[lbo-talk] India elections

[Alexandre Fenelon]

http://www.antiwar.com/bidwai/

India's Ruling Party Faces Fierce Fight in Elections

by Praful Bidwai
With the announcement by India's ruling coalition that it will ask for the
dissolution of the Lower House of Parliament on Feb. 6, the country is all
set for national elections to get underway probably five months before the
term of the House ends.
By all indications, it will be a contentious, sharp and bitter fight.
Contrary to appearances, the Hindu-nationalist, right-wing Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP) is not about to sweep the polls or win a clear parliamentary
majority on its own.

The ruling multi-party National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which the BJP
dominates, might be hard put to repeat its performance in the last elections
in 1999.

Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has himself warned his party that the
electoral battle will be fierce. There are several reasons for this, and at
least four are important.

First, the NDA is a shrinking entity, unlike five years ago. In the past 15
months, six of its original 22 constituents have quit the alliance,
including regional parties from southern Tamil Nadu state, and smaller
organizations representing groups like Dalits (untouchables) from eastern
Bihar state, or farmers in the western part of Uttar Pradesh, India's most
populous state.

The biggest blow to the BJP was the breakdown of its alliance in Uttar
Pradesh with the strongly Dalit Bahujan Samaj Party and that party's
decision to oppose the BJP tooth and nail in the coming elections.

Second, the anti-NDA opposition is making serious efforts to form alliances
so as not to divide its vote. (Traditionally, ruling parties in India tend
to gain disproportionately from high levels of opposition disunity, rather
from their own popularity.)

Crucial to these efforts is the Indian National Congress' decision not to go
it alone and to explore the broadest possible coalition with other parties.
The Congress party, which has ruled India for more than 45 years of the 56
years of independence, until recently used to consider itself the natural
party of governance and was loathe to form coalitions.

Recent defeats in three important state assembly elections have jolted the
Congress out of its arrogance and complacency.

It is now negotiating alliances with other parties from Kashmir in the north
to Tamil Nadu in the deep south, and from Maharashtra in the west to the
seven small northeastern states. A third reason why the coming elections
will be closely fought is that in India, the party or parties in power tend
to suffer the disadvantage of incumbency.

In the past 30 years, a ruling coalition has been returned to power at the
national level only once in two consecutive elections. The Indian voter
prefers to punish parties rather than reward them.

The BJP/NDA rode on the anti-incumbency wave in 1998, when the ruling
center-Left coalition collapsed. Today, the NDA faces the incumbent's
disadvantage.

Finally, the BJP has sharply polarized Indian society and politics as never
before. There are two main lines of division: one along the issue of
religion and politics, which the BJP mixes dangerously; and the other, on
economic policies with sharp class biases.

The BJP is an ideologically driven party that stands for Hindu supremacism
and a Hindu state, which will privilege this 80 percent majority. The party
is closely tied to extremist and violent organizations notorious for attacks
on and persecution of religious minorities, besides vandalism and rabid
intolerance.

Eleven years ago, the BJP and its associates razed to the ground a
16th-century mosque in Uttar Pradesh, which they regarded as a symbol of the
Muslim conquest of Hindu India in the Middle Ages. (Historians have a very
different, multicultural, multi-religious, view of India's past).

Less than two years ago, the Hindu-nationalists butchered over 2,000 Muslims
in the state of Gujarat in retaliation for the burning alive of 60
Hindu-nationalist cadres in a railway train – -for which the victimized
Muslims were in no way responsible.

India's religious minorities, some 180 million people – or bigger than
Brazil's population – have never felt more insecure than under the BJP's
rule.

The opposition sees the BJP as a major menace to India's secular
Constitution and pluralist democracy. The BJP has also promoted brazenly
elitist neoliberal economic policies, which have destroyed public services
and undermined food security, while further enriching the already rich.

In the last three years of NDA rule, India's GDP growth slowed down. But
much worse was the rise in unemployment, especially in the rural areas where
70 percent of India's population lives.

The economy only absorbs about a third of the new entrants into the job
market. But the incomes of the top tenth of the population have
substantially increased – creating what the government crudely terms the
"feel good" or "India Shining" factor publicized in expensive television and
print advertisements.

India has never experienced such sharp income polarities or such gaping
regional disparities. All these factors make for a robust fight in the next
elections.

To win an absolute majority on its own, the BJP would have to win 50 percent
more seats than it currently holds. There is no way it can do this – short
of a wave in its favor and its allies' agreement to concede constituencies
to it.

The BJP has a limited base, mainly in central and western India. As for the
NDA, it reached a saturation point in a number of states where it holds a
good amount or majority of seats. It will not be easy to better this
performance.

The opposition, by contrast, has a much higher chance of improving on its
1999 scores. However, the opposition cannot win the electoral race unless it
can project an alternative set of policies and visions which are of
relevance to, and catch the imagination of, a majority of the population.

It has yet to work out a common minimum program or manifesto. Nor has the
opposition been able to form a single common front.

At the moment, two different anti-NDA fronts are emerging: one led by the
Congress, the other by the communist parties. Some significant regional
players like the Samajwadi Party, which leads a coalition government in
Uttar Pradesh, have so far kept out of both.

Some of India's political parties are also allergic to Sonia Gandhi's
candidature for the leadership of any alliance, simply because of her
Italian origins. The BJP has always made a xenophobic fuss about this issue,
but some secular-minded parties too believe that a leader with foreign
origins will not be acceptable to the Indian public.

At any rate, Sonia Gandhi has told all potential allies that she is not a
candidate for the top job even if a Congress-led coalition wins. This has
certainly helped the alliance-building process. But the critical issue is
that of polices and programs which unambiguously oppose the NDA. Without
them, the secular opposition could still lose.
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