There are some events that momentarily overshadow all else, apart from football. The Union Budget-that dreary statement of a Government’s fiscal intent-happens to be a major three-day wonder that dominates the media space.
Thus, it is not surprising that the news and significance of Amit Shah’s appointment as the new BJP president was eclipsed by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s maiden Budget speech. However, both events have a considerable significance for the future of the Narendra Modi Government. The end taste of the heady cocktail of politics and economy will determine whether the electoral verdict of 2014 was an aberration or a harbinger of a more profound transformation of India.
The need for political managers to complement the efforts of those who seek to guide the economy isn’t always sufficiently understood in practice. For some Prime Ministers, such as Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi, the Budget was entirely an ideological-cum-political exercise where little attention was paid to the real health of the economy. Nehru’s socialism was built on an aesthetic dislike-borrowed from England’s upper-crust socialism-of business and businessmen. Indira garnished her father’s imperious disdain of the dhoti-walla capitalist with a love of cronyism. She had no coherent views of business but she knew which industrialist to promote and which to put down.
To be fair, Manmohan Singh was not a typical chip off the Nehru-Indira block. like PV Narasimha Rao, he realised that the “commanding heights” approach needed drastic modification. Unfortunately, as Prime Minister he was hamstrung by the fact that the real owner of the UPA Government had very different ideas. In days to come, historians may pronounce the likes of Amartya Sen and others as the intellectual godfathers of the UPA Government. They may be partially correct but they would also have to factor in Sonia Gandhi’s self-image as lady Bountiful, Rahul Gandhi’s uncanny ability to be impressed by Jairam Ramesh’s politics of spite, and Manmohan’s inability to say “No”.
Indira Gandhi, in particular, was very focussed on winning elections and her Budgets were all about that. The Budgets of the Manmohan years suffered from a problem of incoherence created by stakeholders pulling in different directions. They rarely failed to transcend the principle of one step forward, two steps back. The consequence was that the average Congress voter lost his/her political bearings and drifted aimlessly as the heir apparent tried to preach the importance of “systemic changes.”
The Congress’ lacklustre campaign of 2014 wasn’t just a consequence of backroom amateurism and poor deployment of resources. It mirrored the existential dilemma of the party: Was it a party of assiduously built-up networks (with a preponderance of inheritors) or was it a strange case of the MBA cohabiting with the NGOIJ
The disorientation wasn’t confined to the Congress. In the six years of NDA rule under Vajpayee the economy performed well and India embraced the logic of rapid growth. At the same time, there was a political disconnect between Government policy and the bhavna of the party’s traditional support base. The core of the BJP is essentially middle class defined not merely in economic terms but also in terms of aspirations. They were also bound by values that ranged from Hindu nationalism to a celebration of the family. The typical BJP supporter embraced the trappings of modernity-particularly technology-but in a nationalistic, indeed anti-Western, idiom.
The biggest strategic miscalculation of the Vajpayee administration was in creating a big distance between the Government and its social constituency. The policy-makers of the NDA, for example, often forgot that the backbone of the BJP was not the big business that is represented in the CII and certainly not the apparatchiks of the multinationals doing business in India. The BJP support base has invariably been among the traders, the small-time professionals and the owners of small and medium scale enterprises. For the BJP, ‘reform’ hasn’t ever meant opening the doors to unrestricted foreign investment; it has always involved saving the little guy from both the inspector raj and tax terrorism.
It is to Jaitley’s credit that he didn’t lose sight of the party’s traditional support base in the Budget. There were two facets of the Budget that were politically relevant: The relief given to Income-Tax payers and the attempt to make tax and excise rules more rule-based and less discretionary. Yes, international investors may also be happy but their moods don’t shape electoral verdicts. The important thing is that those with a stake in India felt that some of their concerns too were addressed.
As a politician, Modi is far more attentive to the nuts and bolts of the political process than Vajpayee. Indeed, Vajpayee had a definite disdain for the details of both governance and politics-the reason why he outsourced one to Brajesh Mishra and the other to lK Advani. Modi is a far more hands-on politician who is only too aware of the need to create an institutional bridge linking the Government and party.
To some Amit Shah may seem a mere appendage to Modi. At one level that is true insofar as they have a clear understanding of each other. But what makes Shah’s appointment relevant is that he brings to the table a spectacular understanding of the material and ideological impulses of the BJP support base. Add to this his undeniable experience in organising elections and it is possible to grasp the importance of this appointment. Modi, it would seem, is determined not to repeat the mistakes of the Vajpayee Government.