Rather quiet fifth phase
THE fifth phase of the Lok Sabha poll has ended on a somewhat sad note. Thirty persons have been reportedly killed in "election-related" violence.

A matter of credibility
AS in long-running television serials, the multi-phased opinion polls and five-phased exit poll too meandered to a limp end, losing track of the initial thrust and direction.

Save cricket from Dawood
WHEN New Zealand cricket captain Stephen Fleming and Chris Lewis of England informed their respective boards about the attempt by an India bookie to involve them in "fixing" a Test match between their teams no one expected the incident would turn into a major controversy.

TASK OF FORMING GOVERNMENT
Constitution and the convention
by S. Sahay
AS far as the election process is concerned, all is over barring the shouting. The final results will confirm, or put a question mark, over the forecasts made by the exit polls, which themselves vary anyway.

India’s worrisome food situation
by Arvind Bhandari
ANOTHER World Food Day on October 16 will once again serve as a stark reminder that modern man, even as he preens himself to take the final leap into the next millennium, has as yet not been able to solve the basic problem of banishing hunger from the face of the globe.

Has BJP antagonised sadhus, mahants?
by P. Raman
THE biggest irony of the current elections has been that despite all prophecies of a big boom, the BJP will find itself at the cross-roads. Even before the dust settles down, leaders of the ”parivar” will realise the heavy damage to the movement and price they had to pay for keeping the Vajpayee Government in power. Initially, the tendency will be to overlook the realities on the ground and highlight the perceived triumph. But the rot has assumed such proportions that despite electoral gains the BJP as an organisation finds itself in shambles in all its traditional strongholds.

Of tables without legs
by Krishan Gopal
DO you know of a table that has no legs? Sure, a multiplication table. I didn’t know that it didn’t have even a top until I surveyed what is taught in most of the English-medium public schools today. Yet, having bidden farewell to “Ik Duni, Duni”, parents have no alternative but to swim along the tide.

75 Years Ago

October 5, 1924
No Authority
THE Metropolitan was obviously right when he said in the course of his interview with the Associated Press, to which we have already referred, that the Conference had no authority to decide and that all that it could do was to hope by means of constant teaching, to make it ideas filter down to the masses.

Rather quiet fifth phase

THE fifth phase of the Lok Sabha poll has ended on a somewhat sad note. Thirty persons have been reportedly killed in "election-related" violence. They include 14 security personnel posted in the North-East, an RJD leader in Bihar and a citizen in Amethi (UP). One expected this round to be much more violent. But, thanks to the Central Election Commission's arrangements and the restraint shown by the electors themselves, the CEC has concluded a major assignment in relative peace. Manipur, Tripura, Assam, and pockets of local rivalry like Madhepura (Bihar) and Amethi (UP) were rightly marked "extra sensitive". Some of the incidents may have non-electoral causes — like clashes in Narsaraopet in Andhra Pradesh, the death of a polling officer in Balasore (Orissa) and abductions in Midnapore (West Bengal). The issue — is democracy safe in India? — raised unfairly in sections of the Western media has got an affirmative reply. The early phases were more disturbed because of the lack of realisation among the people of the fact that they, while choosing their representatives, were the real masters of their destiny.

Quite a few important persons were in the electoral fray on Sunday and their victory or defeat would mean much for the process of the constitution of the new Lok Sabha. Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee and Mrs Sonia Gandhi are two major names. They have ensured reasonably disciplined polling in their constituencies. One hopes that the briefings and debates taken recourse to in the days of anxious waiting for the outcome would be free from acrimony. As long as Indians voted for cows, bulls, trees, huts, lamps, and other things or even put marks on the ballot-paper after being tutored they could not be said to constitute an articulate democracy prepared to indicate their choice clearly, if not correctly. It might mean that they were not capable of voting correctly. It might even mean that they were not capable of being instructed well in the issues of an election or in the broader issues of politics. There were large areas of dangerous indolence and ignorance in such a democracy. It was far from the mass communication methods of American democracy and the highly mechanised system of voting for a multiplicity of offices; nowhere near the door-to-door canvassing of British democracy. In both countries, the uncertainty of voting behaviour had been reduced through long experience, apart from the simple design of a two-party system. In India, there are naturally uncertainties even now. Without full literacy, the value of the vote is limited. But, by and large, the poll process has shown the maturity of our electoral system. This is a cheerful fact.

A matter of credibility

AS in long-running television serials, the multi-phased opinion polls and five-phased exit poll too meandered to a limp end, losing track of the initial thrust and direction. At the start of the race quite a long while ago, the elections were said to be a one-horse affair with the BJP and its allies already in commanding lead. The Congress and its allies were bringing up the deep rear, with a battered third front (read the Left and its allies) waiting to disappear into history. It is curious that all pollsters lumped the smaller regional parties with the two main contenders and stripped them of their identity and even existence to be denoted by the plus sign as in the BJP + and the Congress +. They may have some compelling logic but not much respect for the minor parties which have come to play a decisive role in national politics. And their findings definitely lacked logic and conviction. One psephologist who works for Doordarshan claims his tribe to be practitioners of a science, a new science which penetrates the thinking of the voter and divines his political preference. Yet this science throws up a clutter of confusing counts when different experts apply it and also when the same person applies it at different times. For instance, the same psephologist found the BJP + winning more than 320 seats after the first round of exit poll but scaled it down to a modest 287 on Sunday. Another pollster, who angered the Congress + by predicting a runaway success for the BJP +, shrank the tally to 295-305 and with a 2 per cent error margin in terms of votes and not seats, this could even mean 275 seats.

In another three days, there will be many smiling faces (winners and their partymen), glum faces (losers and their partymen) and several red faces (pollsters and their sponsors). This is because of the substantial variation in the number of seats each of the major polls has allotted to the two main political alliances. Only one can be right if at all, and the chances are that the ground- level political reality may refute the lofty assertions of these new mind-readers. One new-fangled expert blames the mindboggling multiplicity of political parties for this difference while the more knowledgeable political workers attribute it to more intractible reasons. Why the polls go wrong is not the issue but the fact is that they go wrong and distort the final outcome even if only marginally. The leader of the team which has given the maximum benefit to the BJP +, self-deprecatingly said that only 5 per cent of the voters were interested in the findings of these exit polls. Only 5 per cent? He cannot be unaware of the urban chatterati’s obsession with astrology and now the electoral version called exit polls. At least to save the reputation and business of these computer-driven exercises, it is desirable to ban the publication of the findings while the election process is still on. That will shield the poor voter from the opinion manipulators who prey on the low level of political awareness and consciousness of the Indian electorate. As has been written earlier, the Press Council of India has demanded a ban on these predictions. The Election Commission had sought a ban on their publication midway through campaigning and voting. Other countries where opinion and exit polls have built a strong following, have similar curbs. This year the damage has been done; after the real results are out, the country should debate the whole issue dispassionately and objectively.

Save cricket from Dawood

WHEN New Zealand cricket captain Stephen Fleming and Chris Lewis of England informed their respective boards about the attempt by an India bookie to involve them in "fixing" a Test match between their teams no one expected the incident would turn into a major controversy. If the stories which have appeared in the English press are true, it may not be wrong to say that international cricket has indeed become not only a dirty but a dangerous game to play. Investigations by a team of reporters for the "Observer" point to the involvement of the dreaded underworld gangster, Dawood Ibrahim, in manipulating international fixtures through money and muscle power. On hindsight, it can be said that the process of corrupting cricket and cricketers began when some "enterprising" former players organised international events in Sharjah in the garb of increasing the global appeal of the game. In the initial years it was almost mandatory for television cameras to show the real "patron" of cricket in the desert, Dawood Ibrahim, in his air-conditioned executive box enjoying the attention rather than the game being played in hot and humid conditions. Sharjah could not have been upgraded into a major international centre for cricket without taking care of the "needs" of those who administer the game. Can the administrators explain the yardstick they applied for granting the UAE cricket team, made up of players mostly from India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, the status of a national team? It was even granted permission to participate in the 1996 World Cup. Was it merit or a combination of Dawood's money and muscle power which helped Sharjah become a major cricket centre and the UAE team earn the dubious honour of playing international cricket?

The baneful effect of Sharjah on international cricket was often discussed in whispers. But it has taken a team of English reporters, armed with courage and conviction, to blow the whistle on the almost diabolical control over international of one of the most ruthless underworld dons. Until now in India and Pakistan players were accusing players of taking money for playing badly or tanking a match. And the boards instead of requesting their respective governments to order police investigation gave the impression of trying to brush the charges under the carpet. To expect Dawood Ibrahim to have only cricketers and not administrators on his payroll is to underestimate his ability to buy and bully just about everyone into total submission. When Dawood takes an interest in a game his notorious D-Company makes sure that neither players nor umpires nor administrators dare to defy his command. His interest in international cricket runs into billions and billions of dollars. The spilling of beans by Lewis and Fleming has made even Scotland Yard take an interest in the behind-the-scene operations which took place during the summer series in England against New Zealand. For the first time, ever since charges of betting and match-fixing started appearing in the press, a crime investigating agency has taken the responsibility of getting to the bottom of what may turn out to be the tip of a major cricket scam. For the first time a bookie, or rather a self-styled "sports promoter”, has been mentioned by name. Scotland Yard sleuths are likely to visit India for questioning the promoter who allegedly offered sterling pound 300,000 to Fleming and Lewis for "doing the needful". Cricket buffs should brace themselves for a possible big bang at the end of Scotland Yard investigations into charges against an Indian promoter trying to bribe England and New Zealand players. The revelations may shake the seemingly corruption-infested foundations of international cricket.

TASK OF FORMING GOVERNMENT
Constitution and the convention
by S. Sahay

AS far as the election process is concerned, all is over barring the shouting. The final results will confirm, or put a question mark, over the forecasts made by the exit polls, which themselves vary anyway.

However, the broad trends indicated by them are still relevant: that the Congress and the BJP are the main political parties which between them secure more than 50 per cent of the votes cast. Naturally, there has been a tendency on the part of the regional parties and others to enter into an alliance or a deal with either of the two main parties. And the third front comes into play only when the results, in terms of seats, show that the two main formations are evenly matched but neither in a position to form a viable government.

Some analysts believe that it is for the first time that a new trend is visible. In the past, it is the Central parties that wooed the regional parties, but in this election it has been the other way round.

The argument is flawed. The regional parties, compared to the national parties, continue to be strong in their own areas, but then the incumbency factor does matter a good deal, especially in states where both parliamentary and Assembly elections have been held. Thus the latest assessments have shown that things may not be as hanky-dory for Mr Chandrababu Naidu in Andhra Pradesh. And in Maharashtra, if the BJP-Shiv Sena combine may still win in the Assembly elections, it is mainly because of the desertion of the Congress by Mr Sharad Pawar. The Congress, together with Mr Pawar, perhaps still has more than 50 per cent of the votes in the Assembly elections.

In Tamil Nadu, neither the BJP nor the Congress is a force. The AIDMK and the DMK hold the field and the two main national parties have willy-nilly to align with either of the regional parties.

In West Bengal, it is the CPM, with other leftist parties, that dominates. After the formation of the Trinamool Congress by Ms Mamta Banerjee, the Congress has become very weak. Any gain the BJP may make in West Bengal will be with the active cooperation of the Trinamool Congress.

Indeed, whether it be dependence of the national parties on the regional parties, or the other way round, the development is to be welcomed as a healthier evolution towards a federal India.

An over-populated, multi-lingual, multi-religious nation, simply cannot be governed by a single-track mind. Hence the BJP and the Hindutva parivar are deluding themselves if they think that, in the near future, even a distant one, they can be so powerful as to return to their original agenda of abolition of Article 370, of a common civil code and of the construction of the Ram mandir. If at all these items are taken up by the Central government, this will have to be done with the consent of the majority of the parties, national and regional.

However, the immediate task of the political parties represented in the Lok Sabha will be to form the government. The Congress, not sure of a viable majority in the Lok Sabha, has already started propagating the view that the single largest party (which it hopes to become) should be invited by the President, rather than a coalition formed even before the holding of the elections.

It is surprising that this view should have been articulated by Mr Kapil Sibal, a senior lawyer, in his capacity as the Congress spokesman. He is quoted to have said that this was the law. If he has been quoted correctly one wonders which particular law the senior lawyer is referring to. All that the Constitution (Article 75) says is that the Prime Minister shall be appointed by the President, and other Ministers shall be appointed by the President on the advice of the Prime Minister.

The further requirement is that the Council of Ministers shall be collectively responsible to the House of the people.

From this has emerged the convention that the party even with a simple majority is asked to form the government. If no party is in a position to form the government, then the party with the largest majority is asked to do so, with the help of some other parties, which may join the government, or if they like, even from outside.

The Sarkaria Commission, which had the occasion to consider the issue in relation to the State Assemblies, had recommended that the first preference, in the absence of a party with a clear majority, should be given to an alliance which may have been formed before the elections, and only if they fail to do so, parties which enter into an alliance after the elections may be given a chance. This approach was highly commended by the Supreme Court in the Bommai case.

It may also be recalled that, after the shattering defeat of Indira Gandhi in 1977, the Janata Party, comprising several components, was asked to form the government, because the arrangement had been arrived at before the elections. Mr Ram Jethmalani has dismissed Mr Sibal’s contention as a “constitutional nonsense”.

All said and done, the successful holding of elections in a country of a billion people is no mean achievement, aberrations notwithstanding.

Some of these aberrations are easily removable through suitable electoral reforms. What will be difficult to eradicate is booth capturing, muscle and money power, and cynical use of the administration for party gains, especially in States like Bihar and UP. These call for concerted national effort, and for which there is no easy solution.

India’s worrisome food situation
by Arvind Bhandari

ANOTHER World Food Day on October 16 will once again serve as a stark reminder that modern man, even as he preens himself to take the final leap into the next millennium, has as yet not been able to solve the basic problem of banishing hunger from the face of the globe. Approximately 850 million people worldwide are undernourished. Starvation threatens at least another 50 million victims of man-made and natural disasters.

The Sixth World Food Survey, conducted recently as a follow-up to the World Food Summit in Rome in November, 1996, points out that one-fifth of the developing world’s population faces food inadequacy. Nearly 45 per cent of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa is underfed. South Asia accounts for 50 per cent of the world’s underweight children.

The Rome declaration said: “We express our deep concern over the persistence of hunger which, on such a scale, constitutes a threat both to national societies and to the stability of the international community itself”. The Plan of Action adopted at Rome envisaged reduction in the number of undernourished people to half the present level no later than 2015, and a mid-term review to ascertain whether it is possible to achieve this target by 2010.

World food security has no doubt improved. The 5.8 billion people in the world today have, on an average, 15 per cent more food per person than the global population of 4 billion had 20 years ago. But it is not just a question of increasing food production. An equally important aspect is rectifying the existing maldistribution. An average person in the developed world consumes 33 per cent more calories than an average person in the developing world.

This writer noticed much wastage and destruction of food during a tour of the European Union a few years ago. In Rome an agronomist said that tonnes of tomatoes were buried in a pit because it was cheaper to destroy food than to transport it to a poor country like India! A US Agriculture Department study estimates that in 1997 over 43 billion kilograms of food out of the country’s supply of 161 billion kilograms was wasted. This is the ugly face of capitalism.

Improvement of world food security requires that the national initiative in the food-deficit countries must receive strong support from the rich nations in the form of generous technical and financial assistance, bilateral as well as multilateral. Assistance given by the International Fund for Agricultural Development to developing countries between 1978 and 1997 came to about $ 5 billion.

Secondly, the global distributional imbalance needs to be redressed by setting up a world food buffer stock. The World Food Programme of the UN, which claims to have provided food aid to 45 million people in 1997, is not enough.

Thirdly, the food deficit countries should put in place effective government-run public distribution systems to enable those with insufficient purchasing power to have access to free or subsidised foodgrains. The poorest of the poor cannot be left to the mercies of laissez faire.

Fourthly, the food-deficient countries should stop exporting food. In 1997-98 India exported food worth $ 2.5 billion. The latest Commerce Ministry review expresses concern that rice exports during April-July, 1998, amounted to only $ 265.5 million against $ 322 million during the corresponding period of the previous year! While millions in this country cannot afford to buy vegetables, fruits, meat and marine food, these items are being exported in large quantities to the rich nations.

India’s food situation is worrisome. With the present level of population of about one billion, an estimated food production of just over 200 million tonnes is insufficient. The much-trumpeted claim about food self-sufficiency hides the fact that a sizeable section of the population does not have the requisite purchasing power. Between now and 2020, the challenge would be how to provide 300 million tonnes of food to feed the country’s population of 1350-1400 million. Despite the continued brouhaha about the Green Revolution, there is an urgent need to improve agricultural productivity in India, which is among the lowest in the world.

The FAO has described India as a food-deficit area and also spoken about the country’s “silent emergency”.

Of tables without legs
by Krishan Gopal

DO you know of a table that has no legs? Sure, a multiplication table. I didn’t know that it didn’t have even a top until I surveyed what is taught in most of the English-medium public schools today. Yet, having bidden farewell to “Ik Duni, Duni”, parents have no alternative but to swim along the tide. For the last few days, I have been on tenterhooks over the format and style of writing and reading tables taught to my school-going daughter (even though I ignored the recklessly pronounced jarring sound of “Zar” in each line which most of the students don’t understand. The written format was:

2x1=2
2x2=4
2x3=6 etc.

Naturally, the students are told to read it as “Two I’s are two, two 2’s are four, two 3’s are six etc.” It immediately sounded wrong to my ears. I contacted a few grownup children of other well-established convent schools in the neighbourhood and they too testified the same format and style. My doubt, however, persisted because “two I’s are two” means 1+1=2 “Two 2’s are four” means 2+2=4, “two 3’s are six” means 3+3=6. Well, this is not the table of two because of the progression involved in the focal digit. Then I came by a standard table book (published by Kamal Pustakalya, 1977, Nai Sarak, New Delhi-110006) which, corroborating my viewpoint, presented the correct method of writing and reading tables:

1x2=2
2x2=4
3x2=6
4x2=8

(One 2 is two, two 2’s are 4, three 2’s are six, four 2’s are 8 etc.) Armed with this book, when I went to my daughter’s class teacher to turn the tables, she at first brushed aside my format as “ulta”, but then soon got convinced. However, how could she dismantle the huge mounds of wrong feeding that had gone down the memories of all the children, that was the question. I quietly requested her to let my child to go it alone. My daughter has by now changed three schools and I have had to make this request thrice. Wasn’t there a plus point in the “Ik Duni, Duni” of our times?

Has BJP antagonised sadhus, mahants?

by P. Raman

THE biggest irony of the current elections has been that despite all prophecies of a big boom, the BJP will find itself at the cross-roads. Even before the dust settles down, leaders of the ”parivar” will realise the heavy damage to the movement and price they had to pay for keeping the Vajpayee Government in power. Initially, the tendency will be to overlook the realities on the ground and highlight the perceived triumph. But the rot has assumed such proportions that despite electoral gains the BJP as an organisation finds itself in shambles in all its traditional strongholds.

The repeated assertion by senior party leaders that they depended more on the Vajpayee image for votes rather than the party’s our strength highlights the plight of the organisation. For the BJP, this sort of sole reliance on one individual’s charisma was unthinkable even a couple of years back. Proximity to power and merry indulgence in its myriad “maya” have brought to the fore a new generation of go-getters and time-servers. They have already been able to redraw the rule of the political game and turn the tested old generation workers disillusioned. Understandably, this has quickened the process of degeneration of the organisation and the relationship among its leaders at the middle and lower levels.

Even senior party leaders do admit that the very character of the BJP has undergone a massive transformation in the past few years. It is no more a well-disciplined organisation with a firm ideological commitment. Though the expansion was more pronounced under the momentous Advani era, qualitatively the new converts were superior to those floating voters that had flocked to the party during the Vajpayee regime. The first was more homogeneous to the BJP’s Hindu supremacist line and by and large composed of those who were ready to do something for its cause. But the Vajpayee crowd comprises a floating tribe which always looked to new images and new idols for its momentary aspirational satisfaction. They did so to Rajiv Gandhi and then V.P. Singh, and to an extent, Narasimha Rao. They are easily prone to disillusionment and instant cynicism. Then they break the idol as quickly as they had adored it.

By far, the BJP’s biggest problem is that its gameplan for horizontal expansion seems to have reached a plateau. Its Hindutva-based growth plan, which under L.K. Advani had paid rich political dividends to the BJP, had reached a dead end by 1996. After the dramatic reach it had attained, the party found it difficult to break through this saturation point. The present “Lalita” image — as against the “Pootana” image of the early 1990s — of the BJP is entirely founded on Atal Behari Vajpayee’s cultivated liberal face. True, the “Vajpayee-isation” has enabled the BJP to attract a large number of otherwise hesitant secular parties into its alliance.

This remarkable achievement apart, the current elections have shown the restrictions that “Vajpayee-isation” has imposed both on the BJP and its allies. Under the rules of coalition game, the alliance partners cannot claim more seats in their respective states than allotted in the earlier polls. In all places, the BJP had sought more seats on the ground that they were the inheritors of the perceived “Vajpayee constituency”. But every state party, including the TDP, DMK and Biju Janata Dal, refused to buy this claim. This has also been the practice under the Left Fronts. It is based on the assumption that all coalition partners are obliged to share the good or bad performance of the government.

Thus, the BJP cannot expect to increase its seat tally in any of the states where it has electoral alliance with local or regional parties. It can do so only at the risk of breaking the alliance. Interestingly, every regional outfit always zealously guards its fiefdom from poaching by adversaries and allies alike. So every partner should be prepared for a static arrangement in terms of seats. Since such an arrangement totally precludes any BJP expansion, electoral or political, in its alliance zones, it will have to perpetually depend on the non-alliance zone for a higher tally. What makes things worse for the BJP has been that there is an inherent clash of interests between the two zones.

This gives a geographical angle to the BJP’s policy contradictions and the present political confusion. While the electoral understanding in the alliance zone calls for a liberal face and egalitarian approach, the BJP cannot survive in its own influence zone without enough of anti-minorityism and a high dose of religious bigotry. Apart from this geographical schism, the conflict between the Vajpayee-controlled BJP and Hindutva extremists within the RSS parivar like the VHP and Bajrang Dal has also been simmering. Significantly, after coming to power Vajpayee could effortlessly subjugate the RSS establishment and use it to his advantage. The ageing RSS leadership at first readily agreed to silence the Swadeshi Jagran Manch to protect the Vajpayee Government from the charge of being anti-MNC.

Almost simultaneously, the RSS came down heavily on the VHP and Bajrang Dal on the issues of Ayodhya temple, Article 370 and the common civil code. Under threat from Atal Behari Vajpayee, the RSS also called a halt to the open Christian-bashing or attacks on them through like-minded organisations. From the muted protests of leaders of these RSS outfits, it is obvious that they had agreed to oblige only under compulsions. The VHP and Bajrang leaders have their own problems. It was they who had worked hard to mobilise the assorted groups of sadhus for the Ayodhya agitation and thus widen the BJP’s political base. But now the BJP leadership has left them high and dry to face the protest from discarded sadhus. The angry mood of the saffron-clad sadhus for the way they were betrayed after using them to the full, is loud and clear. So many sadhus have openly come out against the BJP for its double-talk and political opportunism.

Akharas, ashrams and mandirs in two saffron concentrations of Ayodhya and Hardwar have come out in large numbers against the BJP. It faces a bleak chance in both places. The mahants and sants have openly assailed the BJP’s “betrayal”. At Hardwar, the All-India Akhara Parishad gave a roaring welcome to Madhya Pradesh’s Congress Chief Minister Digvijay Singh. It is comparable only to the one accorded to the Nepal king by the parishad. Even Mulayam Singh Yadav, once hated as “Maulana”, has been getting friendly signals from the angry sadhus. This is reflective of the general mood of the now let-down Hindutva brigade of BJP. A time will soon come when the bulk of sadhus slip out of the VHP fold or the VHP itself turn inactive under RSS dictates. In the process, the RSS establishment has also exposed its inability for self-sustenance.

Another side of this rebellion is reflected in the reconfiguration of caste politics, From 1991, the BJP has been able to successfully wean away the upper castes through the Ayodhya agitation. Kalyan Singh, Sakshi Maharaj and Uma Bharati have been instrumental in making Hindutva inroads into the large Lodha OBC concentrations. At one stage, the BJP leaders were toying with the idea of giving the top post to Kalyan Singh to grab the OBC votebank. Now the BJP’s power-based politics and Vajpayee-isation of the organisation seem to be forcing the Brahmins in the north to distance themselves from it. On the issue of the BJP’s neglect of OBCs, the UP rebel sadhu leader, Sakshi Maharaj is now intensely campaigning for Mulayam Singh Yadav’s party after his tussle with the BJP high command.

The more the BJP follows Congress policy itself, the more will it have to live with the familiar Congress maladies. Failure to hold complete organisational elections, bogus membership, disruption of party polls, growing indiscipline, domination of the high command culture, etc have already become part of the BJP establishment. A transient electoral triumph cannot conceal political and tactical limitations of the alliance-based expansion. The Congress-style imposition of the high command’s will on state units had reached a breaking point in Karnataka where the latter finally triumphed in putting up its own nominees against the JD (U) by openly flouting Vajpayee’s directives. The Andhra BJP unit also protested but finally relented.

The BJP’s decay in UP is symptomatic. As was proved in Rajasthan and Delhi last November, the BJP failed to provide a viable alternative in UP. Bad governance, caste tussles among its leaders and the mindless high command culture have turned even a tall leader like Kalyan Singh into a rebel. Thus ‘Kalyan joins PM rally’ had become big news. Kalyan Singh’s men, especially his son and Sakshi Maharaj, have openly worked against the party nominee. He himself was “ill” when it came to attending rallies in his rival’s constituencies. And for the first time, Vajpayee, and not Advani, is being charged with interference, high-handedness and factionalism. A wounded Kalyan Singh can harm the BJP more than a Shankersinh Vaghela beyond UP’s borders. This is more due to his importance as the party’s OBC showpiece.

Unlike earlier, a change of track now will be unthinkable for the BJP. The party and its predecessor had undergone sudden policy swings, now egalitarian and magnanimous, now ardently anti-minoritarian. In the past two decades, every change of track under Advani had added to the strength of the BJP whereas those under Vajpayee in 1980-95 had led to disaster. Prolonged Congress-isation followed by Vajpayee-isation have transformed the BJP beyond recognition — its soul, body, style of functioning and calibre and attitude of the workers. Any change of policy or a clean up of the party will be at the cost of the BJP’s acquired bulge. This is the BJP present dilemma.

75 YEARS AGO

October 5, 1924
No Authority

THE Metropolitan was obviously right when he said in the course of his interview with the Associated Press, to which we have already referred, that the Conference had no authority to decide and that all that it could do was to hope by means of constant teaching, to make it ideas filter down to the masses.

What is essential, however, is that this constant teaching should not be left to private and individual initiative on the part of Maulvis and Pandits. That would not only do no good but might conceivably do great harm.

It is necessary that it should be undertaken by the Conference itself by means of a strong, representative and influential committee who as we said the other day, should consider it their first and most imperative duty to waste a ceaseless battle against the spirit of communal dissension and should not lay down their arms until that spirit has been fully exercised.

Without such a committee to implement the decisions of the conference, the best, wisest and most thoughtful of resolutions would do little good.