BJP-Congress inter-changeable commodities !

By Indranil Banerjea

If the idea of the third front today appears dim, no one but the parties outside the BJP and the Congress are to be blamed for it. Again, it is not as if small and marginal parties have ceased to exist or have vanished. In fact, small and marginal parties have proliferated; the polity has grown more fragmented. But most of the parties with the potential to constitute the third front have got sucked into either the BJP or the Congress. Their identities have become inchoate, perhaps more than ever. Political expediency and political convenience is the name of the game. Political identities based on political, social or economic ideologies are matters of a distant past.

However, the BJP and the Congress have to accept a larger share of the blame for the creation of a situation in which one party looks the same as the other. They have themselves become indistinguishable. One can't tell how one is different from the other. It's as much the Congressisation of the BJP as the Saffronisation of the Congress. The BJP and the Congress have killed-or to put it mildly diluted-their own identities. In the process, they have spurred the regional parties and small centrist parties to kill their identities.

As a result, the BJP and the Congress today stand more as two camps and less as two distinct parties. Over two and half dozen parties dotting the national scene, with the exception of communists and a few others, therefore, are more in nature of camp followers. They can switch sides without having to face the embarrassment of changing characters or identities. How does it matter, for instance, if the Janata Dal(U) is part of the BJP-led coalition and the Janata Dal(S) is outside it? Likewise, how does one explain that the Congress was part of the RJD-led government in Bihar but it couldn't bring itself to ally with Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav's Samajwadi Party in UP?

In the initial years in the 1990s, the unifying process of economic liberalisation was held responsible for bringing about this unity of political identities among the major parties. Political parties diluted their identities as they all jumped on the bandwagon of economic reforms and globalisation. True, there was no escape from liberalisation. But after 16-years of reforms, it is being universally recognised that liberalisation has created as many problems in its wake as it has solved. Those problems are people's problems. They need to be highlighted with force. Is it possible, one may ask, that major political parties like the Congress and the BJP must have identical approach to all the gigantic problems facing this continent-sized country?

It may be a matter of debate whether the Congress has diluted its identity to allow the BJP to grow at its expense or whether the BJP has watered down its own ideology to appear like the Congress to grab the Congress's power-base in north and west India. What is certain is that a paradigm shift took place in the 1990s. Empirically, the BJP gobbled up the Congress's power base to grow at a phenomenal pace in the 1990s. From a party with just two MPs in 1984, it grew humongously to capture the seat of power in 1996. The BJP's growth at the Congress's expense was best illustrated in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, where the latter was completely vanquished. The moot point is the BJP and the Congress-the two political formations that claimed to represent the two distinct streams of national politics-have almost become interchangeable commodities.

However, one must give the devil its due. The BJP, from time to time, betrays the pangs of the dilution of its distinct identity. The struggle to keep up to its new image and character shows up in the conflicts among the various constituents of the Sangh parivar. Senior BJP leaders have captured the ideological fault lines in various phrases: For instance, some say it is ideology versus governance in the BJP; others feel it is a conflict between a cadre-based organisation and mass-based party. Some admit that the evils of the Congress have held the BJP in its grip.

The internal conflict in the BJP will get sharper as general election 2009 draws closer. The argument of the pro-ideology sections in the BJP is that the party may lose its sheen if it continues as an entity focussed on running the government. After all, this is not an end in itself for the BJP. The Jana Sangh was set up to achieve certain goals. These goals today seem as far away in the future as they were 56-years ago. The BJP, in its avatar as a party of the government, has been forced to dilute its core issues. The party's aim to grab power was meant to help the Sangh parivar realise its ultimate goal; not just to meander from one crisis to another in South Block. Purists further argue that none of the goals for which the BJP was set up have been realised.

Will the BJP change tack? Will the party formulate policies to achieve its original goals? Can the BJP afford to give up power to go back to pursuing its core agenda? It seems unlikely. The choices before the BJP are tough. Despite being in power for five years, the BJP doesn't look confident of winning a majority in the next Lok Sabha on its own. The party has become dependent on a coalition of parties which are a part of the NDA. These parties are comfortable riding piggyback on the BJP in order to be a part of the ruling dispensation. But they are unwilling to take the risk of allowing the BJP to pursue its agenda that are broadly dubbed as sectarian, fundamentalist and against the minorities.

Ideology can take a backseat for the moment. Of course, the results of the next parliamentary elections will force the BJP to rethink its agenda. Till that happens, the fate of the third front also hangs in balance. INAV

Exam season turns ‘suicide’ season !
TALES OF TRAVESTY

By Dr. Jitendra Singh

Winston Churchill confesses in his autobiography that when the Mathematics paper was placed before him during Matriculation exam, he could not make the head or tail of it and kept gazing at the window thinking what to write without realising that the nib of the fountain pen which inadvertantly rested on the answer sheet had ended up leaving a big ugly ink spot on the paper. Albert Einstien failed the entrance test for admission to college. Two of the Nobel lauretes from India, Rabindranath Tagore and Hargobind Khurana, were never known for their academic grades. While Tagore never took an examination in his life, Khurana could not make it to a medical college.

Even though the above instances can not be used as an argument against the very relevance of school or college exams, these instances still have a lot to say about exams, the exam-going pupils and their parents.

It is no mean coincidence that around the month of March-April each year, when it is exam season in India, the suicide rate among adolescents and teenagers suddenly shoots up to sometimes assume epidemic proportions. Interestingly, in recent years, there are also reports about some of the parents too having attempted suicide following disappointment over exam performance by their wards.

In the Indian context today, exams, particularly class 12 and to a great extent class 10 board exams, are seen as a ‘‘do or die’’ test of lifetime. Young boys and girls are pushed into putting all the stakes into these exams and invariably thier parents also become willing or unwilling victims of this morbid phenomenon. Not only does this end up creating a wave of incapacitating stress especially in the middle classes but also lays foundation for a spate of suicides as an immediate sequel and problems like diabetes, hypertension and heart disease as a long-term consequence.

Exams have never been and are never likely to be a true indicator of intellect. On the contrary, exams, as they are conducted and graded in this country, often tend to become a barometer of a student's ability to memorise things by heart and then regurgitate at the appointed date and time. It is amazing how parents and children go to deadly extents in attaching a highly exaggerated importance to these exams even though, day in and day out, they are witness to the fact that many of those who score very high percentage or grades in school or college exams donot necessarily rise to equivalent heights in later life, more so in a country like India where, invariably, those unable to make it to medical or engineering college after class 12 go on to sit for the IAS and Allied Services exam and those who make it no exam go ahead to join politics and become ministers to sit over the heads of their former class mates who had spent their entire youth in the race for university or board grades.

Time has come for the nation's planners and education experts to contemplate and encourage alternative methods of assessing a candidate's merit rather than making the arithmetic of marks as the sole basis. There is also an urgent need to educate parents, families and infact the society in general. Afer all, what use is such an education system that fails to educate even about the value of life and instead drives the youngsters to kill themselves ? It is for the common man to educate himself about the basic truths of life before staking the life itself for superflous fascinations like an exam performance. Poet Late Kunwar Mahendra Singh Bedi has a word of wisdom for Umapathy ‘‘Zindagi Khud Ek Ibaadat Hai Agar Hosh Rahe......’’

Time for introspection for Akalis

By Harjeet Singh

Since the Akalis occupy a place of honour in the country, and they are ruling Punjab, it is their duty work for the unity of the country and the Panth. The above question is addressed to the Brahmins by Kabir, but it can be addressed to the Akalis also in a different context by the Sikh community. The Shiromani Akali Dal came into being as the political wing of the Sikhs during the gurdwara reform movement in the twenties. The movement enjoyed the support of the Indian National Congress. Mahatma Gandhi greeted the success in the Keys Affair of the Golden Temple, Amritsar, with a telegram that the first battle of India's freedom had been won, and Jawaharlal Nehru went to jail for extending support to the Jaito Morcha of the Akalis. The Akalis, on their part, assured Mahatma Gandhi that their agitation would be completely peaceful and non-violent.

The anti-colonial tradition of Ghadrites and the struggle for Independence launched by the Congress under Mahatma Gandhi continued to inspire the movement, but along with these objective the Akalis took upon themselves the role of keeping a watch on what were perceived as the special interests of the Sikh community, and by 1942 the concern for the special interests of the Sikh community was felt to be strong enough to justify dissociation of the Akali Dal from the Quit India movement that had been launched by the Congress. Thereafter, the Akali Dal was able to create a constituency among the Sikhs in which the Akalis could sell the slogan that at first they had to ensure that the Panth was free and only then the nation could be free. They fought the 1946 assembly elections in Punjab on that basis, and they did well.

After partition, the Akali Dal at one time decided to merge with the Congress when its entire leadership joined that party. But the constituency of perceived Sikh interests remained intact, and soon a new Akali Dal came into being under Master Tara Singh. The erstwhile Akali stalwarts like Sardar Swaran Singh and Sardar Hukam Singh did not come back to the Dal, but their continuance in the Congress did not materially affect the re-emergence of the Akali Dal as a party that, by and large, enjoyed the loyalty of the Sikh community.

The constituency of the Akali Dal among the Sikhs rested on two main concerns projected by the leadership. One was the concern for government jobs and the other was the perceived threat to the Sikh identity. The demand for the reservation of jobs for the Sikhs in the government coming from the Akalis was something contrary to the Sikh tradition. During the Sikh struggle against the Mughals, government jobs were held in contempt. Sikh government servants were contemptuously called "chakrail" Sikhs. The word "tankhah" for punishment for a religious transgression by a Sikh connotes the same contempt for government services.

Lately, both concerns, for the reservation in services and for safeguarding the identity of the Sikhs, seem to have been subsumed in the concern for political power for the Akali Dal as a representative organisation of the Sikh community.

Except for enjoying political power in Punjab for a few short spells during the 59-years of freedom, the Akali record has continued to be uninspiring. The Akalis also have no tradition of introspection or publicly admitting their mistakes, nor has their constituency ever demanded such public admission or introspection from its leaders.

The foregoing would show that the Akali constituency among the Sikhs in order to survive does not require any support of success or achievement nor does it depend on the charisma of a leader. The charisma of an Akali leader, however, can provide the crucial additional support from the masses to enable the Akalis to capture political power, but the core of the Akali support survives independent of any charisma. The Dal has always had a ready supply of grassroots workers who remain unaffected by the failure of their leaders to lead them towards any of their proclaimed goals.

The congregational nature of the Sikh religion provides them with ready fora for the dissemination of their message. The problem that such a situation causes for ordinary citizens of Punjab is that the frustration caused by the failure to achieve emotionally-charged goals among the Sikh masses breeds violence of the type that Punjab experienced in 1990s. This situation is, therefore, required to be understood properly to find a way to handle it properly if Punjab is to move to healthy political maturity.

The very existence of the Akalis as a political group is based on the basis of their projection of themselves as the voice of the Khalsa Panth of Guru Gobind Singh. The Khalsa Panth and the Granth have continued to be the object of great reverence for the Sikhs, as substitutes of the personality of the Gurus. The Granth called Sri Guru Granth Sahib can be placed beyond any criticism as its contents are based on divine inspiration authenticated by the Gurus themselves.

The Panth, however, is a collectivity of the Sikhs who are fallible. The reluctance to criticise all that is invoked in the name of the Panth has no justification, and one can show that it has proved to be disastrous for the Panth. If the Akalis are to be accepted as representing the Khalsa Panth, their objectives and strategy have to conform to the values enshrined in Sri Guru Granth Sahib. The Anandpur Sahib resolution, the Amritsar declaration and the whole Akali discourse go against the world-view of Gurbani.

Gurbani clearly forbids a Sikh to form a group with other Sikhs or others whose objective is to further any perceived worldly interests. The Sikhs are forbidden from ascribing the cause of their inability to achieve those aims to the machination of any agency human or other worldly as what takes place in the world is God-ordained. If a cause has to be identified for human failures, one has to look inwards, at one's own doings, and reshape one's aspirations to bring them in line with the divine order. The verse of the Fourth Guru at page 366 and the verses of Guru Nanak at page 933 and page 258 of Sri Guru Granth Sahib and many other such verses can be cited in support of what has been stated as the world-view of Gurbani.

It is not the intention to make out a case that Sikh should shun political activity as it goes against the spirit of the Sikh religion, which is a whole-life religion, and a Sikh has to seek his salvation through participating in all social, political and economic activities. What is being said is that a political party or group that invokes the name of the Khalsa Panth has to have its objectives which extend the area of human freedom, dignity and values in society and it should be ready to fight for ensuring justice for all, and for the cause of the meek, the weak and the downtrodden.

Gurbani and the Sikh tradition can provide all the idiom and inspiration for taking up such cause from the platform of gurdwaras, and also there is no dearth of grassroots workers ready for any sacrifice for the cause espoused in the name of the Panth. It will again make the oppressed and the downtrodden everywhere to look to the gurdwara for succour and support as had happened in the 18th century.

The Akali quest for political power has so far been like the wasting quest of the deer for its own musk located in its navel by running in circles all over, at all places, as the smell of the musk does not permit it to sit quietly at one place. One wishes the Akalis started looking inwards in their search for political power, and come out openly against all forms of violence let lose by terrorists in Punjab, instead of according the status of a martyr to Jarnail Singh Bhindranwala. INAV