The sins of bed-hopping

Politics makes strange bedfellows. Sleeping with one’s enemies to gain power is not uncommon in Indian politics, nor was it among the princely states over the centuries. Indeed, power not religious beliefs or ideologies, is the ultimate aphrodisiac. The latter are only a means to achieve power.

Two years ago, the BJP was stunned by the audacity of its long-standing ally Shiv Sena, which shared its Hindutva ideology, which made an arrangement with two secular parties, Congress and NCP, and consummated the relationship and Uddhav Thackeray became the Chief Minister heading a shaky coalition government. While the BJP had nurtured an exaggerated notion of its own invincibility, it had underestimated the determination of its former ally to outmanoeuvre it.

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When Devendra Fadnavis threw in the towel the first time and declined to form the government on being invited by the Maharashtra Governor before he invited others, the BJP ridiculed the Shiv Sena for flirting with its sworn foes — the NCP and Congress. When the Governor asked the Shiv Sena to form the government and next offered a chance to the NCP, the BJP attacked viciously the coming together of parties with disparate philosophies.

But on Fadnavis being offered a second chance to form a government by the blatantly partisan Governor, it forgot its jibes against Shiv Sena and had no hesitation in tying the knot with renegade NCP leader Ajit Pawar. It turned out to be a classic case of marrying in haste and repenting at leisure after a quick divorce.

Politics is not only the art of the possible but also the art of the impossible. You have to live today to fight another day.

The Shiv Sena beat the BJP at its own game. Uddhav Thackeray did not blink and was sworn in as CM. He lived up to the old adage — “It’s not the size of the dog in the fight but the size of the fight in the dog.”

Charles de Gaulle said that at times, “In politics, it is necessary to betray one’s country or the electorate”. Both BJP and Shiv Sena can be accused of betraying the electorate.

The NCP and Congress, which were waiting in the wings, seized the day and bested the BJP, which had rubbed their nose in the mud by fair and foul means in the past. BJP had also brushed aside all scruples to grab power in other states, notably Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Goa and others.

It seemed all is fair in not just love and war, but also in politics.

Also Read: Uddhav accuses BJP of plotting to finish Shiv Sena; dares it to hold mid-term polls in Maharashtra

All this was then. Before Uddhav Thackeray and Shiv Sena could redeem their pledges, which were part of two coalition partners -- of good governance and development, abjuring the politics of religious bigotry, the divisive vote bank politics of inflaming the communal divide between Hindus and Muslims, and even abandoning its own ‘sons of the soil’ credo by integrating the Marathas and non-Maharashtrians and immigrants from other states who had settled over many decades, who had all become the warp and woof of the social, cultural and economic landscape of that truly vibrant and great city, a multi-cultural mix and adventurous spirit of the local population melding with the immigrants that had made Mumbai the business capital of India going back decades. Sadly, before all that could be delivered, his brief and tenuous tenure was upended by a rebellion from within his own party, unseating him.

It was not only a murderous and destructive policy that the Shiv Sena had espoused and pursued in its heyday, which would have in time ruined Maharashtra by tearing apart the very fabric of society, it was also a very pig-headed, self-destructive policy for the party itself.

Even a greenhorn in politics can see that the development of a state and the harnessing and realisation of the finest impulses of one’s people — in economic wellbeing, art and culture — in the widest sense of those words are possible only if there’s communal harmony and peace and true democracy.

And the electorate is unforgiving when it exercises its franchise. Though it may seem that it does err now and then in hoisting the wrong party or an immoral politician into power, from a sufficient distance and height, it becomes evident that it has an unerring and uncanny instinct and boots out parties and people who are blinded by greed and power and rule by extremes. When ruling parties divide societies by appealing to baser instincts, employing religious bigotry or wooing religious and caste minorities through appeasement vote bank politics, or brazen corruption and venal politics of the worst kind, by betraying the mandate of the people by switching parties, the people have taught them a lesson by stripping them of their power.

Now, enter Eknath Shinde.

What will be his politics? Will he be a mere rubber stamp of the BJP and do its bidding? Will he and his rebels subsume themselves into the folds and ideology of the BJP, which wants to remain the pre-eminent political outfit that has arrogated to itself the right to represent the belief systems of all Hindus? If he extinguishes the identity of the Shiv Sena to cling to power, abjectly unable to extricate himself from the bear hug of the BJP, he will create the political space for Uddhav Thackeray to ride back to power by stoking the Shiv Sainiks’ Maratha pride. His chair is more wobbly than Uddhav’s. His days ahead are full of pitfalls. Eknath has been catapulted to the CM’s throne by shrewd manipulation and sheer good fortune. It will be the BJP that takes the credit or discredit for what he does. For it holds the strings of real power.

There are pressing issues in Maharashtra for the new government — the farmers’ crisis and distress, corruption, including in the Mumbai municipal body, largely ruled by the Sena, the terrible infrastructure of Mumbai, and the poor economy of the state, which is suffering from inequity, and the Naxal problem, mishandled by successive governments.

Uddhav Thackeray was asked if he had given up his Hindutva plank in view of his tie-up with secular parties when he came to power. He said very shrewdly, “No. I will follow the secular ethos and principle laid down in the Constitution.”

Unluckily, his rule was cut short by the politics of bed-hopping.

Ronald Reagan, the former President of the US, quipped in his inimitable style, “It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.”

(The writer is a soldier, farmer and entrepreneur)