Kejriwal turns Devout Hindu, gets Muslim votes

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

News cum analysis

Kejriwal turns Devout Hindu, gets Muslim votes 

Alarm bells for BJP as Opposition rejuvenated  

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, Feb 11 

The AAP's spectacular second sweep in a row in Delhi Assembly elections today has given the reverse “current” to the BJP leadership. The BJP which had made Shaheen Bagh as its main poll plank and fielded motormouths in the campaign to divide voters, will have to re-invent strategy to win Delhi. The 22 year long drought for the party in national Capital has been a huge pain in its neck and nothing worked for it since 1998. In 2015, the BJP even imported a rank outsider, former IPS Kiran Bedi, as its chief ministerial face ignoring the legitimate claim of party veteran Dr Harsh Vardhan. She suffered a humiliating defeat herself and the party sank to worst ever tally of three out of 70 seats. In 2020, the BJP leadership decided not to project any local leader for the post of Chief Minister against mighty Arvind Kejriwal and Amit Shah personally led the campaign from the front. A conscious decision was taken to grab the 'Shaheen Bagh indefinite dharna' by women folks and arouse Hindu sentiments in the city. More than 20 Union Ministers and 200 plus party MPs were pumped into the campaigning for 30 days. It was a “carpet bombing” Amit Shah is known for. He personally distributed leaflets in several colonies and hoped to turn the election. 

However, Arvind Kejriwal stuck to his development model and shunned Shaheen Bagh completely. He didn't utter a single word against Prime Minister Modi or even Amit Shah. He made all the right noises and even grabbed the Prime Minister's slogan “Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas”. Simultaneously, he went on chant “Vande Matram” and visited Hanuman Temple to send the message to the nationalists and Hindus that he is part of them. He addressed several Town Hall meetings on TV channels and ducked all national issues. Yet, the Muslims saw in him a new saviour as Congress was no where to be seen or heard.

The underlining message of Delhi polls is the emergence of two party system relegating Congress to a position of complete insignificance. The Congress had no strategy and Rahul Gandhi went over-board when he went to address a public meeting saying, “The youth will beat him with a stick in six months as they are not getting jobs.”

The BJP committed the cardinal mistake of attacking the Congress. In the process, the party's votes went to the AAP furthering the prospects of Kejriwal.

Kejriwal proved himself as an astute politician and termed his victory by chanting “Bharat Mata ki Jai”. The BJP cannot target him for being anti-Hindu. Last but not the least, the BJP will have to revert to development model of the PM dumping the politics of hate. It will now have to look at Bihar Assembly polls more carefully and cannot take victory for granted. The location of one Shaheen Bagh may be shifted. But Kejriwal's win has given a new fervor to the entire Opposition.

Dilemma grips BJP on fielding sitting LS MPs

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Dilemma grips BJP on fielding sitting LS MPs

Searching formidable candidate against Kejriwal

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, Jan. 18

The BJP leadership is in a serious dilemma whether to field some sitting Members of the Lok Sabha for the Delhi Assembly to take on the Aam Aadmi Party. Earlier it was toying with the idea of fielding all the seven sitting Lok Sabha Sabha MPs including Union Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan for the Delhi Assembly seats. This thinking evolved as many felt that the party should put its best foot forward. But suddenly the party developed cold feet and now it is contemplating to field only three Lok Sabha MPs in the Delhi Assembly battle.

According to highly placed sources, Dr Manoj Tiwari, president of the Delhi BJP, Parvesh Varma, son of former Delhi Chief Minister Sahib Singh Varma and Ramesh Biduri are keen to contest for the Assembly polls and conveyed their desire to the party high command accordingly. Vijay Goel, former Union Minister and ex-president of the Delhi BJP and sitting Rajya Sabha MP, is also determined to contest for the Assembly polls. In any case, his Rajya Sabha term is expiring from Rajasthan in April and its time, he returns to the local Delhi politics.

Earlier these leaders wanted them to be projected as chief ministerial face of the party. When the party told them that this can't be accepted, they still want to contest for the Assembly to take on the AAP.

The party is also looking for a candidate who can be pitted against Arvind Kejriwal from the New Delhi constituency. Meenakshi Lekhi, two times Lok Sabha MP from New Delhi constituency was sounded to contest against Kejriwal. But she was not inclined though if ordered will obey.

The party has announced the names of 57 candidates so far and nine more are yet to be announced. Four seats have been allocated to its ally Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD). The BJP has three MLAs in the Delhi Assembly and the Modi-Amit Shah team wants to snatch the Assembly after loosing the battle for past 22 years.

Fly on the wall : Congress's Kejriwal riddle in Delhi

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Congress's Kejriwal riddle in Delhi

Congress president Rahul Gandhi's plan to clinch alliances or adjustment of seats with the like-minded parties has hit major hurdles in West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh and Delhi. While the talks in rest of the states are going smoothly as a team of three senior leaders – Ghulam Nabi Azad, Ahmad Patel and Kamal Nath – is working over-time to negotiate an amicable settlement. The talks with the BSP are progressing slowly but they are in right direction as Mayawati is wanting pan-India alliance with the Congress. Kamal Nath is insisting that it should be state-by-state as every state has different political situation prevailing. He wants Mayawati to come on board irrespective of alliances in other states. But the bigger problem is in Delhi which has seven Lok Sabha seats. The AAP is keen for adjustment of seats despite bitterness in relations with Shiela Dixit and Ajay Maken. If sources are to be believed, the AAP has offered New Delhi for Ajay Maken, East Delhi for Sandeep Dixit and Outer Delhi for any candidate of Congress choice. But the Congress is playing pricey though it is in on a weak wicket in Delhi as its a divided house. The AAP argument is in a four corner contest – Congress, BJP, AAP & BSP contesting separately, the BJP is sure to get all seven seats. The ball is in the court of Rahul Gandhi now. Similarly, the Congress is at a cross roads whether to go with Mamata Banerjee or CPM in West Bengal. The one-to-one meeting that Ahmad Patel had with Mamata Banerjee yielded no results. Serious problem exist in Andhra Pradesh where Congress is struggling to find an ally. The YSR Congress of Jagan Mohan Reddy has his own problems and doesn't want any pre-poll alliance with the Congress. Its a fate-accompli for the Congress in Andhra. 

The Baffling Silence of CBI in Sterling Biotech case 

All the spotlight may be on Vijay Mallya for defrauding banks. But the silence of CBI is baffling in the Sterling Biotech case despite the fact that the two Sandesara brothers are hiding in Nigeria. They fled the country, like Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi, Lalit Modi and several others, along with their key family members with ease. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) went to town claiming attachment of assets worth over Rs 4,700 crores in the Rs 5,000-crore fraud case. But CBI officials are silent even one year after registering the case which is in sharp contrast to the speed with which cases P. Chidambaram, Lalu Prasad, Robert Vadra and several former Congress Chief Ministers are being pursued. The case surfaced after the seizure of a "diary" way back in 2011 from the Vadodara premises of Sterling Biotech by the Income-tax officials giving details of purported payments to some tax officials, politicians and police officers, including a Gujarat-cadre IPS officer who is now a CBI special director. The 11-page CBI chargesheet even named son-in-law of Ahmad Patel, senior Congress leader. Certain raided were also conducted on Patel's aides. It was claimed that clinching evidence exists establishing the nexus between the Congress leaders and Sterling Biotech  group owners. But sources say the probe is stuck as CBI is struggling to find evidence if the UPA government gave any favours to the Sterling group. On the contrary, it has surfaced through a fact-sheet that the group grew leaps and bounds during the BJP rule in Gujrat since June 2004. It was awarded contract for the development of Dahej Port and given 150 acres of land. The Gujrat government took the help in organising Vibrant Gujarat Summit as late as in January 2017. In November 2008, Nitin Sandesra, Chairman of Sterling Biotech who is  absconding, accompanied top Gujrat BJP leadership and government officials to Uganda and Kenya in his aircraft. The Vibrant Gujarat brochures of 2009, 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017 list Sterling Biotech as success story of Gujarat's pharma and biotechnology policies. Sterling SEZ was allotted 3000 acres to develop a SEZ at Jambusar.  The Government of Gujarat allocated additional 6000 acres despite complaints from banks that loans  to the group were turning bad. The Sterling SEZ was sitting on a land bank of 9000 acres given by the Gujarat Government by 2013. It transpires that some “action” may be taken in the weeks to come to cover the tracks. 

No Data Chief for months in Digital India

Ever since TCA Anant retired as the Central Statistics Officer on Jan. 31, the government has failed to find a replacement. The CSO was without a boss when it released figures last month showing the economy regained its position once again of being the fastest-expanding major economy in the world, with the growth of 7.7 per cent in the fourth-quarter of the fiscal year ended March 31. The PMO was somewhat unhappy with the way he used to come out with the data on the economy. At stake is the reputation of an institution that’s been working hard to rectify the image that India has deficient and unreliable economic data. With a population of 1.3 billion and an economy of $ 2.3 trillion collecting timely and accurate information is a gargantuan effort. With only months to go before the next election, the data is also coming under increased scrutiny as Modi’s political rivals question his claims about key campaign pledges, such as jobs creation and related parameters. The new methodology is also being worked out. For example, when the statistics office published a new series for a GDP that put India’s growth rate on par with China, eonomists said in 2015 that the data didn’t match up with high-frequency indicators showing more subdued expansion. It transpires that the PMO is looking for an outside expert for the job who is capable of gathering reliable economic data which is quite a challenging task.

Fly on the wall : IBC Code divided the Cabinet, for a change

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

fly on the wall 

IBC Code divided the Cabinet, for a change

For a change, Union Cabinet witnessed some prolonged if not heated discussions when the Insolvency Bankruptcy Code (IBC) Ordinance was brought before it. A couple of Cabinet Ministers felt that if the purpose of the Ordinance is to revive 500 sick companies, it will be rather detrimental. But the Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister Arun Jaitley argued that if this Ordinance is brought, then all sick companies will be grabbed by the relatives and friends of those promoters who had looted them for decades. The actual value of these companies is less than 50%. The government wants that new genuine promoters should come forward. Some ministers said the Ordinance is so stringent that there will be no buyers left. When a another senior minister quipped that it would impossible to find such buyers in India, Jaitley said world is looking at India how this government is dealing with corrupt promoters. Another minister pointed out to Jaitley that the money was lent to these companies by the banks and let the banks be given free hand to deal with the situation. Why the government was interfering in the process. At this, Jaitley got irritated but replied in a coll manner that the IBC was evolved only after intense consultations with the bank who are finding themselves unable to deal with the crisis. The willful defaulters are creating all sorts of hurdles in selling these companies after milking them for decades. The government won't allow any relative to buy the sick company of another relative. Prime Minister Modi maintained a complete silence when the debate was going on the Ordinance. The Ordinance was later issued and now set to be challenged.

Sonia to continue as CPP chairman as Rahul cracks whip

Rahul Gandhi has done what none including Sonia Gandhi dared in the past; suspending senior leader of late Rajiv Gandhi era. Manishankar Aiyer who was an IFS, quit his job and joined Rajiv Gandhi and never looked back. He held key positions and often put Dr Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi in trouble for his remarks all these years. But nobody touched him as he was an “uncle” to the Gandhis. Aiyer thought the storm over his “neech” remark will blow over with his “half-hearted regret” and that too with riders. Rahul Gandhi was furious when Aiyer didn't tender unqualified apology as directed and cracked the whip. Though Rahul Gandhi wants to carry the oldies in the party with him and won't reshuffle the pack after assuming office of the Congress president on December 16. But he won't sack anybody. Meanwhile, it is unclear whether Ahmad Patel who is Political Adviser to Congress President (CP) will continue to hold the post. It is clear that Rahul doesn't want political adviser and will rely on the “entire leadership” rather than one individual. It is yet to be seen if Ahmad Patel is made political adviser to the Chairman of the CPP (Congress Parliamentary Party) or not. It is emerging that Sonia Gandhi will continue to be the chairman of the Congress Parliamentary Party until the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Congressmen say that while Sonia Gandhi always avoided taking risks, Rahul Gandhi is no-nonsense kind of a person and by suspending Aiyer, he has sent a signal to senior leaders to keep their tongue under check.

Akola makes Yashwant Sinha a mass leader, BJP worried 

Yashwant Sinha may be in political wilderness and a loner. But over-night, he made the ruling party worried when he landed in Akola in Maharashtra and forced the Fadnavis government to concede all the six demands of the farmers. The tremendous success in a short span of time of the farmers' agitation surprised political class as Sinha was able to mobilise the support of not only local farmers but also West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and other parties looking for a leader worth a salt. She dispatched Dinesh Trivedi and now it transpires that Swabhiman Paskha Party, Aam Aadmi Party, Biju Janata Dal and several others may swim in the troubled waters in BJP ruled states. They have got a leader in Yashwant Sinha who is 80 years plus and working hard to engineer a revolt within the BJP too. Don't dismiss the 80 year old job seeker as he is enjoying a new role of farmers messiah. One will have to wait for some more time how things take shape.

She-Box Zeal takes Maneka no where

Maneka Gandhi launched the a comprehensive She-Box, an online complaint management system for working women to lodge complaints of sexual harassment at work places. This was under the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, prohibition and Redressal ) Act which is called the She Act 2013. it was passed during the UPA regime but Maneka has been focusing on its tough implementation ever since she became a minister in 2014. Its an online portal facility and covers even those who have already filed their complaints to the private or government companies or department. The ministry published even a handbook to pretext the dignity and safety of women. The PIB churned out a huge handout of the launching of the She Box on November 7. But shockingly, the same handout with verbatim words was issued by the same ministry on the same subject six months ago, on July 24 to be precise. The Press Information Bureau has both the press releases on its website with a five months gap. The Fly was told that ministers are under so much of pressure from the PMO to show activities relating to their ministries in the media that even when they have no event, they are forced to create an event. Maneka hit upon the idea of recycling press bulletins.

Fly on the Wall : Nitish Kumar gets a Bungalow in Delhi

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Fly on the Wall

Harish Gupta 

Nitish Kumar gets a Bungalow in Delhi

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar had been struggling for long to have a bungalow at the Lutyen’s Delhi for almost a decade. Normally, Chief Ministers are given this privilege by the ruling parties at the Centre though there is no specific rule. Ever since the principle of giving bungalows to VIPs falling in the Z plus security has been dispensed with, the problem compounded. Nitish Kumar faced the problem for almost ten years as the UPA never allotted him a bungalow as he was an ally of the NDA. Though the state government repeatedly wrote to the Centre but to no avail. Unfortunately, when Modi came to power at the Centre, Nitish Kumar deserted the NDA targeting Modi. Thus, he was left high and dry again. But full 42 months later in the NDA regime, Nitish Kumar’s long wish of having a bungalow in Lutyen’s Delhi was fulfilled. The Urban Development Minister Hardeep Puri reportedly took the matter to the Cabinet Committee of Accommodation and the chairman Rajnath Singh consulted the Prime Minister informally in this regard. After a lot of confabulation, Nitish Kumar was given Type VIII ministerial bungalow in the Lutyen’s Zone last week. It was earlier occupied by his friend and former Solicitor General of India Ranjit Kumar who had spent tons of his personal money to re-do the entire house. It was also inspected by Hardeep Puri who informed Nitish Kumar that it is the best bungalow available at present. Nitish sent his consent and thanked the PM. 

Is Sharad Yadav political adviser to Rahul?

How Rahul Gandhi and the Congress Party changed its stance and agreed to share seats with almost all like-minded parties in Gujrat Assembly polls over-night has surprised party veterans. Talks had broken down with NCP and even the three young musketeers were talking in different tune. An upbeat Congress leadership was unwilling to give peanuts to these new groups. Sonia Gandhi’s key political adviser Ahmad Patel was rushed to AIIMS to undergo emergency heart treatment and things were going haywire. Though he went back in a short span. But it is learnt that something happened and everything was normal. It transpires that Rahul Gandhi had a rather long meeting with Sharad Yadav at his residence. What transpired between the two could be anybody’s guess. But Yadav is an old hand in caste-politics and explained to Rahul Gandhi how the party could never come back to power as it lost crucial caste alliances. The Congress must seize it and its time party should take everybody along. He told Rahul that his objective should be 2019 Lok Sabha polls as once Gujrat is clinched, the dissidents within BJP will grow. Sharad Yadav is also talking to AAP leaders though Congress is firm not to have any truck with it. Yadav wants AAP to field its candidates in such a way that the BJP suffers a set back. 

Why its Waterloo for BJP & Modi

It is no secret that the entire Cabinet has been deployed in poll bound state of Gujrat and the BJP headquarters has been airlifted to Gandhinagar. Amit Shah is claiming that there is nothing new as the BJP always contested polls in states like a war machine. But political pundits say stake are very high in Gujrat compared to any other Assembly poll. Dissidents like Varun Gandhi, Shatrughan Sinha, Kirti Azad, Shyamlal Gupta and a couple of other sitting Lok Sabha MPs  are waiting for the outcome of Gujrat results on December 18. Any adverse outcome may shake the current political fabric and alignments. Though the RSS will continue to bet on Modi despite differences on one issue or the other. But it is aware that Gujrat is the key for 2019 Lok Sabha polls. The BJP has more than 140 Lok Sabha MPs who came from nowhere in the party and given tickets in 2014. Any slide in Gujrat will shake the confidence of these fence sitters. Therefore, the entire focus of the BJP-RSS is to enhancethe BJP’s Gujrat tally of 117 out of 182. The Capital is agog with reports that some of the MPs who have fallen out with the leadership may look around for some political opportunity if there is any slide in BJP’s tally.

Watch out Milind Deora in Congress shake up

  

Milind Deora, former Lok Sabha MP and son of late Murli Deora is set to play a key role in the Team Rahul after he assumes the charge of Congress president. It has been decided that no major shake up will be undertaken in the organisation until the Budget session of Parliament due to pressing circumstances. It will rather be a slow process as immediately after the Gujrat & Himachal Pradesh, Parliament’s Winter session will set in and once the brief session is over, the party will face elections in three states of North East. Then, the Budget session will commence on January end and end early April. Therefore, those eyeing key positions will have to wait for some more time. But Milind Deora is the man to watch.

Never say die !

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

With the collapse of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), first in Punjab & Goa, and now in the recently held Municipal polls in Delhi, the last “hope” of the Opposition politics is heading towards self destruction. No doubt, the opponents too are working over-time to inflict a body blow to the four-year born baby. But most of the AAP’s wounds are self-inflicted. If the party is heading towards the funeral pyre, its no one’s fault. Its none else than Arvind Kejriwal himself.  

Gone are the days when he was the darling of the media, the down-trodden and the middle-class. It was Kejriwal who had stunned the nation by trouncing the  BJP in its citadel by winning 67 out of the 70 Assembly seats. The rout of the Congress which ruled the Union Territory for 15 years under Shiela Dikshit, was of no consequence. It was expected due to variety of reasons. But it was he who single-handedly halted the victory march of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. It was a severe blow to the BJP and sent its leaders into a shell.  The “alternative politics” became the narrative. It was not as if the country was not aware of Kejriwal’s national ambitions. After all, he had contested 500-odd Lok Sabha seats in May 2014 and came a cropper. Yet AAP winning four Lok Sabha seats in Punjab raised eye-brows. But it was his win in Delhi that aroused a new kind of  “Hope”.The “secular forces” needed a horse to ride and Kejri was right there. He was the man of the moment.

The timing of his rise in 2013 was most opportune and he never looked back until the big shock in Punjab & Goa and then in Delhi which was his citadel. The Congress had lost the plot in May 2014 and could never recover from the shock tally of 44 Lok Sabha MPs. And this was not all. The party started losing one state after the other and with the BJP scouting for “talent” in every state, the Congress suffered one set back after the other. So much so that veterans like S M Krishna opted to “dump the sinking ship.” A prominent Madhya Pradesh Congress leader had almost clinched his re-entry into the BJP. It was nixed at the last minute by one of the Trioka members (Modi-Shah-Jaitley). 

The Congress’ two sitting Chief Ministers will face their litmus test this year end in Himachal Pradesh & Karnataka. It is also an irony in the era of Congress bashing that its victory in Punjab is not attributed to the  Gandhis. The credit for Capt. Amrinder Singh’s win is attributed to his leadership and to the BJP which did everything possible to ensure AAP’s rout. Secondly, AAP’s one blunder after the other in Punjab helped the Congress to dislodge the Akalis after ten years. Why the Congress leadership can’t be credited with Punjab win ? Look at the MCD poll results in Delhi ! Rahul Gandhi’s hand-picked Ajay Maken ensured that the party secures the third position. Therefore, the most worrying aspect is that the Congress leadership failed to create “hope” amongst its rank and file and Rahul Gandhi’s inability to enthuse the voter is widely accepted. The Left parties who commandeered Central governments from outside, have now been reduced to single digit in Parliament. It is now confined to Tripura and even here, BJP chief Amit Shah is determined to snatch the Left’s last Bastion. The Indian Left is facing a leadership crisis and it is desperately searching for a Kanhaiya to save it from virtual extinction.

The less said the better of another prominent national political party, the BSP which has nearly 20% votes fixed votes in over 100 Lok Sabha constituencies. But she is fast losing the plot and surfacing of her recent audio-tapes could be a turning point in Dalit politics. Her image is already sullied and the BSP is virtually on the verge of extinction in both houses of Parliament. The Lalus, Mulayams, Mamatas have destroyed their own image as one scam after the other hits them and their parties. This has brought Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar who is considered a clean politician at a crossroad. If he dumps Lalu, his government goes. Alternatively, he can re-join the NDA. The BJP also badly needs Nitish Kumar as it wants Bihar’s 40 Lok Sabha seats in its kitty. The BJP is aware that it will be difficult to sweep Lok Sabha polls in Bihar if it contests alone and Nitish-Lalu-Congress stay together. In either case, his dream of emerging as a consensus candidate for the Prime Ministerial post from the Opposition benches is in jeopardy.

Therefore, its a pitiable situation for the Opposition, at least for the moment. For the very survival of democracy a strong Opposition is needed. But one cannot expect the Modi-Shah to create the Opposition. The leaders on the Opposition benches will have to re-invent themselves. The Opposition will have to find a leader who is capable enough to take other parties along. Arvind Kejriwal had showed the charisma and there was a moment when the Left parties were willing to do business with him. But he lost the plot due to his self-destructive over-ambitious politics. Rahul Gandhi had ample opportunities to lead the party from the front and provide the leadership. But he too missed the bus. May be he will have to re-orient and re-invent.

If BJP can re-invent after 14 years of struggle after being routed in 1984, why shall the Opposition be in a hurry. Modi’s honey-moon is not over yet and the Opposition parties do not have 24X7 politicians like Modi and Amit Shah. But political parties don’t die, only their corrupt and incompetent leaders fade away with time. The parties bounce back.

Never a vote-less Year

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

India is a nation with its carnival of elections. The Lok Sabha election is a colossal affair that involves a population nearly a seventh of humanity. Yet it does not speak the last word even for a year or two. In 2014, the consummate victory of BJP under Narendra Modi kept doubts and disgruntlement on a low key. But that was only for a while. The very next year, in the city state of Delhi, the fiercely anti-BJP Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) swept the 70-member assembly, grabbing 67 and leaving only three seats for BJP. The BJP succeeded in grabbing Haryana, Jharkhand and Maharashtra (with Shiv Sena help). But after a few months, in the crucial state of Bihar, it was repeated. RJD chief Lalu Yadav and incumbent chief minister Nitish Kumar, sworn enemies over a decade, made friends; their alliance trounced BJP. All this led to an unprecedented national mood-swing to the detriment of Modi, holding up his reform plans and denting his authority. Is it good for democracy, or not? 

One argument is that the division of power in a democracy is all about checks and balances, and, being so, it is perhaps good for the nation to keep the party in power accountable throughout its tenure, with the series of assembly elections being a way of keeping it on the edge. On the flip side, though, it invites too much discordance for the Central government to carry out its mandate, leading ultimately to ‘policy paralysis’, the malady that plagued the previous UPA-II government. Democracy, like the judicial system, is certainly adversarial at its core. But for a government to perform it needs consensus, which an unending procession of elections can disrupt. 

This February-March, there will be elections, not only in the mega-state of Uttar Pradesh but in six more, including Punjab and later this year in Gujarat. 

The 2018 calendar too is ‘eventful’, with elections due in Congress-ruled Karnataka and the BJP-ruled Chattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. Even in 2019, when the next general election is due, as many as eight states, including key states like Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, will have their assemblies re-elected. There is no guarantee that all the elections will be synchronous. The cycle of elections got disrupted in the late Sixties, with the rise of anti-Congress parties across north India leading to dissolutions of legislative houses at the Centre and states. It is now like a clock that has its movements gone haywire. They must be reassembled if the clock has to tick on. 

Efforts towards it are in progress, though there is no consensus in sight. The government now seems willing to go by the decision of the parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice, headed by Dr. E. M. Sudarsana Nachiappan (Congress), which has made the following recommendation: that elections be held in two phases, first, that of some legislative assemblies bunched together around the mid-term of the Lok Sabha, and the rest of the assemblies going to poll at the end of the Lok Sabha’s term. The idea is to club together all state assemblies going to poll in a span of six months to one year. If, for instance, such a law were already in place, Delhi, Haryana, Jharkhand and Maharashtra would have gone to poll in sync with 2014 general election, and Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Bengal, Punjab, Tamil Nadu. Puducherry etc. were to hold elections on a fixed date (or dates) this year. 

It also implies that a good many states in which polls are due in 2018 must wait for up to a year if their elections are to synchronise with 2019 general election. On the other hand, to make elections simultaneous, it may be necessary to shift the timing of Lok Sabha elections too. 

All this require amendment to Article 83(2) providing for a term of five years for the House of the People, and Article 172(1) providing for a five-year tenure for the legislative assemblies from the dates of their first sitting. The Committee has recommended that in order to hold early elections to Lok Sabha and state legislative assemblies, one of the two conditions must be met: (a) a motion for an early general election must be passed by the House, or (b) a no-confidence motion must be passed by the House, with no alternative government being passed, with no alternative government being elected within 14 days. Dr. Nachiappan’s party, Congress, is not in favour of the changes on the ground that these are “impractical, unworkable and can lead to a scenario where the necessary balance in the Indian democracy given the diversity of the country is lost”. Now the Congress has suggested that there should be a Constitutional amendment bill if Modi wants his wish to be implemented.

The liberal camp views the move with apprehension. It smells a political motive. It is generally believed that when elections are held together voters act similarly. Popular wisdom, though, is that Indian voters are “astute” enough to distinguish between voting for government at the state level and that at the Centre. But IDFC Institute, a Mumbai-based think tank, has, in a research paper, has established, based on data since 1999 elections, that there is 77 per cent probability of an Indian voters preferring the same party at the Centre and state if elections are held simultaneously. So there may not be much evidence in support of our voter’s fabled “astuteness”. 

Interestingly, the Election Commission of India and President Pranab Mukherjee have also come forward to support the government desire to hold simultaneous polls.

But the core problem for Modi is to persuade the non-Congress opposition to come on board. Modi succeeded in getting all including Congress together on the GST issue as it was to benefit all. But the opposition suspects simultaneous poll to be a ruse to shrink the space for making up in the subsequent innings.  

RaGa WAITING FOR HIS MOMENT

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Be not afraid of greatness," goes the cliched yet profound line in The Twelfth Night, "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them."

Start up & stand up

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Living in India and being exposed to the Indian media, it is difficult to win over the cynicism that has become an integral part of the Indian psyche. The country has improved beyond recognition in the last two decades or so. The share of people living below $1.25 a day was nearly a half (49.4%) in 1994; it is about a quarter (24.7%) in 2011 and is supposedly around 23% now. Between 2005 and 2014, the prevalence of underweight children under the age of five fell from 43.5% to 30.7%. The trend-line is therefore towards optimism, but the urban middle class, from where opinions filter down, is not much swayed by statistics. It is the poor growth of jobs since 2011 that turned Narendra Modi's election into a tornado, running the Congress ship aground. But 20 months in power, Modi and his NDA government is still battling with poor industrial production, steeply falling labour-intensity of farming and negligible job growth. No wonder, therefore, that the Congress' new boss, vice president Rahul Gandhi, is out on the road in style, as he did last week in Mumbai. As he marched from Bandra to Dharavi, many young men and women disappointed with Modi government walked with him.

As some of the figures of poverty alleviation cited above will show, India hasn't done badly in the recent years. But a few epochal changes have taken place in global economy that have turned some old Indian notions on their head, one of these being that industry still has the potential to employ many workers. Both industry and agriculture need much fewer hands these days. But one million workers are joining the work force each month. It is an existential problem. Traditional industry cannot expand (and thus pick up new jobseekers) because firms are hugely debt-laden, with total corporate debt being seven times the companies' net profit. It is clear that the conventional narrative of industrial growth and job creation must change.

Interestingly, Modi is the first to begin scouting for a solution out of the box, in promoting start-ups. In his Independence Day speech last year, he promised to launch Start-Up India, a campaign to remove all obstructions for entrepreneurship to blossom. Last Saturday, he presided over a day-long programme at Delhi's Vigyan Bhavan for which the motto was 'start up India, stand up India' and the guests included, apart from many Indian entrepreneurs, about 50 of their counterparts from Silicon Valley. Modi shared the dais with Uber founder Travis Kalanick and CEO of Japan's Softbank Masayoshi Son. Modi was at his sarcastic best when he declared the state's arms-length policy to start-ups. " We have done a lot (of controlling industry) for 70 years. Where have we reached?"

Start-ups were visible for a decade but it is picking up speed now, the number going up from a mere 501 in 2010 to 4,500 last year. Start-ups like Flipkart, Snapdeal, Paytm or OLX employ thousands of workers who work not only on their computer desks but are engaged in delivery and other logistic functions. Softbank is going big on solar and wind power. Modi spoke of new start-ups that he'd like to see in education and health sectors. At present, about 90 per cent of start-up finance comes from abroad. The government has now laid before the young dreamers a Rs. 10,000-crore 'fund of funds' (last resort financier) and Rs 2,500 crore credit guarantee fund. Son has in an interview spoken about $10 billion funding of Indian start-ups.

As records go, about 90 per cent of start-ups nearing success invariably migrate to the US or other Western countries because of India's multiple problems, notably high taxation. Modi has announced a three-year tax exemption for start-ups and other benefits. It is good news for scions of the owners of thousands of failed industries who want to move on. He said there would be easier exit with the proposed new bankruptcy laws and, impishly, suggested that the entrepreneurs lobby with India's opposition leaders to facilitate early passage of these laws.

The Modi administration has often been criticised for betraying a lack of original thinking. In December, the Prime Minister headed a meeting of 80 senior bureaucrats and sought to pick their brain for new ideas. The exercise was mostly one-sided. 'Digital India', which too has Modi's imprimatur, is still iffy because of low availability of wireless frequency which pushed up the cost of wi-fi which, in its turn, has kept fully loaded smart-phones beyond ordinary people's reach. Swachh Bharat, the cleanliness mission, had the potential to be a magnet for unskilled and semi-skilled jobs, but its employment success calls for state governments' cooperation which Modi hasn't been fortunate to get. The Ganga Action mission too is lost in sand.

Modi's start-up experiment is a bright spot on India's political 

terrain which is unfortunately greying up all too soon with 

leaders who have reduced their objective to winning elections at any rate.

Shifting gear to Start-Up, Modi is clearly moving to a safe zone without political opposition. Interestingly, Rahul Gandhi is twenty years younger than Modi but his politics so far is focused on bitter opposition to Modi, as if he is a usurper, but he has shown no vision of where the country’s young adults will be employed. “ To have start-ups”, he said in his speech in Mumbai on the day Modi was spending with entrepreneurs, “one needs a society without intolerance”. The observation is particularly jejune in the context of India’s critical employment crisis and the jobless growth that began when Rahul’s own party was in power.

Modi’s start-up experiment is a bright spot on India’s political terrain which is unfortunately graying up all too soon with leaders who have reduced their objective to winning elections at any rate. Thinking of larger issues is alien to them. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal of AAP has nursed a “thinker” image, his masterstroke being the plan to reduce cars on Delhi roads by allowing odd numbers in one day and even numbers the next day. But the plan was only for 15 days, so the problem will be back soon though it did not go in the first 15 days either. As Kejriwal’s ambitious start-up, it is not sustainable 24x7. But Modi is seeking a lasting solution to the problem of unemployment.

THE TRIDENT & Modi

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

The next general election is not happening before 2019 but it seems some opposition leaders can’t wait to bang the war drum. In other words, they have been thinking that the 2014 mandate in favour of Narendra Modi and the BJP got screwed up for one reason or the other, and that it must be rectified now. The challengers to Modi’s election are three in number, call it a trinity, if you like, but each of them thinks that it is he who deserved to get the job in 2019.