The number of coalition partners in political formations is inversely proportional to the availability of political space for diversity and dissent within political parties.
India is the second most populous country in the world with roughly one-sixth of its population. Its federal, parliamentary and representative multiparty system makes it the largest democracy. The fact that the majority of its people did not have formal education did not deter the architects of our Constitution from recommending universal adult franchise. The regularity of regional and national elections, their fair conduct and their ability to usher in new political formations suggest phenomenal success with democracy. This is particularly true in the context of the divergent trajectories of politics and governments among our neighbours in the subcontinent. Nevertheless, the recent era of coalition politics and its compulsions demand analysis.
The freedom movement, led by the upper castes and the rich and landed gentry, morphed into the ruling class. Its leaders formed the Indian National Congress. Their promise of a secular and socialistic society received nationwide support. The party won many State and national elections and ruled the country during the first two-three decades. Gradually, the sheen wore off. The party's penchant for dynastic politics, its intolerance of dissent, empty slogans of an inclusive society and the excesses during the Emergency in the mid-1970s led to disillusionment among the people and its resounding defeat at the polls. About the same time, some States saw the emergence of regional parties, pushing local and regional agenda. The last three decades have seen the emergence of many regional, linguistic, religion and caste-based political formations across the country, fighting to represent the diversity of India's people and their distinctive interests.
Representation without empowerment: The initial excitement generated by universal adult franchise gave way to cynicism. The five-yearly exercise of elected representatives seeking the people's consent for re-election became a ritual. The initial hopes and dreams of the majority, the poor, were soon shattered with minimal changes in their lot. The original enthusiasm, when faced with an option of voting for different parties, gradually faded with the realisation that the choices provided no real alternative. Representation of people in the legislatures and the government did little for their empowerment.
Nevertheless, political parties soon realised the importance of identifying dominant socio-demographic pressures within constituencies. Religion, language, caste and community determined the choice of candidates rather than integrity, ability and policies. Matching candidates with dominant local identities was found to be a vote-winning strategy. However, these linguistic, regional, religious and caste considerations seemed to matter little after results were declared. People soon realised that their representatives did not represent their perspectives and priorities in the legislatures and governments. Political parties were quickly able to assuage the feelings of many elected representatives by sharing the spoils of power. Nevertheless, discontent gave way to factionalism and fragmentation of the polity. The realisation that large national parties fail to represent the diversity, divisions and pluralism in the country has accelerated the support for regional formations.
Space and growth: The space and choices for politicians were restricted. Autocratic leaders, family rule, religious and caste considerations produced glass ceilings within parties. The lack of true intra-party democracy, at the grass-root and higher levels, resulted in frustration among budding political leaders. Local and regional aspirations were stifled. Token representation, the norm in most political parties, denied empowerment of individual representatives and their constituencies. Many leaders with political aspirations moved out to form their own political factions. Many succeeded. Their ability to tap into local and regional discontent and the chauvinistic nature of their campaigns paid handsome electoral dividends. These gains multiplied their power and ability to take on and negotiate with national parties.
Telangana is a classic example of economic growth without political space and empowerment for its people. The complex caste equations in Andhra Pradesh marginalised their representatives, restricted their political space and limited their political emancipation, resulting in the birth of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi. The Bahujan Samaj Party and the Pattali Makkal Katchi brought together people and priorities based on support from specific formations. Mamata Banerjee, Kalyan Singh and Uma Bharti felt suffocated and squeezed out of political space and formed their own outfits, with varying degrees of success. Many breakaway factions of the Congress supported regional aspirations, which did not find articulation within the larger organisation. Many of these leaders and splinter groups now have much greater power outside the larger parties than they did when they were inside the organisations.
Coalition conundrum: The Left Front in West Bengal was the first coalition, which has successfully won and retained power for over three decades. Kerala also saw major fragmentation within the larger political parties and the resultant formation of coalitions. Such coalitions at the State level have been relatively stable both within the government and in the Opposition.
The last two decades have seen the rise of coalitions at the national level. The initial unstable coalitions have given way to secure alliances, which have brought in major reforms and significant shifts in policy. They seemed to have even enhanced democratic legitimacy, representativeness and national unity. Many parties have become skilled in the required negotiation, cooperation and compromise. Marriages of convenience between incompatible partners have given way to durable, flexible, pragmatic and evolving partnerships. Many parties seem to be able to paper over their contradictions. The temporary nature of their initial relationships within coalitions seems to have matured into established associations. Pre-election negotiations and agreements with common minimum programmes strengthen such arrangements and are now recognised by the electorate. The electorate, through tactical voting, often supports these united platforms. While regional issues dominate many campaigns, the electorate also seems to keep an eye on the need for stable formations at the Centre.
The larger national parties, which did not provide political space for local and regional aspirations within their rigid structure, are now forced to make much bigger compromises with dissidents who are their regional partners. Regional formations, with specific local support, have been able to extract greater concessions and a larger slice of the political pie. The national parties now regularly moan about the disproportionate powers of regional outfits. They blame the lack of progress on the coalition dharma with its committees, consensus and compromise. Nevertheless, pragmatic approaches (e.g. of the Congress) seem to be more successful than those driven by ideology (e.g. of Bharatiya Janata Party and the Left). Political parties will necessarily have to formulate inclusive agendas and frameworks to succeed in coalitions (e.g. the BJP in Bihar).
Intra-party democracy and political space: The few large national parties find it difficult to do justice to the diversity and complexity of India. However, while regional parties are here to stay, all parties would benefit from genuine intra-party democracy. Healthy debates within organisations and organisational elections at all levels will allow political space to raise genuine local and particular concerns. The dismantling of glass ceilings based on autocracy, family background, region, caste and religion will go a long way in creating an ideal environment for the empowerment of the diverse and heterogeneous people.
Many of our leaders and politicians are parochial and partisan. Their worlds are dominated by individual ambition, immediate goals, and narrow sectarian objectives, and they bat for limited constituencies. There is a dearth of visionaries. Many parties have non-inclusive agendas. It is politically naive to expect model parties with true internal democracies, but any movement in this direction will benefit the organisations and the nation. Until such time, the electorate will have to be astute in choosing the least damaging option. Often, the choice is between the devil and the deep blue sea. The fragmentation of parties and the number of partners within coalitions will reach an equilibrium and saturation when political space for debate and dissent is available and valued within political organisations. Without intra-party democracy in most national and regional parties, the polity will continue to fragment and parties will splinter; the pressure and complexity of coalitions will increase with further reduction of choice for the electorate. Coalitions have forced India to recognise that all politics is local. However, the question is: will it increase the insight among political leaders and transform political parties?
(Professor K.S. Jacob in on the faculty of the Christian Medical College, Vellore. The views expressed are personal.)
Keywords: Coalition politics, intra-party democracy
The Author gives more credit to the Indian democratic process than it is due. The fact that the quality of life for one-third of Indian population has not changed since Independence, alone is enough to suspect the suitability of Democracy for India. An article by Bhaskar Ghose in Frontline regarding the oligarchic nature of Indian democracy was enlightning. He refers to Robert Michels who said that all democracies eventually have a tendency to become oligarchic. This seems to be the most appropriate insight into the contemporary Indian politics. All that political parties in India are after, is power and its material dividends. K.S.Jacob is wrong in his analysis that the regional and caste politics have emerged from the dis-illusionment of the electorate with parties potraying macro and national agendas. Rather, the same set of political leaders who were part of the national parties have resorted to invoking caste and regional sentiments to retain and increase their power and influence.
Even after his well-researched piece on coalition politics in the country, still there are many doubts in his mind - he must clear his mind that coalition politics mainly at the national level shall survive in years to come on the Indian political scene. Gone are days for two orthodox parties- Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party- to rule the country of their own strength. Well the ongoing coalition government, started with West Bengal and different states of the country, has rather strengthened the roots of democracy in India with minor if and buts. Coalition government in over twenty years, mainly at the centre , has proved tremendous succeess for empowerment and maximum scope of removing regional imbalances in the country. Majority of deprived have got real taste of power and democracy has reached at their doorstep to raise their voices against injustices since independence.
The culture of coalation governments started with regional parties culture based on caste, region, power hunger but not based on the strengths and weakness of ruling party. Some people thought to become rich the path is power. So they used caste bogey, some used regional bogey, etc. Even within these again to have power they divided -- see the case of Tamil Nadu or Andhra Pradesh - Telugu Desam which ruled the state and played major role at the centre. Telugu Desam was formed on the 'self respect of Telugus -- Teluguvari atmagauravam' but now they wanted divide based on regional basis. Dynastic rule or emergency have nothing to do with such politics. With the progression of time people are thinking that political power is the easy way of becoming rich overnight.
The article enlisted the evolution and impact of coalition parties on GOI beautifully .Also, gave us the proper insight to the issues faced and reasons that gave the way for to the coalition formation and further the efforts made today for realizing stable and sustainable coalition formation. We need the articles like this with few complicated words, so that the analysis fused properly into our young minds and help in building the nation.
The article starts with the details of the persons who steered the freedom struggle are from upper caste. The author should have added that their basic approach was sacrifice and service. Since intelectual and of the like have been more projecting on the caste lines. This gave rise to regional,casteist and linguistic political leaders and enabled them to create a base on this base instead on values.
Prof.Jacob has shed a new light on how the necessity of finding political space for the various interest groups of India was the father of coalitions and how that experiment has failed to rise above parochialness.He cites the example of Telengana for the failure to provide political space in an environment of economic growth.He says that coalitions,in the final analysis,boil down to politics at the local level of religion,caste and region of the constituents and does not aim to truly empower the people and the challenge remains for political parties and leaders to cultivate intra-party democracy and an insight to eschew individual ambition,immediate goals and narrow sectarian objectives. The author's take on pragmatic approaches versus ideology-driven approaches is interesting and what we have seen from the pragmatic approach of the Congress party in the form of the mother of all corruptions speaks for the success of it.What Prof.Jacob finds unsuccessful in the ideology-driven coalition of the BJP and the Congress party with the Left parties and the Left parties among themselves in West Bengal cannot be termed so.
I agree with the author almost 100 percent.Mr.M.G.Ramachandran did both ways i.e removed caste names from the street as well as created caste based districts.It is not easy to remove money power and caste power and higher caste people are to be blamed for part of this menace.Even in advanced countries like US, money plays a big part in election.People complain about family dynasty without realising the fact that our Indian people want to relate to their leaders in a personal way and not every one has this charm.Freebies and entitlement policies will make the people idle.No one has a readymade pill for this condition .
I totally agree with Prof Jacob.The Indian politics is spoiled by non-participation more than anything.Being a Prof at CMC I'm very surprised and at the same time very happy to see you so articulate on a political issue.If all educated and sophisticated citizens of our nation get aware and participate in politics we'll surely be a mature democracy.
The article broadly sums up the current situation of our political situation. We have had the experience of coalition politics for nearly two decades now. We have the largest parliamentary democracy and can be just proud of that for the record. But are we working it properly? The party that led from the front in the independence movement had been converted long ago into a fief of a dynasty along with the nation. There is little intra party democracy in that party. While the framers of the constitution wanted the nation to move towards a casteless society, at any rate to remove the stains of classifying bulk of the population as untouchables, by giving them liberal benefits to come up in all walks of life, every caste formation has sprung up to claim similar facilities for them too. In the process the nation is in the danger of putting the clock very much back. Even the ensuring census has given an official seal to that process. Added to that is the blatant play of money in elections - the latest evidence being the daily seizure of vehicles laden with bundles of unaccounted money! No wonder such phenomenon produce a longer list of tainted people with criminal background in every other elections to the central and state legislatures. On top of this is the poor performance, quantitatively and qualitatively of the elected parliamentarians and legislators. Recently Britain has also turned itself into coalition politics away from its long experience of alternating single party rule. It's time media debated this as a coalition of compromised opinions. Britain's 'Daily Telegraph' commenting on what looks like its hung parliament and quoting Lord Norton said that "hung parliament is not a people' parliament; it is opposite: it is politicians' parliament. Compromises are reached which may bear no relationship to what electors want!" When the ruling UPA is in some difficulties in charting through its legislative proposals, it seeks help from some opposing formations which insist on a quid for its pro! Not rendered wise,the UPA is needlessly riding roughshod over opposition parties in the vain belief that it will try to show itself in great strength while actually there is hollowness in leadership vision. The net result is the loss of good and effective governance and spreading of corruption wider and deeper. IN effect, our nation is having a shell of parliamentary system while it is in effect a dynastic rule in both the centre and some states, like TN are desperately seeking to establish one for themselves. Not a happy situation for a nation that is being considered worldwide as one of the future's large economies alongside China.
There is not much on which one can disagree with Professor Jacob so far as the emergence of numerous political outfits and the formation of coalitions is concerned. The situation seems to have reached the saturation point.There does not seem to be any further scope of fragmenting and splintering. There are political parties and leaders who can successfully combine local with national- nay with international also. They have a large and and broad vision. Intra-party democracy is the necessity and not the charity.The way we have been evolving is thoroughly indigenous and very much rooted in the soil of India. The trends of accommodation, assimilation, inclusiveness and convergence are likely to rebound with a bang .The obdurate splinters. are sure to face elimination. The days of ideological barrenness will soon be over. No political party can exist without ideological moorings. All encompassing political organizations will only survive.Shortsightedness or parochialism will soon be out of place with the emerging world reality.
The Indian word for democracy is 'Loktantra' that is people's system. To run this system the process is named 'Rajneeti' meaning 'neet' to do 'rajya' and that is where the problem lies. Conceptually speaking, democracy comprises of elected legislatures, elected/selected executive, an independent judiciary and a media. The main problem with India's democracy is that executive and legislature are combined. People (lok) elect their leaders for an effective loktantra. However, our political class contests elections for executive power, meaning all elected representatives are always seeking an office of power. This mutual dichotomy has resulted in the established success of our 'electoral democracy', and an almost defunct 'functional democracy'. Because of such over emphasis on electoral aspects of democracy, our leaders are electorally accountable to their constituents but there is lack of accountability of what they do after they get elected. Until this dichotomy is resolved, the entire debate about the national politics and regional aspirations is fruitless. In essence all political leaders whether they represent a regional or a national outfit, are seeking power (raj) and are not much interested in neeti (policy).
The author seemed to fault in explaining a few things. The so called policy reforms have not emanated from coalitions or their maturity; On the contrary the said policies are outsourced from IMF initially and now tweaked, at the instance of multinationals and contractors. It is important to notice that bureaucracy has evolved and overwhelmed the policy making establishment to seize absolute power. Most powerful people now have no mooring in politics of any kind; they have catapulted there through patronage in return for family loyalty and some strange connects.
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