Factions and Big Money

FROM N.C.’S WRITINGS

At the time of writing these lines, there is excitement in the Capital about the imminence of reshuffle of the Union Cabinet. This is of course a source of hypertension for many of the Ministers as to whether they would be wrested of their present portfolios and downgraded with the charge of less important ones. There are others who have been getting restless waiting to be called to join the Council of Ministers. While there are indications that this time the Prime Minister is likely to go in for a major reshuffle, there is also a touch of uncertainly about it because Narasimha Rao has conceived so many times in the past few months without actually going through the operation.

The government at the Centre is no doubt a subject of interest and concern for the entire country. At the same time one can hardly shut ones eyes to the happenings in the States particularly in those run by the Congress party because this is the ruling party at the Centre as well. The manner of handling the affairs at the State level perhaps provides a clearer insight into the current state of political functioning in the country as a whole. It is therefore relevant to direct the spotlight on the two southern States of Andhra and Karnataka where turbulence has been very much evident in recent months.

Will the new Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh last? And will there be no change of guards at Hyderabad till the next general election?

These are questions which may not be fair to Vijaya Bhaskara Reddy but legitimate in the light of the fury of factional tussles within the Andhra Pradesh Congress that preceded the ouster of the previous Chief Minister. For two long months, the inner-party battle rocked the Congress and virtually debilitated the functio-ning of the Ministry headed by Janardhana Reddy. And this sordid squabbling would have continued for many more weeks, if not months, had the Andhra High Court on its part resorted to the proverbially protracted proceedings in the private medical college scandal case which brought judicial censure upon the Chief Minister.

In other words, an ugly tussle within the ruling Congress could not be settled by the party’s High Command despite the despatch of party observers in relays from Delhi who could hardly pacify the open brawl among the Congress MLAs. Equally ominous is the fact that even after the ouster of Janardhana Reddy, the contending factions could not on their own choose his successor, as they reached a checkmate situation, leaving it to the party President to nominate the new leader of the party in the legislature, that is, the new Chief Minister.

Few can disagree with Narasimha Rao’s choice, as Vijaya Bhaskara Reddy is by far the most deserving individual for the post, among all the contenders. However, personal competence, experience or esteem count little when factions within the Congress party fight like the Chinese warlords, a tradition which has persisted within the Andhra Congress throughout the decades since independence—and the Prime Minister himself can bear this out from his direct personal experience. With all the back-up from the party President, however, the new Chief Minister will have to reckon with the disgruntled within his own party. Will they be reconciled to be left out of the plums of office for long? Even Vijaya Bhaskara’s astrologer cannot guarantee that.

AT the same time, it would be wrong and iniquitous to single out the Andhra Congress party for this malady of inner-party bickerings. Witness the dog-fight that has been going on in the next-door Karnataka. For more than three months now, the Karnataka administration—at one time one of the most efficient in the entire country—has been in a state of paralysis because of the civil war going on among the Ministers. Bangarappa has broken all record of cliff-hanging with all his adversaries left dumbfounded at his capacity of being a limpet Chief Minister. Depu-tation after deputation from the rebel Congress legislators have come to Delhi to plead with the party bigwigs, including the President, for the removal of Bangarappa but somehow he has managed so long to survive, tiring out all those expecting his removal, with Veerappa Moiley in the lead.

Dissidence on questions of policy has always had a place in the Congress. Group politics in some form or other was inevitable in a large sprawling organisation like the Congress in the best of times. But in the last two decades these have become hardened into factions each more pronounced and palpable since the days of Indira Gandhi’s leadership, though ironically she split the Congress to set up a new party of principles and commitments—both of which are conspicuously absent in the Congress today.

In reality, the great split in the Congress in 1969 accelerated the entry of Big Money into Congress politics with the top leaders unasha-medly establishing direct links with magnum-size moneybags. All the inhibitions were dropped in the name of collecting party funds. And as the party with the preponderant impact on the politics of this country, even though it has lost its monopoly of power, the Congress has set the fashion which other parties, by and large, have taken up consciously or otherwise, with the result that corruption has virtually ceased to be a dirty word in party politics today—so long as it is not caught.

This is borne out in the politics of Andhra and Karnataka today. That was why nobody could actually dislodge Janardhana Reddy nor could he be accused of not having indulged in corruption in that scandal which brought the Court strictures upon him. Bangarappa, on his part, has never made the unreal claim that his regime can flaunt its chastity on this score. Rather his political opponents hold that it is on the strength of the accumulated resources at his command he has so long been able to hold on to the Chief Ministership.

Over the years, corruption of political life has assumed a mega size. In the years immediately following independence, a Minister or a powerful party leader would have normally been the target for bribing by a contractor or a provincial-level businessman. All this has changed. Today not only does Big Business invade the precincts of Pradesh politics, but even international links are being established at that level: witness the procession of Chief Ministers nowadays going abroad ostensibly in search of the hard-currency investors, and incidentally to replenish their own coffers.

As for those installed in power at the Centre, new pastures opened up through kickbacks in purchases of defence equipments and for heavy industries. Collecting for the party fund became secondary to augmenting personal accumulations by individual leaders. Corruption, direct or covert, is this eating into the very vitals of political functioning. ‘The experience of the last two months in these two important States confirms this in a brazen form. This comes in the way of democratic functioning of the parties themselves.

ONE has, of course, to acknowledge that after taking over as the party President, Narasimha Rao tried hard to restore the practice of inner-party elections. But the virtual embargo on such elections within the party for twentyfive long years, imposed first by Indira Gandhi and then by her son, Rajiv, made the large body of Congressmen inert to the idea of elections within the party. After two decades of unrelieved resorting to appointment from above, it is but natural that the Congressmen at many places should find it difficult to go back to the principle of elections from below.

If democratic functioning of political parties is being thwarted by the vicious inroad of Big Money, its converse is equally true. If political leadership in a determined manner enforces democratic functioning within their respective party organisations, that too in its turn can help to thwart the pernicious encroachment of corr-uption in public life. The malady of “son-stroke” which has been spreading fast in recent times in the leadership of political parties is a conduit for corruption vitiating public life and also forging the unholy link between black money and the politician. Enforcing democratic functioning within the Congress is thus integrally linked with the task of cleansing political life from pollution by moneybags.

Perhaps too tall an order for any leader on the political stage today. Will Narasimha Rao take at least the first step towards chasing away this behemoth of corruption from our public life?

(Mainstream, October 17, 1992)