A gaddi and a mantle

Harish Khare

A young Cyrus Mistry finds himself hustled out of the coveted gaddi at Bombay House, the iconic headquarters from where the Tata empire has supposedly been controlled and expanded. A young Akhilesh Yadav, similarly, finds himself harassed and humiliated despite occupying the chief ministerial gaddi in Lucknow.  And, in Delhi, a not-so-young Rahul Gandhi finds himself scorned and jeered, despite being firmly in control of the Congress mother-ship. All these three snapshots give us a clue to difficulties of sitting on a gaddi. Because we live in exacting times and in a cynical age, it may well be easy to ascend or inherit a gaddi, but it does not necessarily ensure emerging as  the rightful heir to a mantle. 

There was a time when “the King is dead, long live the King” kicked in automatically in all its efficient operational manifestations, with clear-cut expectations of command, obedience, and allegiance between the monarch and the subject. The monarchical leadership was anyway deemed to be a divinely-blessed arrangement. In due course democracies devised their own rites of succession. Today, the occupancy in a modern office itself does not garner nor guarantee instant respect or legitimacy. Leadership has to be constantly renewed and earned by performance.

On the other hand, in the quasi-religious settings like the deras, religious or spiritual or both, gaddi itself becomes a powerful totem. The occupant guru or baba or mahant commands (almost) total allegiance from the followers in the congregation. The sect desperately wants to perceive in the new "leader" shamanistic qualities; the devotees  instinctively transfer their allegiance from the deceased mahant to his successor because  they very much want to believe  in his ability to  cure them  of their physical and spiritual ailments. Still, some dera chiefs find themselves having to protect their gaddi with the help of the equivalent of a praetorian guard.

In the democratic setting of a political party or a government or even a big business house, the retention and consolidation of gaddi is a substantially different proposition. Those who sit on a gaddi can crib that they are not allowed the requisite elbow room to demonstrate their potential and talent, but the very nature of modern organisation demands a constant tug-of-war against both friends and foes. A modern gaddi has to be constantly justified; and, if a Cyrus Mistry is not able to deliver or is perceived as not making the cut, some kind of course correction would inevitably get put in place.

In the public arena, there can be no guarantee that the gaddi-nasheen will remain unchallenged. The contestation is in the nature of things in the modern democratic office. The best protection for a gaddi in a democratic setting can only be a robust renewal of the leadership brief. That means an ability to reinterpret and enlarge the charge, a skill to explain and define what works and what does not work and what needs to be changed and how that change is to be brought about. A successful re-calibration of grammar of change itself can enhance the gaddi and its brand value, to use the modern jargon.   

In the case of Cyrus Mistry, no one has been told how he proposed to minimise the harmful radiation from the "legacy hotspots". In the case of Akhilesh Yadav, it is not very clear on what issues he differs from his uncle, Shivpal Yadav or his father, Mulayam Singh Yadav. In the case of Rahul Gandhi, no Congressman can say with any degree of confidence as to how the heir-apparent has re-worked the Nehru-Gandhi legacy to suit and appeal to the nation's changed sensibilities. In Rahul Gandhi's case, it is not even clear that he understands that India has changed its preferences and sensibilities rather dramatically since 1984. 

The Cyrus-Akhilesh-Rahul tableau tells us that a mantle can be inherited by virtue of birth or by appointment, but it does not automatically bestow potency or even effectiveness. Perhaps the best and most effective passing of the mantle took place from Mahatma Gandhi to Jawaharlal Nehru. It could work because Jawaharlal was not an innocuous lightweight. Historian BR Nanda comes close to getting to the heart of this relationship:  "Nehru owed his position in the party and the country to a great measure to his own qualities: his high idealism and dynamism, tireless energy and robust optimism, infectious faith in the destiny of his party and his country, his glamour for youth and charisma for the masses. Nevertheless, it is doubtful if he could have reached the apex of party leadership so early and decisively, if Gandhi had not catapulted him into it at critical junctures in 1929 and 1936." Still, this relationship worked because the Mahatma was convinced that despite all his weakness for impetuosity and radicalism Nehru was "humble enough and practical enough not to force the pace to the breaking point."

In the gaddi-centric turmoil in Mumbai, Lucknow and Delhi nobody need mourn the failure of the young because being young cannot be a sufficient qualification in itself. In the world of politics, which pivots around leaders with inspiring ideas and ideals, succession does not mean instant success. A political leader needs to have the ability to unite a party behind him, just as he has to propose some kind of a road map, based on political principles and beliefs. Neither Akhilesh Yadav nor Rahul Gandhi has yet cared to do any value addition to the brand their respective parties represent. Even though "family" remains the only raison d'etre for Akhilesh Yadav and Rahul Gandhi, both appear keen to move away from the mixed "legacy" they have inherited.

Gaddi represents an incongruity in the democratic temper of our times. No heir can succeed without charting out a new beginning because of the requirement of leadership remains unchanged. Margaret Thatcher noted that throughout her leadership days she “had to stress continually that, however, difficult the road might be and however long it took us to reach our destination, we intended to achieve a fundamental change of direction.” Despite the Mahatma's mentorship, Nehru blueprinted the new India on a very different footing; Indira Gandhi succeeded only when she could cut loose from Nehru's ideas. And, it needs to be noticed that Narendra Modi, too, has given a quiet burial to the Vajpayee legacy, whatever it meant.

We are unapologetically into the age of meritocracy and those who inherit a gaddi will do well to remember that the [family] past makes a very ineffective armour against requirements of performance and leadership in the political arena. Family lineage does not cement the mantle nor ensures democratic legitimacy.