The Hindu : Divine right to rule?

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jun 26, 2002

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Opinion - News Analysis

Divine right to rule?

By Inder Malhotra

Only a month ago I had occasion to write in this column about the proliferation of political dynasties in this country, my main point being that the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty, though unquestionably the most dazzling of them all, is but one of many. Indeed, several new dynasties, largely confined to single states, have sprung up in recent years while more are mushrooming still.

The time seems to have come to draw attention to a crucial facet of the dynastic pattern of politics: every established dynasty's belief in what practically amounts to its ``divine right to rule''. This assumed right operates, of course, only if it is democratically endorsed. The exclusion from power in New Delhi of the most famous dynasty for 14 long years underscores the point, regardless of the 14 Congress-governed States. But this has never made any difference to each clan's unshakable faith in its destiny.

There can be no room for doubt on this score after the spectacular spectacle in Srinagar on Sunday of Farooq Abdullah, Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir as well as the leader of the National Conference, passing on the baton to his son Omar. As many have commented, this was a repeat, with some conspicuous differences of the ceremony two decades earlier at which Dr. Abdullah's father, the towering Sheikh Mohammed Abdullah, had transferred the mantle to him.

Notwithstanding the constraints of tight security, the function where the third generation of the Abdullahs of Kashmir received its inheritance was held with pomp and circumstance. But these were overshadowed by passion, anger and rhetoric, with Farooq Abdullah raving and ranting against New Delhi ostensibly in support of his demand for greater autonomy for his State. Almost everyone is familiar with the Kashmir Chief Minister's volatility.

What stunned one and all, however, was the wholly uncharacteristic performance the previous evening of Omar Abdullah, whose behaviour until that melancholy moment had been impeccable. Throwing all sense of propriety and proportion to the winds, this able and promising young man used unacceptably offensive language against the Vajpayee Government in which he was then, and still is the Minister of State for External Affairs.

Clearly, the fury of father and son against the Centre stems from its failure to honour its promise to elevate Dr. Abdullah to the office of Vice-President in New Delhi after the transference of his present responsibilities in Srinagar to his son. Decision-makers in the capital have acted most casually, indeed shoddily. They should not have made a promise they were unable to deliver. Or else, they should have kept their word. However, this having been said, does it behove the Abdullahs to haggle, more or less publicly and so acrimoniously, for a seat in the Union Cabinet for Dr. Abdullah with a portfolio of his choice which is reported to be External Affairs?

Autonomy, evidently the National Conference's main plank in the coming Assembly elections, is a serious and substantive issue. As the then Prime Minister, P.V. Narasimha Rao had promised autonomy to the Kashmiris and indeed told them that the ``sky is the limit'' to the autonomy on offer. That apart, there is a case for devolution of powers to all States, not just Kashmir. Especially after the Sarkaria Commission's wholesome recommendations on the subject were consigned to deepest available deep freeze. But then, with power, must go responsibility.

Autonomy must extend also to financial affairs. Neither Kashmir nor any other State can insist on being a manor and refuse to live on its own produce. Similarly, law and order is an exclusively State subject. Those requiring large formations of the Centre's military and paramilitary forces for this purpose cannot demand at the same time that New Delhi must make the forces available but ask no questions because that would amount to interference with the State autonomy.

By happenstance the transfer of leadership from Dr. Abdullah to Omar Abdullah coincided with another event with a bearing on dynastic dispensation. Sunday, June 23, was the 22nd death anniversary of Sanjay Gandhi. Maneka Gandhi, used the memorial meeting to demand political space, if not a place in the sun, for her and her son, Feroze Varun, a bona fide scion of the Nehru-Gandhi family. She also complained that the ``strangers'' controlling the Sanjay Gandhi Trust had kept her and her son out of it. Her complaint is legitimate. But is this the only anomaly or paradox in Indian politics in which dynastic succession and dynastic feuds are usually the two sides of the same coin? In the eyes of the BJP and the wider Sangh Parivar, Sanjay Gandhi was the ``principal villain'' of the Emergency whose 27th anniversary fell on Tuesday. And yet Maneka Gandhi has had no difficulty or qualms about remaining enclosed in the BJP-led Council of Ministers for the last four years.

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