NEW DELHI, 13 May — India is the only nuclear power in the world that is frightened of Bangladesh. But that is another story, although it does link the two themes of this column: the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) can hardly expect to triumph in Assam and Bengal when a whimper is its primary response to the horrific events on the Bangladesh border.
The nuclear story of the moment deals with what happened in London on June 4, 1998, some three weeks after we announced, to loud applause at home and loud wailing abroad, that we had unilaterally joined the Big Stick Club. Soon after Pakistan also became, officially, a nuclear- weapons power. Brajesh Mishra, principal secretary in the Prime Minister’s Office was among those tasked to explain our decision to influential allies, a perfectly legitimate responsibility.
In the process he carried a letter from Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain. Mishra bypassed our high commissioner and got an appointment with Blair through the Hindujas, the world’s most famous arms agents, who owed at least some of their fame to the BJP’s strident campaign against them during the prime ministership of Rajiv Gandhi following the investigative stories done by a gentleman who is now a minister in the central government, Arun Shourie.
The influence of Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie in this government does not need endorsement from a mere columnist, but I had no idea that their philosophy of privatization and disinvestment had become so contagious. This government has gone ahead and privatized foreign policy as well.
As is only to be expected in best-of-breed practice, foreign policy has gone to the highest bidder. The Hinduja brothers, when not selling arms, do like foreign policy on the side. They got the foreign policy franchise for the United Kingdom from their friend Brajesh Mishra (I hope our high commissioner in London 1998 has retired from the service by now, otherwise he would have to resign in embarrassment).
The Hindujas were delightfully coy about their friend. This is the opening paragraph of their letter to Jonathan Powell, chief of staff to Blair, sent on the morning of June 4, 1998: “GP and I, with our Indian friend, look forward to seeing you and the prime minister later this morning. Our friend will have with him a letter from the Indian pime minister to give to Mr. Blair.” No names mentioned. Very hush hush. As if Mishra was head of the Indian secret service who traveled with a forged passport and a false mustache. What was the need for such mystery? I presume the prime minister of Britain prefers to know the identity of anyone bringing a letter from another prime minister, so Mishra’s credentials could not have been a secret from him. Did Brajesh Mishra want secrecy?
He has made an extraordinary statement that this meeting with Blair could only have been arranged by the Hindujas. Why? Can’t an Indian ambassador keep a secret? Mishra must have an extremely low opinion of India’s diplomats if he believes this of his old service. You do not have to be a nuclear scientist to realize that the exercise was an effort to improve the standing of the Hindujas with 10 Downing Street, a pre-arranged opportunity seized eagerly by the author of the letter to Powell, Srichand P. Hinduja, and his ubiquitous brother, Gopi.
The two do everything in tandem, as the Supreme Court fully appreciated when it (very correctly; there was no justification for keeping the brothers in a kind of permanent house arrest in India) permitted Srichand and Gopi Hinduja to continue their lives in London or wherever their British passports permits them to travel. It was the kind of help that the Hindujas desperately needed in their search for British passports.
Effectively the government of India was helping them to change their nationality at a time when they were on a potential charge sheet in the Bofors case. It is as simple as that. What would Atal Behari Vajpayee and L.K. Advani have done if they had been in opposition and discovered a high official of the government of India helping the accused in the Bofors case? There is an answer to this question and it is with a man called P.V. Narasimha Rao who once had an external affairs minister called Madhavsinh Solanki.
Solanki tried to help the Hindujas by handing over a letter on their behalf to a head of government. Vajpayee and Advani demanded his resignation. Rao forced Solanki to resign. In this shadowy world of power, reputation is as good as reality. The Hindujas, who love using first names (they just spoke to Tony, while Bill was trying to reach them on the other line), are masters in the manipulation of their image. From arms dealers they have repositioned themselves as Narasimha Rao had an opposition to contend with. Vajpayee is fortunate that he still does not have to worry about an opposition.
The Congress party reacts only if there is any suspicion of attack on its exalted leader Sonia Gandhi. It stopped parliament when it felt that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) might inquire into allegations against Sonia; she is clearly above anything so gross as suspicion. The party refuses to recognize that there can be any other issue on the national agenda. Or perhaps the Congress feels beholden to the Hindujas for some reason and prefers silence when the principal secretary to the prime minister avers that he prefers arms dealers to his embassy in his dealings with the British government.
Vajpayee has been sending out signals much before the results of the current round of assembly elections indicating two things: first, that the BJP will not do well; and second, that nothing will happen to his government in Delhi. He is absolutely right on both counts. The BJP did not have any chance in Kerala, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu or Pondicherry but it had a vote share in all four places that was increasing. That trend will be reversed. It will lose its vote share everywhere. As if the cumulative effect of its policies was not enough, its unconvincing mismanagement of the border incidents with Bangladesh have struck a negative nerve in the Indian psyche. The voter has suddenly remembered that this is the same government that crawled before hijackers when it was only asked to bend (Advani might remember this phrase; he made it famous after the end of the emergency when he thus summed up the behavior of some journalists during censorship and tyranny).
Assam was one state where the BJP was poised to leap into the forefront and become an alternative to the Asom Gon Parishad (AGP). Instead the BJP lost its confidence, and joined a declining ruling party. But nothing will happen to Vajpayee’s government.
There will be no pressure on the BJP’s allies to break the coalition. Why? Because there is no credible alternative. Vajpayee has been getting a little irritable with Sonia of late. This is an error. He should continue to show fulsome gratitude to her. Under her the Congress will continue to remain a stagnant force. I am writing this after the exit polls (which can be, like opinion polls, misleading) and before the results are known, but it is safe to suggest that the Congress has been a liability for its friends and an indifferent option for voters.
The Congress may claim victory in Assam because it will certainly be the largest single party, but t he fact is that a Congress victory in Assam should have been as clear-cut as the UDF performance in Kerala. Then the Sonia-minus factor came into play, starting with poor selection of candidates (any other adjective would be far more pejorative). As she campaigned Sonia inadvertently aroused the “foreigner” sentiment. Despite all her years in India, Sonia simply has not acquired either the local inflexion or a feel for Indian sentiments. This is curious.
Indians have no difficulty in sounding like Americans or Britishers (very clipped) or Europeans if they settle abroad; but Sonia still sounds as if she is a chance visitor from Italy. If Mamata Banerjee does not win in Bengal, she will not wait very long to point every finger she has (as well as her toes) at Sonia. In Tamil Nadu of course Sonia has converted the Congress into a reluctant tail of Jayalalitha (the reluctance is on the part of Jayalalitha, not the tail). A government falls midterm in Delhi if two conditions are met.
The credibility of the ruling party or coalition has to collapse, of course, but that is not sufficient. The opposition also has to be certain that it can either form an alternative government or win an election. No political party today believes that it can gain from a collapse of government. The BJP knows that it will suffer if it goes to the voter now.
But the Congress also knows that it has not gained enough goodwill to win more seats in the Lok Sabha (lower house): it will win by default in Gujarat but lose or barely survive everywhere else. Sonia has campaigned for the Congress in two general elections: she got a little over 140 seats the first time and 112 the second time. If a general election were held now she would not cross three figures. She has therefore no interest in destabilizing the government.
A general election now would turn the Lok Sabha into a multiparty mess. This is the inevitable consequence of what might be called India’s first hamam election: an election in which the voter is convinced that all parties are equally exposed, equally corrupt, equally unreliable. If there is Tehelka in the BJP there is the constant image of Bofors around Sonia, spiced by regular stories of this ticket or that being sold, as in Assam.
If the voter in Tamil Nadu turns away from Karunanidhi, who does he find? Jayalalitha, with an unsavory track record. And so it goes. When you touch nadir you reach an interesting syndrome. Someone will lose. But no one will win. That is what a hamam election is all about.
