Political Loyalties - the Value of Federalism

(Originally appeared in the 1990s in the Times of India, as published in M. D. Nalapat's book "Indutva", Har-Anand Publications, 1999)

It is a fact of life that a political party or front can secure less than

a quarter of the votes cast and yet come to office. Despite polling

significantly fewer votes than its Hindutva rival, it is the party of

Mulayam Singh Yadav and not that of Kalyan Singh which is in

power in U.P. today. The SJP-BSIP victory confirms the

fragmentation that has come about in the Indian polity, now

divided nationally into four competing streams—the Congress,

the BJP, the Janata Dal and its left allies, and finally the regional

and sectional parties. Each of the four has to compete with the

other three to retain, or expand, its base.

Feudal Roots

With Indian society moving away from its feudal roots to enter

the phase of commercial capitalism, it may not be inappropriate

to use a marketing analogy for the political spectrum and say

that each political party is attempting to increase its ’market

share' at the expense of its rivals. However, just as a marketing

organisation needs a clear picture of its target, Indian political

parties need to recognise the changing realities in the political

market place.

The first change is a loosening of traditional ’brand loyalties',

to use a marketing term again. So far as the national elections are

concerned, this is a process that picked up speed when Indira

Gandhi unilaterally changed the rules of the political game in

1975 by imposing the Emergency and making organised political

structures (including her own) irrelevant. Her preference for

personalised power, as distinct from the consensus-oriented

Congress formula, led to a shift away from her 'brand' that cost

the Congress its hold on power.

The second major change is an increasing pragmatism within 

the electorate, which votes in accordance with the principles of 

enlightened self-interest. It is not abstruse philosophy or universal 

principle that determines voting behaviour, but the price of 

onions or tomatoes. Behind the caste or other sectional appeal of 

parties such as the BSP, the Telugu Desam or the SJP is the 

message that their coming to power will make a positive material 

difference to the lives of the group whose cause they are claiming 

to espouse. 

It is a fact that any society is divided into groups and classes, 

and it is by recognising and cultivating them that the smaller 

political parties build up bases for themselves, usually at the

expense of the mainstream parties that attempt to appeal to

broad aggregates rather than to segments The best example of

such a mainstream party is the Congress, and its recent electoral

history is proof that, just as in marketing the concept of ’niche'

is driving away strategies based on broad-spectrum markets, in

politics the age of the ’niche' electoral segment has finally

arrived. In other words, political parties will now need to

abandon catch-all strategies in favour of more focused messages.

Both the BJP and the Janata Dal are political parties that at

various stages and locations were able to trounce the Congress

by targeting specific segments of the Congress vote bank. In both

these parties, however, there are powerful groups still in the

thrall of the 'mainstream' Congress culture, which would like to

widen the sectional message. In other words, to quit chasing the

niche in favour of the whole. Within the Janata Dal, Ramakrishna

Hegde and Biju Patnaik can be said to represent such a trend,

while within the BJP, the supporters of Atal Behari Vajpayee are

attempting to push the party closer to the mainstream tendency

represented by the Congress.

Unfortunately for such individuals, recent electoral history

confirms the wisdom of the political 'niche marketeers' over

their universalist colleagues. The danger that these marketeers

face, however, comes not from mainstream parties, but from

smaller parties whose sectional messages are even sharper and

more narrowly-focused than their own. While the BJP has thus

far escaped the divisive tendency seen within the Janata Dal, it

is not improbable that hard-line elements may separate from it

and follow their own course.

Small Parties

Does this mean that Indian democracy is fated to witness a

kaleidoscope of small parties, combining and splitting away

from each other? Does this mean that the stability enjoyed by a

single party will soon cease to operate? It need not, provided that

in place of attempting to impose a kind of universality over a

political party, the political leaders favouring a return to the

mainstream see a party not as a homogeneous entity, but as a

group of disparate elements that combine in the manner of a

many-stranded rope. The V. P. Singh formula of a 'federal'

political party, provides an example.

As the largest political party in the country, and one that has

not yet given up its attempts at fashioning a universal message

strong enough to enable it to fend off its 'niche' competitors, the

Congress has a major responsibility in this regard. In the

Nehruvian era, the different units of the Congress functioned

with a wide degree of autonomy, and were therefore able to

formulate policies that were more acceptable to their respective

areas than a broad-spectrum message would have been. Thus the

Congress in Tamil Nadu remained aloof to Hindi while the party

in Uttar Pradesh demanded the spread of the language to all

regions. It was only when Lal Bahadur Shastri imposed uniformity

in 1964-65 and forced the Tamil Nadu Congress government to

take a hard line on the DMK's anti-Hindi agitation that it was

swept out of power in the state in 1967.

More Liberal

Under Indira Gandhi, the 'federal' character of the Congress

disappeared, and the era of nominations arrived with a vengeance.

Rather than come up through the grassroots, the new leaders of

the Congress came from among those who had mastered the art

of wooing the powers that be in Delhi. If one takes the 1971

(garibi hatao) victory as the first successful exploitation of the

materialist tendency then nascent in the Indian voter, it is no

accident that the 1980 victory came at a time when the Congress

was out of office, out of funds and therefore perforce more liberal

in its attitude to the state units.

Two years ago, the long period of 'nomination raj' in the

Congress was brought to an end by holding elections to all

organisational posts. Today there seems to be a return to the

centralised system of the past. In a polity as complex as India, it

is impossible for a single leader to fashion the many subtle

changes in political strategy needed to take account of variations

within the electorate. Rather than a 'high command' decide

whether the Mandalism of a Veerappa Moily or the business-

friendly pragmatism of a Sharad Pawar is more suited to the

political needs of a particular state, it would be better to let the

'market' (i.e. the local party unit) decide.

This is not a call to anarchy. Each broad-based political party

would have a core set of beliefs, allegiance to which would be a

necessary condition of remaining within it. Thus, for example,

belief in secularism would be essential to any member of the 

Congress or the Janata Dal, while a belief in a uniform civil code 

would be necessary for any member of the BJP. However,

outside such 'core' areas, there is scope for freedom of ideological

and organisational choice, and this freedom should be encouraged

rather than curbed.