Since 2022 is the 75th anniversary of India’s Independence, a broader canvas is called for than the usual year-end power list. A shortlist of those who had the most impact in shaping India’s political destiny since 1947 seems more appropriate. Space constraints compel me to limit myself to four names.
If there was a single politician responsible for the OBC reservation quota, he or she would have been included. But the broad-based and more representative ruling class that has emerged today, compared to the tiny left-leaning, upper-caste, liberal elite which dominated in the early years of the Republic, is not due to any single individual.
Jawaharlal Nehru’s inclusion in the list is of course a no-brainer, even if today’s sarkari brains trust focuses only on his negative aspects. Nehru grandiloquently and unnecessarily internationalised the Kashmir issue. His preachy, moralistic, non-aligned foreign policy did not benefit India in practical terms. A supposedly friendly China trod over India’s unprepared army. Nehru’s socialism mantra bequeathed a white elephant public sector, which slowed economic growth by decades and fueled corruption. But this is outweighed by his many achievements. He paved the way for a genuine democracy, establishing constitutional institutions to act as checks and balances to the legislature, at a time when many leaders in newly independent nations took the dictatorship route. Nehru’s vision of India envisaged elite institutions of higher education, scientific progress in space, nuclear science etc. He amended unequal Hindu personal laws, but failed to bite the bullet and introduce a Universal Civil Code. His interpretation of secularism was that minorities needed a special space to feel secure.
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Indira Gandhi was far less democratically and ideologically driven than Nehru. She once candidly explained her philosophy to her son Sanjay: “The question is not of right or left but a struggle for power’’. And she was skilled in the machinations of wielding power. She steered India towards authoritarian rule by surrounding herself with sycophantic courtiers. Even judges were expected to toe the government line. The venerable, inclusive Congress party became the fiefdom of the Nehru-Gandhi family, setting the template for most other political parties. Her darkest hour was the imposition of Emergency; her finest moment the decisive defeat of Pakistan in 1972.
Another stalwart who changed the course of modern Indian history is seldom given his due. Narasimha Rao’s own Congress party disowned him so completely, that even his coffin was not allowed entry into the party headquarters. Rajiv Gandhi’s cocky young acolytes once dismissed Rao as a ditherer. But when Rao was unexpectedly elevated as prime minister, he succeeded in accomplishing what even the modern thinking Rajiv Gandhi hesitated to attempt. Faced with a looming economic meltdown, Rao, ably assisted by his finance minister Manmohan Singh, began the process of liberalising an economy shackled by longstanding suspicion of private enterprise, demolishing the license-quota raj and opening up the economy. Today’s generation will have difficulty visualising the deprivation days of my childhood. We, Midnight’s Children, though middle class and city dwellers, missed out on many of the consumer luxuries now taken for granted – from cheese and sliced bread to ketchup and chocolate bars. In the semi-socialist era, we were accustomed to long queues and waiting lists for all sorts of goods and services from gas cylinders and watches to cars, scooters and cement. It was mandatory for every visitor returning from abroad to fill up his suitcases with “phoren” stuff for friends and family.
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Because Narendra Modi has sharply polarised Indian society, his critics generally fail to give him his due. No non-Congress prime minister before him wielded such enormous power. Vajpayee, for instance, constantly looked over his shoulder for the reactions of his allies and the RSS. Modi, by securing an absolute majority in two consecutive polls, is in a league of his own. He has transformed his party into a full-time election machine out to decimate all rivals, both within and outside the ruling party, riding roughshod over the conventional rules of the game. Even the RSS has become an appendage, not the driving force. It is a mistake to downplay Modi’s many achievements. The remarkably effective delivery system he has put in place at the grassroots through the anonymity of Aadhaar numbers has to a great extent done away with middlemen and leakages. His practical schemes such as gas cylinders, toilets, piped water and food grain doles have struck a chord with the voters. He succeeded in getting Parliament to strike down Article 370, the contentious provision that gave special status to Kashmir, with almost no debate. Wielding such absolute power comes at a price. His unabashed Hindutva agenda has made many Muslims insecure about their future in India. The Nehruvian vision of a liberal polity based on freedom of expression, a vibrant Parliament and the independence of constitutional bodies seems a Utopian dream.