Narendra Modi’s grip on the electoral arithmetic in Gujarat

Despite strong public opinion prevailing in other parts of the country, successive elections to the Gujarat assembly in 2007 and 2012 were handsomely won by Narendra Modi. Not just critical opinion, there seems to be quite a lot of documentary evidence of the not-so-great performance of Gujarat over the years in terms of the human development, government policies openly favouring the rich and the very rich businessmen and industry groups flouting normal fiscal prudence and administrative norms (running up sizable fiscal debt), the widening of the urban-rural divide, government doing everything to delay and deny justice to the 2002 riot affected and displaced Muslims apart from the official insensitivity towards them and neglect of their rehabilitation needs. Despite all these facts, many of which the congress party brandished as the part of their propaganda at various times before the 2012 elections, 48% of the valid vote polled went in favour of BJP (and in Gujarat the party does not mean anything without Modi), with Congress polling about 39%.

The Muslims constitute only about 9% of the population of the state. For the sake of a simplified analysis, even if Muslims vote enblock against him that hardly affects Modi electorally, as long as he could garner the majority of the remaining votes on the supposed strength of economic development of the state, apparent priority accorded by the government to business and industry (which goes well with the traditional Gujarati ethos), well developed urban infrastructure, good availability of electricity and electronic connectivity, etc. From the reports critical to NaMo and his policies and programs, it may appear that Gujarati society is after all not monolithic and his actions did affect sections of the population in negative ways, especially the poor and the marginalized and those inhabiting the rural Gujarat. Do the voting percentages and patterns in different parts of the State, the regions and the districts demonstrate the disenchantment of these sections? Only a detailed statistical analysis of the poll data can establish that or refute the hypothesis.

Since the voting patterns in 2012 election show a fairly complete polarization between those for and against NaMo (all other parties in the opposition neither significant in gathering votes nor seats) obviously there is a fairly clear divide in the state – it remains, however, to be demonstrated as to whether this divide is indeed between those apparently benefiting from the stress Modi placed on the economic development  (coinciding with the benefits visible in the urban and semi-urban areas of the state) and others being denied of the same. That BJP won comprehensively in the urban areas, cities in particular, is beyond dispute as shown by statistics. But the party also appeared to have got majority of seats – if not greater vote percentage- in most of the 5 major regions of the state.

The 8-9% difference between the BJP and the Congress votes during the last election is too large to have happened without a benefit that accrued to Modi on the back of the perception of a development dividend delivered. There are some indications of the role played by the so-called neo-middle classes of the Gujarati society in this election. There is a sizable section of the population from the poorer classes of the rural areas forced to migrate to urban and semi-urban areas as a result of economic difficulties and backwardness. It is quite possible that they have been attracted by the promise of an economic revival of their fate in the wake of the development ‘magic’ they are consuming as new entrants of the burgeoning middle classes in the cities and urban clusters of Gujarat. And for them the perception is that entrepreneurial ethic is getting the desired attention and support from the government. And naturally they became the latest vote bank for Modi.

Lastly, the recent delimitation of the assembly constituencies may also have played a role in tilting the electoral balance by way of redistributing the purely rural areas and combining them with relatively more urban areas and generating a new constituency with both urban and rural category of voters. This again needs more detailed examination provided relevant statistics are available.

Hope to revisit Modi’s magic formula for wining elections and how it could impact countrywide if at all some other time.



Tsunami of public opinion and the response of the marooned political class

The political class in this country has always moulded the public opinion and is used to commandeering it by (dividing them into religion or caste-based communities,) appealing to raw and the basest and the most archaic instincts of people and historical schisms between communities in terms of their caste, cultural and religious identities. Lack of information, education and enlightenment among the people in broad swaths of the country which foster superstition, outdated outlook and conservatism came in handy in perpetuating this hegemony. And in this they have always had implicit support of the ruling classes, the economically rich and powerful, both in the cities and villages.

But the development breakthrough brought in by the emerging capitalism in India since the 1990s through the policies of liberalization has changed this force field. India is changing with growing aspirational urban middle classes, whose ranks are slowly but surely being swelled with new entrants from poorer and historically and socially backward classes. Ironically, this is helped by the affirmative policies embraced by successive governments and that of positive discrimination that is the staple of the serial political drama played out by the political class for the last three decades. With the growth in the urbanization, education, enterprise, exposure to international standards through television and mobile telephony (probably two major drivers of demands for consumer products that indirectly helped economic growth) came the need for information. At least urban Indians (especially those in semi-urban, tier-2 or tier-3 cities and towns) - and their numbers are no longer miniscule or could be safely ignored in political calculations - are getting to know about the products, standard of life, standard of services available in the most developed and metropolitan cities of the country. They are also getting informed how the best of capitalism is brought out in the first rate cities in the first world countries by harnessing it through intelligent and efficient regulation and steadfastly following the rule of law. 

This underlies the importance and increasing role of the media (especially the electronic version) in highlighting the deficiencies, inequities, unreasonableness in our political system and amplifying the popular impatience about the status quo sought to be maintained by the establishment – the government bureaucracy and the political class – and delays in redressal of the public grievances.

There is also the new technological developments in internet based communication and dissemination (social media platforms, blogosphere) that has made this tide of anti-political class sentiment due to its speed and extent of spread – through spontaneous articulation, repetition, recycling, resonance, lack of a command structure, runaway unpredictability – resemble a tsunami, that of public opinion (something the political class has not yet learnt to commandeer to its selfish goals).

It is in the light of the above that we could analyse what might appear as a beginning of a rethinking by the political class on the bill and later the ordinance to retain the lifeline available in the existing Representation of the People Act (RPA), proposed to be snatched by the Supreme Court in its July judgment, to the convicted members of the parliament and the assemblies. Is this a belated recognition of the strength of public opinion against the criminalisation of politics? It is difficult to be sure, though. Indications are there about the political parties individually readjusting their public posturing, especially keeping in view the imminent need to face the electorates for the assembly elections in four states during the end of this year and for the big parliament election early next year. 

It was the Congress party that actually took the lead through an all-party meeting to reach a consensus about bringing about a bill in the Parliament making the requisite changes in the Representation of the People Act (RPA) so that the elected representatives can continue to hold their position despite conviction, with some marginal restrictions. Practically every party, including the BJP, supported the move. But somehow between that meeting and the actual debate in the Parliament when the bill was introduced, the principal opposition party and also smaller parties like BJD, CPI etc, were smart enough to sense the public mood (to be more accurate the mood of the articulate and educated middle classes) and opposed the bill brought by the ruling party. When at the end of an acrimonious day of debate the bill was referred to the standing committee, it was clear that the political class bought some time for themselves.

Pressures from the parties supporting the UPA, like the SP and RJD, whose leader Lalu Yadav was looking at the spectre of disqualification as MP after his possible conviction in the fodder scam case, partly forced the hand for Congress. There was also this arrogance of power, feeling of hurt among some cabinet ministers who pride themselves as the legal eagles being forced to bite dust on their own legislative turf. One found a determined government pushing the so-called Congress Core group into resolving to bring the law by the backdoor of an ordinance to be regularized later in the parliament’s winter session.

The response of the BJP was crafted on the basis of their cynical estimate that their current losses, if any, due to the application of the new legal provision, would be more than made up by cornering the Congress in the forthcoming assembly elections later this year if they can get on to the right side of the enormously negative public opinion about the ordinance. They went to town crying hoarse (including protesting to the President) about the Congress party’s mala fide intentions in pushing the bill as an ordinance and parading their own consistent stand opposing the bill since the parliament debate.

Congress party’s own prevarication was finally ended when they realized firstly that persuading the President, if not about the legality but the morality of the ‘criminal’ ordinance, would not be a cakewalk. Secondly in some quarters of the party, especially its youth enclaves, the realization had set in that pushing through this ordinance would alienate the party from the young India of the social media, the new voters, aspiring among other things a better definition and practice of the rule of law. Certainly they were loath to loose the game to the opposition even before it began.

Thus the two main political parties, though not voluntarily, showed for once a remarkable alacrity in deferring to the undercurrent of a progressive public opinion in favour of a more lawful political space where the electoral exercise might aspire to become cleaner and fairer. If this trend can be sustained it will certainly be good for our democracy.



Rationalizing negative and evil deeds of fellow-men



It is perhaps not too difficult to notice a common enough tendency today in many of us in India to rationalize (if not exactly justify) certain obviously negative traits in people around us, our friends, enemies and those in between. This is done sometimes apparently with a detachment befitting a disinterested observer, although the emotional underpinning of the analysis is not always easy to hide. It is as if people do not anymore expect other people to behave in an ethically correct and consistent manner and most of them are more likely to be in breach of a moral code our elders so painstakingly tried to instill in us during childhood (and in turn us reprising the same futile effort vis-à-vis our children) in schools, at home, in the community and so forth than to adhere to these. With every passing generation the hold of the norm having become less constraining, aberrations stop raising eyebrows.

Thus we are not surprised to find airplane passengers, apparently educated, civilized and smartly turned out people like you and me trying to move ahead towards the exit through the aisle within the aircraft jostling and pushing fellow passengers, elbowing them or trampling their feet with oversized bags brought down from the hastily opened overhead luggage hold against express appeal from the cabin crew for greater patience and sensitivity for ‘others’. We hardly expect motorists on partially waterlogged and pot-holed city roads during the rainy season to drive with moderate speed so as not to endanger lives of drivers of other vehicles (and even their own) let alone try and avoid splashing people who could not avoid walking down the footpath with dirty muddy water. We have rather learned to expect a biker or an auto-rikshaw driver to come to grief if by a slight error of judgment his vehicle so much as touches the glistening posh (possibly imported at a great cost) ‘CAAR’ (just not a car you know, remember the ad on the TV!). An actual scratch can easily lead to a case of ‘involuntary manslaughter’ (or ‘culpable homicide not amounting to murder’), with bear bottles, baseball bats, pistols and such handy weaponry stocked in the CAAR giving fullest expression to the great Indian ‘Road Rage’. 

When women are molested while negotiating our crowded public mass transport system, or are abducted and gang raped with impunity day in and day out, we as onlookers or readers or viewers of such news stories feel dismayed or even outraged. But at heart of hearts many of us are convinced that it is perhaps difficult to control this primeval male proclivity and hence it is hard to wish it away, particularly in view of the unavoidable proximity and visibility of so many women, in modern urban and semi-urban settings, everywhere in public all day long and even during late evenings and sometimes even later. We do not believe it is feasible to teach our sons to behave and not stalk, bully, molest, disfigure women, to learn to take no for an answer. But asking our daughters to follow stricter dress code, restrictions on time and place to move about, as indeed even careers to choose appears as a practical way out.          

Some of us, being believers of the adage ‘prevention is better than cure’ would rather advise women about the danger of turning out in ‘modern outfit’ (inviting lecherous male attention), finding themselves at the ‘wrong time and at wrong place’. Some, if they had their way, would even wish they would not turn out at all without male family members, though how much protection that might offer against a pack of desperate louts and rowdies is anybody’s guess.

 

Some of the more thoughtful among us would rationalize crime against women in terms of a clash between the tradition and the modernity, the inevitable cultural backlash, the male angst in the backdrop of all round female assertiveness and progress that has surfaced as a part of this era of ‘India Growing’ narrative. And of course it might not be too difficult to explain how all manner of religious preachers, godmen, heads of ‘cultural’ organizations, politicians and the policemen have invariably converged as the upholders of the so-called ‘Indian tradition’ against the onslaught of modern tendencies like freedom of speech and freedom of choice, especially by women.

Narendra Dabholkar was felled by the bullets of an assassin on a quiet morning street in Pune. Decades earlier, Safdar Hashmi was clubbed to death on stage during a street play in a village near Delhi. They dared to enlighten people, asked them to wake up and keep the light of reason from being extinguished.  Scores of other social activists, RTI campaigners, green crusaders are routinely assaulted and sometimes put away permanently by hoodlums and hitmen let loose by politicians, builders, promoters and contractors who feel threatened by potential disclosures of their misdeeds through RTI or affected by interventions by Courts. In this long running morality play on the real life stage the real villains manage to have their way most of the time over the dead bodies of the good guys and the rest of us demoralized and fearful for our own lives pass by wearing the cloak of neutrality as if what happened to Hashmi or Dabholkar do not really concern us. And to neutral observers like us what had happened was perhaps as logical or inevitable as the Newton’s laws. 

Getting past the shadows of the past

Lamenting about the loss of a time in the past is generally considered futile and a part of the natural wistfulness of a fogey about to be permanently archived. The values and the culture people were then comfortable with could at best be a historian’s curiosity and is certainly ineligible to provide a relevant perspective to our present-day attitude or demeanour.

In terms of the rapid changes occurring in the recent times in India and even in the neighbouring countries, fifty or hundred years are a long time in the past indeed.  A writer in The Hindu Sunday Magazine section (dt 3^rdAug 2013) first wonders aloud as to why there is hardly any celebration (official government sponsored or otherwise) on the occasion of the birth anniversary of an once famous Hindi short story writer and novelist Munshi Premchand, and then finds the answer in the innate disconnect between the values of the writer and his contemporary readers. On the one hand Premchand appears too rooted in his times and the society (largely that of villages and small towns of India of late nineteenth and early twentieth century) that appeared almost static and immutable. An India that almost seems to be too primitive and remote, hence not of much relevance to today’s ‘shining’ India. The young readers today are certainly far removed from the mileu Premchand described and was concerned with and hence are probably unenthused about his work (many may not have even heard about him). What might have additionally contributed to the quiescence is that he is not uniquely identified with or appropriated by any currently dominant political constituencies like dalits, scheduled castes and tribes or the Muslims or the women, although much of his writings held up a mirror to the caste oppression and the plight and the position of women in the Indian society with unmistakable empathy for the downtrodden.

Ironically, while The Hindu magazine writer entitled his article ‘Cast into the shadows’ referring to the fate of  Premchand, one has the uneasy awareness about the dark shadows of worst forms of cast discrimination being insidiously continued and ingenuously revived in much of the dark hinterland behind the neon shine of the progressive and contemporary India. Undermining of women’s rights and position in society is continuing unabated despite big charades of government-initiated tokenisms perpetuated by power-hungry politicians of all hues. If anything, the humiliation of women have become much more open, brutal and ubiquitous. Are we sure we are getting out of the shadows of our past ?

By a curious coincidence, in another page of the same Sunday Magazine, there was a discussion with Tash Aw the acclaimed Malaysian writer discussing the context of his recent   novel “Five star Billionaire” (that made to the Booker Prize long list), that of Malaysians migrating to Shanghai seeking to change their life, make a fortune, pretty much with the same motivation that drives much of the voluntary migrations within and from the post-colonial Asia. But, Tash makes the point, coming out of the shadows of a stagnant underdevelopment in the native country and embracing the new, the glittering, the desirable, has not always been easy despite valiant and somewhat tragic effort. To quote from his analysis of the problem, “I think that there’s a tendency in many Asian cultures to be very ruthless with the past, both in a national and a personal sense. Partly this is because our recent histories have been difficult narratives to deal with; often involving upheaval, violence and, above all, the lingering and badly-articulated humiliation of having been colonized, or defeated in some sense. So we tend to focus on the shiny new ‘Now’, in which our countries are on an upward curve, certainly in a material sense; the past is at best irrelevant, at worst a bit shameful. Which means that we cut off parts of our narratives and, in so doing, cut off our emotional roots.” According to him Asians in countries like Malaysia, Singapore, China have generally found it difficult to deal with their past in an honest and rational manner with the desired detachment despite pretending to do so. That in some sense is also true about Indians in India and those described to be the diaspora Indians.



Morally ambiguous choices in governing a democracy

Life in India today often presents one with a difficult and morally ambiguous choice. Proscription of illegal and environmentally dangerous sand mining, quarrying etc which is rampant today in many parts of India may be the ‘right’ action on the part of the government, if and when it chooses to do so. But outlawing and putting effective curbs on this pernicious practice might result in two economic consequences. It is known that thousands of trucks are being used in transporting these illegally mined sand to the end users – mainly building contractors – and sizable number of workers are being used for mining as well as for loading, unloading, transporting this commodity. Curbing illegal mining would also mean loss of job for many directly connected these activities.

Secondly, there is a spurt over the last couple of decades in the infrastructure development and other building (residential, commercial) activities, which are directly related to urban prosperity and economic growth in the country. The latter is also responsible for employment generation to some extent, the argument about ‘jobless growth’ notwithstanding. The spectacular rise in the demand of sand is at least partly occasioned by the contractors’ profit motivation which gets its legitimacy within the prevailing dominant capitalist worldview sweeping the country’s corridor of power. Irrespective of whether one agrees with that worldview or not and even if one chooses to say yes to the moral imperative of saving river beds, lands, forests from the predatory and patently illegal mining, it is difficult to ignore the immediate negative impact of curbing the sand mining on the employment, apart from the loss of revenue (in the form of royalty) to the government

This question is symptomatic of much of the current and larger debate in the country : how can the economic development and growth be achieved without letting capital a free hand (or through enabling governmental actions including legislations) in acquiring land (and also forest lands if required), mineral deposits, spectrum for telecommunication and many such resources on its own terms. And how can that be balanced with possible or potential damage to the environment and natural resources, curtailing of rights of the tribal communities, workers and farmers in general.

Can we endanger our natural resources by allowing wanton exploitation in the name of economic development and growth ? The aggressive sand mining in the riverbeds or banks are being held responsible by many experts for changes in direction of the natural course of a river. But the ‘animal spirit’ of the builders of the new India, the ‘growth constituency’, would be dimmed if their voracious appetite for sand is not met at a rate of their choosing. As a result, we are told, there would be no modern roads and expressways connecting our burgeoning cities and towns teeming with little entrepreneurs, the promoters and the contractors of construction projects throughout the length and breadth of urban India. How will, then, the new and massively architectured slick glass-and-concrete office buildings, call centers, back offices and other commercial complexes, shopping malls come up at the rate at which Indian and foreign investors would like it so as to be competitive in the global market ?

A couple of months back, many parts of the state of Uttarakhand were visited by unprecedented rains, cloudburst followed by tear-away flash flood that caused landslides and brought about an avalanche of mud water, boulders, uprooted trees that practically erased many of the ‘Chardham Yatra’ routes and caused death and disappearance of thousands of pilgrims. In the process the flooded rivers also destroyed much of the mushrooming external economy – the hotels, guesthouses, restaurants, shops that have grown not only along the routes, often precariously constructed and perched on slopes or unsound foundations, but sometimes also right inside dried up river beds around the shrines. As watched on television by millions through out the country, these constructions came down like a pack of cards during the deluge in Uttarakhand. In course of the media-led postmortem in the aftermath many well known facts came to be highlighted about utter illegalities, flouting of norms, collusion with local municipal authorities or government administration looking in the other direction apart from sheer ignorance and lack of awareness about the impact of widespread and unregulated building activities in this eco-sensitive region (like causing blockage of the normal flood plains of the rivers like Mandakini).

All these were allowed in the name of growing business activities, prosperity of the locals feeding on the religious tourism. It is undeniable that the tourism in Uttarakhand, especially that related to religious pilgrimage, provide livelihood to a sizable population of the state. In view of the widespread damage to the trekking routes and the infrastructure in and around temple towns this substantial loss of jobs would be definitely an important motivation for reconstruction and reopening of the pilgrimage routes. But like in the case of sand mining, should the livelihood question be posed in a way so that those questioning the laissez fair attitude of the proponents of unregulated construction activities can be disarmed easily ? In some sense this reminds one of the use of Shikhandi, a character in Mahabharata by Pandavas in Kurukshetra war to disarm a major warrior on the side of Kauravas.

You can win a growth vs environment debate in a TV discussion, or be able to cynically maneuver majority in Parliament to ensure the passage of economic legislations like Forest Rights Act or Land Acquisition Bill and others related to Power and Infrastructure Development. But it is the poor, tribals, farmers, migrant labourers and itinerant small service providers and finally common citizens seeking salvation of their souls in gods’ abodes in the Himalaya region who would eventually be at the receiving end as in the above instance, as indeed nearly always, growth or no growth.

Checklist of critical issues about selection of a medical insurance policy

This is in continuation with an earlier blog on the medical insurance currently being offered by many companies for the elderly in India. Here is a summary of the more critical elements of the policy on offer that one (especially a senior citizen) should be watching out for and be careful about.

• Sum insured (range and the maximum amount)
• The annual premium for individual/family floater scheme as the case may be
• Maximum entry age
• Maximum renewal age (For some policies the renewal is said to be guaranteed life long. However, the relevant policy wording usually allows for the insurer to put the insured under “the then prevailing health insurance product or its nearest substitute” as approved by the insurance regulatory authority, IRDA. This may effectively mean enhancement of the premium or other conditionalities not present in the original policy)
• Is there a loading of the renewal premium depending on the claims
• Percentage co-pay for the age-band concerned and that for treatments in a non-network hospital (make sure the hospitals of interest in a given location are included in the list of network hospitals)
• Sub-limits on various components of medical expenditure incurred as an in-patient (accommodation, especially the type of accommodation, nursing, medicines/drugs, diagnostic tests of all kinds, OT charges including equipment, consumables, medicines, anaesthesia gases, blood, oxygen, prosthetics (if implanted inside or fitted externally on the body, fees for surgeons, anaesthesists, additional specialists (if required for the procedure), technicians and attendants)
• Sub-limits/package rates applicable to specific surgical or other procedures and special diagnostic tests
• Check the definition of ‘one illness” and the number of days (usually about 45 days or so) before which a repeat hospitalisation  for the same disease or a relapse may mean that this will have to be part of the ‘one illness’ and therefore one claim (this may adversely affect in case of sub-limits such as above)
• Pre- and post-hospitalisation benefits (check the sub-limits and other conditionalities)
• Check the list of day care procedures (Usually these are allowed only as in-patients and not taken in the hospital OPD. Advisable to check with the insurer if they will make an exception if either the hospital concerned does not agree to such an admission due to non availability or other reasons and offer to carry out the procedure at the OPD instead)
• Mandatory waiting period (30 days/90 days) for the first proposal
• Special waiting periods (usually two years) – check the list of diseases for which these waiting periods are applied (in this way treatment of many common diseases and surgeries that may be of interest to everybody, especially senior citizens, are expressly disallowed for as long as 24 months, while one keeps paying the premium)
• Waiting periods related to the pre-existing diseases (usually four years) – check carefully what the insurer defines as a pre-existing disease
• Policy about the waiting periods in the event of the portability from an existing policy with another company
• Claim settlement process – whether in-house or through a TPA
• Response time in the case of cashless hospitalization procedure – both for pre-authorisation and during discharge

Anti-corruption – whose movement is it anyway ?

At the height of the anti-corruption movement during 2011, there were at least some commentators in the media who, apart from expressing serious doubts about the form of the movement and the remedy it suggested to curb corruption (in the form of an all-powerful, extra-governmental institution like Lokpal) also questioned the relevance of the movement to the toiling masses who form the majority of the electorate. The essence of the latter part of the argument was that while it was undeniable that the people at the lower economic rungs of the society pay a disproportionately large price for getting any service from the government machinery that was rightfully theirs, in their cruel daily grind to somehow survive (if necessary by paying a little bribe or speed money) they could not possibly accord a large priority to a high-minded protest agitation to eliminate corruption in the entire government machinery or the establishment, an impractical and utopian goal. A suggestion that the movement was elitist was probably implied.

The jury is still out as to the positive and definitive effect of the current mood of intolerance about corruption in the national capital, big cities and urban centers, among the educated, the intelligentsia, media and specifically that of the Anna Hazare led movement on the electoral outcomes in the assembly elections held since 2011. The results as always in the recent years had been dramatic in terms of biting the dust by the incumbent governments, but it might be disappointing to look for a clear indication of a countrywide uniform anti-corruption mood tilting the electoral choices. Although DMK’s decimation in Tamil Nadu may be ascribed to an extent to the culpability of A Raza (and others in the party) in the 2G scam having occupied both the national center stage and in the state adding to the general perception of DMK as a party full of corrupt politicians, it may not be fair to single out this cause for their fall, especially as governance wise DMK did reasonably well during their tenure. In Tamil Nadu emotive issues like the atrocities against the Sri Lankan Tamils and the perfection of the alliance arithmetic by Jayalalitha might have played equally or more important role. In Goa, a much smaller state, with a more focused political issue around a huge mining scam under the Digambar Kamat government, one might be more justified to flag the corruption as a major issue.

In UP and earlier in West Bengal the issue of regime change was probably the central one. Though the recognized left leadership in West Bengal may have been largely untouched by personal corruption it can not be anybody’s case that the left rule, especially during its last one or two stints had not spawned corrupt local satraps at the district and the block levels. The public anger at Lalgarh in demolishing the CPM’s party office and the opulent residence of the local party leader bore testimony to the popular disgust at their disproportionate wealth while the people they were supposed to serve were utterly impoverished. Still what was at stake in West Bengal in May 2011 was the possibility of ending a long-standing left rule in the state, ushering in what was euphemistically called ‘Poribartan’ (the change). Similarly, notwithstanding the latest indictment of several ministers in her government under corruption charges including Babu Singh Khuswaha earlier in the health mission scam, corruption in Mayawati led BSP government during its five year rule from 2007 was not the dominant issue in the 2012 UP assembly election nor the reason for her downfall.

Congress may be claiming that the spectacular downturn for the BJP in the recent Karnataka election is a vote against a corrupt government run in major part by Yeddyurappa whom the state Lokayukta indicted and the scams and loot, at the state’s connivance, by the mining lobby led by the Reddy brothers. But if corruption happened to be at the top of their mind the Karnataka electorate certainly could not have ignored the humongous record of financial scams and corruption notched by the Congress led UPA-2 government at the Center for the past four years. The election results do not seem to demonstrate such evenhandedness. Similarly, a little earlier, Virbhadra Singh who had to resign (or persuaded to do so by the Congress party) as a minister from the union cabinet under mounting corruption charges against him in his native Himachal Pradesh led, contrary to expectations in some quarters, the Congress party to victory in the state assembly election late last year and triumphantly became the chief minister yet again.

Thus the recent election results do not appear to provide any evidence of the heightened intolerance of the mass of Indian electorate (at least those who actively participate in the elections) about corruption as a priority issue. The commonplace and the cynical view is that for the broad electorate the caste or the religious identity (associated with the magnified assertion of a group’s self-worth, ‘asmita’ or pride), prospects of self-preservation (including physical safety in the face of hostile groups and communities, economic interests but not leaving out preservation of specific socio-cultural practices), and election-time monetary and other largess matter more. Chetan Bhagat in a recent OP-ED article in Times of India (18 May 2013) mentioned these issues as ones possibly overriding the concern of the Indian electorate regarding corruption.

Bhagat in his article suggested (without exploring it beyond it) an interesting angle to view this apparent disconnect between the progressive aspirations of the educated, enlightened, upwardly mobile middle classes and the stodgy and sheepish acquiescence of those occupying the lower depths to the corruption in high places. Ironically, according to him, this may be characterized as a sort of indirect revenge of the masses of the downtrodden on those miniscule sections of the Indian society who have always moved way ahead of them in terms of material prosperity. If anything the liberalization process underway over the last two decades has accentuated this inequity. Wages for the progress and the privileges cornered by these classes due to advantages of birth, education, rich inheritance, networking of classes or groups of higher economic and social standing, are being paid today to the less fortunate Indians for whom a morally spic and span society is possibly less of a priority than an equitable one. That is why they would elect a candidate promising them caste reservation in education and employment (hence making possible an improvement in their economic upliftment) or protection of minority religious rights (often an existential concern for many) despite allegations of financial corruption or criminal charges against him or her.

Ashis Nandy’s somewhat outlandish comments during a seminar within Jaipur literature festival earlier this year highlighted this same dichotomy. This school of thought shared by sections of the avant-garde Indian elite seems to believe that the increase in corruption indulged by the so-called ‘backward’ classes (SC/ST/dalit etc) is to be justified as a historical readjustment wherein the normatively ‘oppressed’ classes are finding ways to turn the tables on their erstwhile oppressors by learning and becoming more adept at the same game of corruption. It follows therefore, derived from this view point, that a principled opposition against corruption by the rich and powerful, especially those involved in the political governance of this country, is not only a distraction, but may eventually prove to be a stumbling block for the natural readjustment that the vigorous capitalism freshly unleashed by recent policies of liberalization. Dalit capitalism, according to these thinkers, is the way forward for ending the caste apartheid in India. And who does not know a little primitive accumulation of capital would serve this cause very well. One need not be squeamish about corruption if it helps this process.