The two profound challenges before the government are a
turbulent relationship with Pakistan, turned septic by
terrorism; and the Naxalite insurrection, spurred by poverty and
decades of neglect.
 Call it
the Manmohan Singh paradox: the strength of his coalition
depends largely upon on how weak he is as Prime Minister. The
glue holds because he has no power over his partners. One
minister is caught with his hands in the telecom till and shrugs
off accusation with impunity; a second has no time for Cabinet
meetings; a third dismisses a portfolio as people-centric as
railways with the throwaway line that it does not represent her
true identity. All the Prime Minister can do is smile and carry
on. The smile is wearing thin.
A fundamental equation has been quietly reversed. During UPA1,
the smaller allies were in power because Congress held them up.
Now, the Congress is in power because the Trinamool, DMK and NCP
hold it up. Since power is central to Congress schemes for the
present and future, all parties have, by mutual consent,
eliminated accountability from the algebra of governance to
create a semblance of stability. Temperament and tantrum can
coexist with venality and incompetence.
The casualty is credibility: it began to creep away but the pace
has gradually built up to a crawl. If Dr Singh, whose own
reputation remains more positive than that of his government,
does not act soon, the pace will quicken to a trot and develop
into an irreversible gallop.
Weakness is contagious. It tends to debilitate even those limbs
of the body politic that are functioning normally. Congress
ministers have always known that they owe their jobs to party
president Sonia Gandhi, but they showed the requisite deference
to the PM during UPA1 because they knew that Dr Singh's image
would be an asset on judgment day when the voter headed for the
ballot box. This enormous strength has withered because no one
expects Dr Singh to lead the party in the next general
elections. Dr Singh admitted as much at his only press
conference held, ironically, to project an image of control.
Instead, he passed the baton when he said, in his typically
honest manner, that he would make way for Rahul Gandhi the
moment he was asked to do so. Power is never stagnant. It either
consolidates around the leader, or ebbs. Those with longer plans
for the future than the Prime Minister are establishing
individual markers at the cost of collective cohesion.
The two profound challenges before the government are a
turbulent relationship with Pakistan, turned septic by
terrorism; and the Naxalite insurrection, spurred by poverty and
decades of neglect. There is disarray and dissension within
government on both fronts. External affairs minister S M Krishna
was clearly, and visibly, disoriented when his colleague
Chidambaram, armed with explosive information, lit the fuse
under his conciliatory mission to Islamabad. Home secretary G K
Pillai had Chidambaram's permission to reveal David Headley's
testimony about ISI and Pakistan navy aid to Mumbai terrorists,
or he would have lost his job. The Prime Minister chose to rise
above the drama.
This is useful if you want to buy time, but not effective if you
want to run a government.
Dr Singh is burdened by a further paradox. He is presiding over
not one but two coalitions. Congress itself is the second
coalition, a storehouse of multiple interests that requires
dexterous management even during times of serenity. Personal
feuds are only a part of the alternative story; there are
genuine and strongly held differences over policy. This is
healthy, up to a point; when that point comes, the leader must
demand obedience to a government decision. An astute veteran
like Digvijay Singh would not have berated Chidambaram as a
misguided intellectual snob whose single idea was to shoot his
way through the Naxalite problem, without tacit support from his
party leader. The Prime Minister has imprisoned himself in the
rather dubious proverb, that silence is golden. Silence is too
aloof an option for democracy.
A helpless Prime Minister induces a hapless government. Drift,
as the term indicates, is never in a hurry. A government can
float a long way before someone realizes that it has lost
direction. Drift does not threaten a government's survival, but
it saps the people's patience.
The third paradox may seem puzzling but is easily
comprehensible. It is always much more difficult to run a weak
government than a strong one. The latter has a command
structure, purpose and enough discipline to induce confidence in
the ever-watchful voter. A weak government is great news for a
newspaper, and even better fodder for television; but that is
where its limited entertainment utility ceases. During his first
five years, Dr Singh was an anchor that was powerful enough to
keep the ship steady through heavy turbulence in the final 12
months of its journey. Victory in 2009 could have made him
master of a cruise liner. If, however, he continues to do
nothing, he could become captain of a paper boat.
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Paul shows Indian Politicians way to go
It is
reassuring that Paul the Octopus, arguably now the most famous
contemporary resident of Germany, has entered the Indian
political discourse. When the revolutionary leader Jayalalitha
promised at a spirited rally in Coimbatore this week that the
end of DMK rule in Tamil Nadu was nigh, a government spokesman
asked whether she thought she had become Paul the Octopus. Paul,
as our learned readers will fondly recall, predicted the results
of eight World Cup matches on the trot. Had Paul been a betting
man instead of a playful ink-squirter, he would have been a
millionaire.
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