a kind adjective for this unpredictable person, whose shifting allegiances and upredictability are legendary. However, she allied herself with the Congress, which was single-handedly responsible for the continuing misrule (with significant impact on Mayawati's Dalit constituency) in Bihar. This will hurt her ability to command the undivided loyalty of the Dalits.

· President K R Narayanan: hitherto considered a model statesman, the 'activist' President has come under sustained flak from BJP supporters, admittedly with some justification. The President has been made to look rather partisan; or else he miscalculated.

The haste with which he forced the BJP to seek a vote of no confidence contrasted with the generous amount of time he gave Sonia Gandhi to prove her majority. The President, a gentleman and scholar, could have been more discreet -- and should have ensured there was not even a whisper of impropriety in his conduct.

· The stock markets and the small investor: in the wake of the political turmoil, I am told the BSE lost Rs 700 billion in market value! This is an enormous amount, and the consequences were grave for the small investor. In addition, it badly punctured the prospects for increased foreign institutional investment, which had brightened somewhat after the Budget.

· Economic prospects: with the uncertainty about a whole slew of pending legislation regarding economic issues, we can expect this year's GDP growth rate to be knocked down by at least 0.5 per cent if not more

· The exchequer: given that the general election will cost Rs 10 billion, the poor taxpayer is paying an enormous cost for the blind power-hunger of politicians.

· Governance: Tavleen Singh wrote in India Today that there had been no decisions at all by the bureaucracy for two weeks. They, naturally, took a wait-and-see attitude lest they make a move that any new government might disapprove of.

· Foreign policy: there had been some movement in projecting a strong India, one that wasn't going to be pushed around by the hectoring Americans and others. Presumably Agni II and continuing weaponization go back into cold storage.

Any continuity has been lost; in particular, I am sure the Chinese and Pakistanis are delighted at all the confusion. In fact, Pakistani Prime Minister Sharief did say (quite logically, matter of fact) that the Lahore agreements may now become null and void because the government that had signed them had fallen.

· The common man: at the end of the day, R K Laxman's Everyman will take the brunt of all this. For, every politician will want to raise the (allowed) Rs 1.5 million to the (actual) Rs 25 million spent on elections from local merchants. Not to mention the millions raised from large industrial houses. Naturally merchants and industrialists will pass these costs on to the consumer. All will pay extortionate amounts.

Therefore, as part of our Monday-morning quarterbacking, we need to understand why it is that the system has failed all of us so badly. Here is my initial analysis of what went wrong, and what could be done. I will leave out the obvious ones like the venality of the Indian politician as this is part of the environment, and cannot be affected. In general, I am beginning to think the framers of the Constitution erred in only looking at the British model:

· Terms in office. The fact that an elected official can be subjected to an election practically at any time -- and we all know this is the third general election in four years -- leads to a lot of chaos. It might be better to go with the American model where a member of the House of Congress, the lower house, has a two-year fixed term, and a member of the Senate, the upper house, has a six-year fixed term.

Similarly, limit the term of the prime minister as well, so that a government is not subject to random overthrow -- for example, set the minimum term of a government to be two years, within which they cannot be dislodged

· Indirect democracy. In India, the voter is very removed from reality: you only get to vote once for a candidate, and thereafter, if s/he pursues policies you don't like, well, that's tough. I like the US and Swiss models where there are referenda every year. This means that ordinary citizens do have a say in major policy matters (and even in minor propositions like banning cigarette advertisements).

Admittedly, there is galloping proposition-itis especially in places like California, but honestly, does anybody trust their local MP or MLA to represent them? This is why there is so much anti-incumbency sentiment in India. The voter feels powerless. As various states put infrastructure in place, maybe these referenda can be done electronically over computer networks, thereby reducing the cost.

· Too many small parties. This leads to fragmented and completely pointless horse-trading. This has been the experience in other countries such as Israel and Italy, as well. There should be limits on the number of parties approved by the Election Commission, ideally less than five. The EC should make the process of recognition of a party prohibitively difficult so that people do not split and create parties at the drop of a hat.

There is another danger: these tiny parties are so hard up for cash, they will be highly vulnerable to being 'bought' by the Chinese or the CIA. It is a well-known allegation that the Chinese invested several million dollars in buying up American politicians (According to AsiaWeek, Chinese Prime Minister Zhu Rongji said regarding this allegation: "Why on earth would I only spend a few million dollars? I have $ 146 billion in foreign reserves." Though he was jesting, it is uncomfortably close to the truth).

I have no doubt the Chinese will be happy to invest a billion or two in staving off the possibility of India expanding its nuclear or missile capability, if a nationalist government comes to power again.

· Procedural confusion. There should be a clear process for no-confidence motions and so forth. For instance, isn't it a big deal to bring down a sitting government and create all sorts of confusion? Therefore, I submit there should be a two-thirds majority for this.

If this is not acceptable, any would-be topplers of governments should be forced to have in writing the names of their prime-ministerial candidate, and the to-be council of ministers, as well as the signed votes of all their supporters before they are allowed to bring a no-confidence motion to the floor. For, they are putting the country in danger of having a lame-duck government; instead they should be able to smoothly provide a transition to a new government.

We need to avoid any more cruel Aprils by making some changes in the way things are done.

Rajeev Srinivasan