Rebuilding the party system

By Harish Khare

LET US consider three recent developments, relating to the turbulence in our political party system. First, Mr. P. A. Sangma, seniormost general secretary and a founder-member of the Nationalist Congress Party, chose to accept the membership of the proposed Constitution Review Commission. What makes Mr. Sangma's action noteworthy is that his party's working committee, its highest decision-making body, had committed itself by a resolution to oppose the very idea of a Constitution review panel. What is more, the NCP leadership finds itself unable to do anything about Mr. Sangma's individualistic stance. In less than a year, the party found itself having to jettison the organisationally sound principle of collective responsibility for collective decisions.

Second, during the course of campaigning in Orissa the Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, announced unilaterally that the Biju Janata Dal leader, Mr. Naveen Patnaik would be the next Chief Minister of Orissa, (of course, assuming that the BJP-BJD alliance will win the requisite majority). It needs to be noted that at no time had the BJP - either at the national level or at the State level - committed itself to Mr. Patnaik as Chief Minister. But Mr. Vajpayee could not allow himself to be guided by his party's reservations about Mr. Patnaik.

Third, Mr. G. K. Moopanar, president of the Tamil Maanila Congress, has taken it upon himself to suggest that the Congress (I) should reorganise itself on a federal basis. Since he is a quintessential organisation man, Mr. Moopanar's views reflect the thinking of a former apparatchik of the Congress (I); and, in a way, his views are not very different than that of Mr. Sharad Pawar, which he voiced last year at the CII convention, just before he found himself thrown out of the Congress (I). Like Mr. Pawar, Mr. Moopanar also seems to be suggesting that ``New Delhi'' can be governed only from the States.

All three developments, in one way or the other, point to the need to re-arrange our party system to meet the demands and requirements of the Indian state, increasingly moving away from the commitments of a welfare state. There is an all-too-obvious and too-little-understood mismatch between political activity, rooted in electoral competition based on universal adult franchise, and policy frameworks attuned to the requirements of the market.The apparent political instability during much of the 1990s is a logical and inevitable consequence of the policy paradigm shift that took place in 1991. For much of the pre-1991 era, the raison d'etre of the Indian state was that it would be the engine and the forum for bringing prosperity to the people of India; since 1991, there is an implicit acknowledgement that the market would be the instrument for our collective welfare and growth. The fashionable response has been to raise the bogey of ``too much politics'' and to crank up an anti-politician bias in the country, especially among the middle classes. In the process, the party system has been allowed to go to seed, producing another kind of instability. The quest for a presidential system of government, the suggestion for allowing only two political parties, the preference for a fixed term for the Lok Sabha, and the ``constitution review'' are all devices to get past the collapse of the party system. The central problem appears to be that while the moral economy of the welfare state has been given up, the political economy of greed and private profits has yet to entrench itself.

What, then, are the uses, if any, of party competition and conflict in a ``liberalised'' economy-oriented polity? In a way, the BJP is finding itself struggling to define its role, as much as a ruling party as a party in the new age of privatisation and globalisation. On the other hand, the Congress (I) has not even begun understanding that its trouble are as much to do with the limitations of its leader as with its inability to redefine its role in the changed polity.

However, let there be no mistake. There is no alternative to political activity based on party competition. Hence, political parties cannot be dispensed with. That is as long as we have a democratic parliamentary system of government. It is when political parties lose the art of practicing their craft that the administrative and political system comes under strain and challenge. For instance, the assorted naxalite groups continue to challenge the state in Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Maharahstra or Andhra Pradesh because the political parties have failed to live up to their obligations. The same is the case in much of the Northeast or in Kashmir. Alienation and separatist thoughts creep in only when the established political parties are rendered ineffective.

When a citizen chooses to commit suicide right in the heart of downtown Lucknow it means that political parties are no longer seen as the instrument of mediation and mitigation between harassed and persecuted citizens and a harsh and unfeeling administration. To the extent the civil society has not yet developed capacities and resources to engage and confront, if need be, the ``authority'', the political parties remain the only recourse open to a citizen or group of citizens with grievances, frustrations and anger.

Again, let there be no mistake. As we travel further and irreversibly on the road to privatisation and globalisation, there will be greater anger and a more unpredictable expression of that anger. That will be the time when a healthy and operational political party system will be desperately needed to negotiate and moderate the deprivations and inequalities that are inevitably built into a market-oriented economy. In a short term, attention can be diverted by raising issues such as Ms. Deepa Mehta's controversial films or whether Government employees ought to be allowed to join the RSS; in the long term, there is no escape from ``populist'' parties and leaders who would excite - even incite - the large chunks of masses to demand a share in the national pie. It is all very well and all very politically correct to decry a Mr. Laloo Prasad Yadav and his antics; but, it is political leaders like him who have provided the political system enough cushion to continuing experimenting with an economic model of doubtful usefulness.

Moreover, a political party system is needed to provide a synergy between the Indian state and the all-India institutions, and a vibrant citizenry. On the one hand, we have a state structure based on all-India institutions such as the Judiciary, the Election Commission, the Planning Commission, the IAS, the IPS, etc.; on the other, we need to have groups and individuals who would crank up and enforce pan-Indian sentiments, slogans, ideas, forces, preferences and policies, etc. This requirement has become even more acute than before as the new policy paradigm insists on ``local'' initiatives and ``global'' encroachments.

Unfortunately, for now, the party system seems to be giving way to individual-centric political formations. The BJP is now an entirely Vajpayee-centered party; the Congress(I), too, is obsessed with the ``Nehru-Gandhi family'' mumbo-jumbo; and, almost all regional parties - the Akali Dal, the TDP, the Biju Janata Dal, the Shiv Sena, the Trinamool Congress, and the Lok Dal - are entirely dependent upon the resourcefulness and charm of this or that leader. What is more, anyone who breaks away from an established political party - be it a Kalyan Singh or a Meira Kumar - is instantly hailed as a great and authentic democrat. The Indian party system needs to be rescued from individualistic entrepreneurs as well as from the fashionable anti-politician onslaught. Without a sound, working party system, the Indian polity would be vulnerable to authoritarian temptations.

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