A Government In Crisis?

A corrective was indisputably overdue, this unrestrained loot had to stop, and without doubt nemesis had to some day visit upon us. Yet, despite that inevitability, there is little gladness. When I shared this view with some friends they were outraged and felt I misdirected my sympathy. It could be that they are right, equally, that I am not entirely wrong. Because we do after all need a viable and a functioning state; a caring, compassionate and an honestly efficient government: certainly not a Machiavellian management of affairs which remains immersed in cynical, amoral, manipulative scheming simply to hang on to office. In the process, however, of applying the corrective are we moving towards achieving an orderly state? Also a society wherein the vast bulk of our citizens, those who wish to pursue their affairs, in peace and in freedom are enabled to live in security, rejoicing in their private joys, content with their individual endeavours. After all the pre-occupations of our citizens, their priorities and concerns are not of any lower value than the priorities of the politicians.

 

Are we actually moving towards achieving that synthesised wholeness? Or is this combat of `judicial activism and political venality, bringing about a situation in which both political order and political society, as we have known uptil now, is likely to be rendered not just ineffective but also largely irrelevant? This is deeply troubling. Also that other greatly disturbing thought: Is the present state of our nation not the most telling commentary on our experiment with self-governance, through democratic means, for the last 50 years? Is this what we have to show for a half centurys endeavours to build a nation, a viable state, a civil society, and a contended and law abiding citizenry?

The central problem has always been and remains of establishing stable and effective political institutions. Our fight is against corruption and rightly so. But corruption means not simply mindless avarice, it is also an absence of work ethics, it is querulousness, unwillingness to accept laws, to moderate our demands, adhere to norms, pay taxes and so on. I have often commented that if the peoples representatives are to actually be representative of the people, then surely they must also mirror the quirks, traits and peculiarities, of that very society from which they emerge. This points to a challenge, also to a dilemma, yet is not a contradiction: How is our political leadership to reflect society and yet provide the needed leadership? And if leadership deficiencies lie behind our present crisis then surely that is not a fault of the institutions.

Which general observation leads me to sketch briefly the perilousness of the present UF government. Even if strung loosely together by an hurriedly put together `Common Minimum Programme, it is, after all, but an arrangement of 13 contending political `formations, hardly even parties. The two that come close to being actually so are only supporters from the outside. The principal one, the Congress(I), now goes through a major crisis. What new inspiring idea or new leadership will the Congress put forward? How will it continue to support a government with which, in reality, it has little left in common? Except antipathy to the BJP, that is. Reverse the coin: How will the Congress cope with resolving its inner crisis and yet remain a partner in the governance of India, without compromise to national interests? I do believe it becomes their duty to declare that until they have resolved their internal problems, they will withdraw from governance, even from this `one-step-removed variety. Because whilst a crippled Congress can perhaps provide the arithmetic of parliamentary numbers, it cannot the needed guidance of ideas, certainly not to an inherently unstable and dependent government like that of the UF. And if you were to examine yet another facet and to ask: What of the UF? Then I do believe that it becomes also their duty to say: We cannot sustain ourselves in office on the back of the Congress, that would be a travesty of the spirit of the system. Will any of this be done? Not really. What then the consequences? A further belittling of India, a more rapid descent into this whirlpool of a crisis, and the rendering of all our institutional supports as even more ineffective.

The choice is really stark but it is not simple. The country must elect again. It is not correct for this government to continue in office. That, after all, (of retaining office) is not the great issue that confronts India today. How restore to politics its prestige as a high and honourable calling is; because politics and politicians are necessary in our affairs. An anti-politician mood is fine, for irreverence is an attribute of democracy; denigrate them, yes, but build replacements for what is brought down, otherwise suggest an alternative.