How BJP Can Win Over its Enemy Nitish Kumar

So the run-up to upcoming general elections has started with some unpredictable scene. While the whole country was expecting this to be BJP Vs Congress Party war, a new face has made this fight multi-dimensional. Officially JDU and Nitish Kumar say that they have nothing in common with and will never ally with Congress Party. But the manner in which Nitish Kumar is attacking Narendra Modi with intensity increasing with proximity to the general elections, his actions are proving different than his words.
 

The best strategy for Congress Party is to make NDA allies fight each other because it can’t win next elections on the basis of its performance. It can only win if there is no one to challenge it. The biggest alleys of Congress are some of the most corrupt political parties and dynasties, be it Mayawati, Mulayam, DMK or NCP. In fact now UPA led by Congress Party is considered synonym with political corruption in India. Therefore it was important for the sake of the nation that all opposition parties with integrity should unite and give a tough fight to the Congress party. Alas, this is far from what is happening!
 

Nitish Kumar has been acting as an agent of Congress Party. His histrionics against Narendra Modi looks so ugly that it is but natural that his own personal integrity would be starting to be questioned. What does Bihar’s CM got to do with the CM of a faraway state which does not even share boundaries with it? People have failed to understand this and it will not be late when they will realize the truth behind Nitish’s veiled attack on Modi.
 

Nitish Kumar plays minority vote bank politics. His goal is to steal Muslim voters from going towards any other party especially Laloo’s RJD. Biased favors, policies and schemes made with communal vote bank politics in mind, state sponsored racial and communal discrimination – these are the less known sides of his so falled “Bihar’s growth story”. This is the dark side of his government and such communal politics is forcing him to attack Narendra Modi with the assumption that Muslims will love it.
 

JDU has 115 seats in Bihar assembly while BJP has 91. In the last elections, JDU added 27 seats while BJP won 36 new seats. In fact the speed at which BJP is gaining ground in Bihar, is also one of the worries of shrewd politician like Nitish Kumar.
 

So what should the BJP do to pacify Nitish’s attack? It should ask for what is its right. All across India when two equal parties make a coalition, there is also a fair sharing of power. Why should Nitish Kumar alone enjoy the CM’s Chair? Why should not there also be a CM from the BJP? I am sure if BJP demanded its right to have its own CM for rest of the term, Nitish Kumar will be forced to come down to fair terms.
 

Disclaimer: Views expressed are personal and are in no way linked to any organization associated with the author. The purpose of the article is for solely academic and brain storming purpose and there is no attempt to attack or malign the name of any party or person. In case of any complaints on this article or blog, please use the Guest Book entry.

Indian Democracy is Faulty on Caste and Religious Lines

I think our democracy is faulty because it has been exploited on religious and caste lines. It does not matter by which party, because if a fault line exists someone or the other will exploit it.
 

Ideally we should have declared a state religion after a separate nation was created for followers of Mhd. Since we chose a difficult path, religious minorities became vote banks and Hindus had to live with minority appeasements and also we keep seeing communal riots.
 

Next, caste politics decides who is going to win in most of the seats. The caste based politics stemmed from politics of payoffs by quota and other benefits. All our reservations, subsidy, and scholarships should have been for poor people below poverty lines irrespective of castes. But we made open casteism our state politics and hence worst kind of people came over to rule us, exploiting us by divide and rule policy!
 

I think there is no pride in the fact that our democracy is being exploited by petty people by dividing us on caste and religious lines. I know almost every wrong thing can be attributed to the dynasty ruling us, but I believe if they did not do it then someone else would have done it. We should stop state sponsored casteism and religious discrimination. Then only politics of growth will remain and India will see real growth…

Railway’s Kumbh Mela Surcharge is like Jazia Tax

Ever since Kumbh Mela has started this year 2013 at ancient city Prayag, TV News channels and print media have been bringing out many reports on the arrangements done by the government to facilitate the pilgrims. Everything was going alright and peacefully and the whole nation was getting tremendous positive energy by the good atmosphere created by the Kumbh. But then, as if in an anti-climax, an accident happened at Allahabad railway station which distressed all of us. But reading even little about the accident brings out many hidden truths:
 

Indian Railways had imposed Rs 5-20 tax called Mela Surcharge on everyone using its facility to reach to the Kumbh Mela. The surcharges are as follows:
 

Sleeper: Rs 5

AC Chair Car: Rs 10

3AC: Rs 10

2AC: Rs 15

1AC: Rs 20

The Target for Railways was: Rs 1000 Crores of Profit during the Kumbh Mela!
 

It was a shocking revelation that Indian Railways imposed a tax on Hindu pilgrims for completing their pilgrimage!!! Though there is some business logic in it – how could the Railways provide additional and exceptional services to the huge number of people traveling if it did not charge more? Total 10 Crore people were expected to visit the Kumbh and the number of foreign visitors is expected to be 10 Lakh! But the manner, in which the accident was handled, exposes the Railways to the core:
 

The Times of India reports that Railways had released only 50 medical boxes for the lakhs of passengers expected to come to the Allahabad Railway station on the Mauni Amavasya day. And when the accident happened, these boxes were nowhere to be found! And how did the accident happen in the first place?
 

The railway station was totally packed with lakhs of outstation pilgrims (who were forced by the authorities to leave the riverside immediately after taking the holy dip and hence had come to the railway station to travel to their places). Trains were running as late as 20 hours and were all packed. A train was expected to come at Platform number 4 but suddenly Railways announced that the train was arriving on Platform number 6! People rushed to change the platforms using the bridge. Then GRP (Government Railway Police) then lathi-charged (caned) the pilgrims to control the crowd! This created a panic in commuters who ran and stampede happened… It is clear that this was a “man-made” disaster!
 

Why I say Railway’s Kumbh Mela Surcharge is like Jazia Tax because the Railways taxed pilgrims but failed to provide then facility! Minister  “In charge” Azam Khan has resigned from ministry but it is expected that after some weeks pass he will be inducted back into the Samajwadi Party government in UP. 36 people are dead and so many injured. It is immensely sad the way Railways and the Government have used Hindu Pilgrims as Cash Cows for monetary benefits…
 

References:

Times of India, “No justification for Railways’ Kumbh surcharge”, TNN | Feb 12, 2013, 04.55 AM

Jagran Post, “Railways increase Kumbh Mela surcharge from 1st January”, 07 Dec 2012, 08:47 PM

Times of India, “Crowd mismanagement, change of platform caused Kumbh stampede: Witnesses”,  Feb 12, 2013, 12.40 AM

Afzal’s Execution tells Congress is desperate and ready to Risk

“Terrorist Mohammed Afzal’s execution may indicate desperation in the Congress Party to come up well before general elections, but the risks it is taking may not be best for the nation”
 

So finally, after a long wait, terrorist Mohammed Afzal Guru met his destined fate of being met with capital punishment. At the time of posting this post, Congress leader Manish Tewari has accused principle opposition party BJP for playing politics over its criticism of delay in the hanging. That there has been a huge delay can’t be denied. We just have to look at the timeline:
 

Attack on Indian Parliament: December 13, 2001
Sentenced to death by the court in Delhi: December 18, 2002
Death sentence upheld by Delhi High Court: October 29, 2003
Appeal rejected by Supreme Court: August 4, 2005
Actual execution: February 9, 2013

So the party in power can’t accuse the principle opposition party of playing the role of an opposition party. Finding fault lines in the govt is one of the main jobs of an opposition party. This verbal-war aside, the execution itself reveals disturbing truths about the way government is headed towards.
 

During the last 2009 General Elections, BJP had made Afzal’s hanging case a poll issue. It fared miserably in moving the masses and channelizing the voters on the issue of terrorism. By this time, Afzal’s issue was not even able to raise the brow of the voters. So the probability that the issue of pending-execution of Mohammed Afzal would have created some big difference in the upcoming general elections would be a far-fetched vision. So what made the Congress party go for it suddenly and unexpectedly?
 

One reason was to preempt BJP from keep citing pending execution as a failure of government and as a proof of minority appeasement politics which Congress Party plays. Narendra Modi often cited Afzal’s case as a big failure of govt, which would have been in the mind of Congress strategists for some time now. Then Dr. Subramanian Swamy had threatened to pull Manmohan Singh govt to the court, claiming that no-execution was equivalent to insult of the Supreme Court’s order! Then there can be a reason that Congress party always wanted to hang Afzal but the law and order situation was bad and hence had waited for a peaceful spell to thwart any hazard or riots and communal violence. Nothing can be far from the truth than this!
 

Over the last few months, the law and order situation and communal harmony has not been at its best. There was an atrocious attack from Pakistan side where the beheaded one of the Indian soldiers and took the head away (which they never gave back despite Indian side ‘asking’ for it). Then Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde made a provocative and colorful allegation on the BJP-RSS of so called terrorism, which resulted in charged moments. Lately, an FIR was filed against Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Dr. Praveen Togadia for so called “hate speech” when he tried to offer a reply to the hate mongering Owaisi. Just when everything was going from bad to worse, govt came up with this execution which resulted in some protests in the Kashmir valley. By all logic, Congress Party was not to lose a lot but would have won some minority votes if it kept Afzal’s execution pending. If it won the next elections, it could have gone ahead with the execution to honor the spirit of the law.
 

What this decision tells most is that the Congress Party is desperate to preempt the opposition parties from having any valid poll-matter. Then, perhaps more importantly it is a clever maneuvering of national psyche where systematically the government is trying to alter the mood of the nation towards anything other than the “real issues”. For how many days now “corruption” has not been in the news? The plan it seems is to keep people engaged and distracted in other issues which can make them forget the rampant corruption cases and scandals which used to break out till a few weeks back. The decision also tells that the govt is ready to take risk for its strategy. It is ready to risk communal harmony in order to win smaller brownie points which may not be in best interests of the nation.

Why Should BJP Declare its PM Candidate

“Will VHP endorse Narendra Modi for PM’s post at Kumbh?” This is a prominent headline in Hindustan Times today. Same is the case with all prominent news media, be it the newspapers or the TV news channels. All are busy focusing on Narendra Modi and speculating on whether he will be declared as BJP’s or NDA’s Prime Ministerial Candidate during the ongoing Kumbh Mela. And a lot of hype has been built around it. The suspicious part is that this whole “campaign” is media devised!
 

The timing of the campaign is much revealing. The campaign was started around the time Rahul Gandhi was declared Vice President of Indian National Congress (popularly called Congress Party) and the news became butt of a joke with people from all quarters ridiculing him and his credentials. Congress Party became uncomfortable, especially with the popular sentiment at the social networking sites and designed its own counter-propaganda initiatives to correct the poor image of Nehru/Gandhi dynasty scion. But the party could not find answer to the one question which was underlying everything, “Does Rahul Gandhi has it in him to become PM some day?” It was from this question, that a need arose to “divert” public attention away from the PM Candidate of Congress Party. Making the focus being diverted to BJP/NDA was a very logical choice. The fact that there were multiple contenders of the post from within BJP/NDA, gave it its much desired leverage.
 

Any discussion to declare Narendra Modi as PM’s candidate would certainly ruffle feathers of a lot of other contenders from within the BJP/NDA. And this media-fed campaign did produce the dividends for Congress Party. Internal fissures within NDA came to the forefront. JDU’s shrewd politician Nitish Kumar was encouraged to further his anti-Modi stance to win some more Muslim voters. BJP came out strongly in favor of Narendra Modi to silence Nitish somehow. Next, NDA’s key ally and an opposite pole of minority-politics player JDU, Shiv Sena came out in the support of Sushma Swaraj. News channels found it easier to keep stretching this campaign for Narendra Modi because of Kumb Mela. Modi’s recent visit to a college in New Delhi (SRCC) to address students was hyped by the media as if it was address to the nation of a future Prime Minister. Everything is falling in the line of what Congress wants!
 

Because of multiple contenders for PM’s role, if BJP/NDA wins the next general elections, it is logically in the best interests of the party to not declare its PM Candidate in advance. Its focus should be on the wrong-doings of the Congress led UPA government’s misdeeds and failures and it should come out as “one team” against the incumbent. Therefore any discussion on “Who should BJP declare its PM Candidate?” is counterproductive to BJP/NDA’s interests. But logically what is wrong for the BJP is good for the Congress Party and using its network and leveraging its power position, the Congress Party is trying to keep the national attention on BJP’s candidate instead of its own!
 

Now the biggest question is: Will the Indian Public look through this design or will they be fooled by the Media barons?

India Against Corruption (IAC) Vs Aam Aadmi's Party (AAP)

Finally, Arvind Kejriwal and team have thought of a name to their political outfit. It has been named "Aam Aadmi Party" (or Common Man's Party). Here are my thoughts on this development:

In a way I am happy that we did not repeat a historical event (mistake in the opinion of many). Indian National Congress (INC) was by and large a political organization to unite and channelize nationalists efforts to ensure freedom of India from the British. When India achieved independence in 1947, many proposed that this party should be dissolved and a new party with a new name may be floated which can take part in the democratic process of a living democracy of post-independent Bharat. But somehow this did not happen and we still have a political party in the same name of Indian National Congress (INC) whose several members have been accused of numerous large scale corruption charges and scandals. In a way it pains us to see the name of Congress party which is inseparable from our freedom struggle and with Mahatma Gandhi, to be regressed and defamed in this manner. The good thing with Anna Hazare's anti-corruption movement called India Against Corruption is that it has not allowed its name being used to start a political party separate from its own agenda.

India Against Corruption (IAC) was by and large an organization identified with two things: (1) To demand Jan Lokpal Bill from the government, (2) A social movement against corruption in government and government organizations. Also, IAC has been identified with social activist Anna Hazare and other leaders like Kiran Bedi also played important part in it. By the time it accepted failure in securing Jan Lokpal Bill, Arvind Kejriwal almost individually eclipsed it. The IAC Brand was gradually shifting from being identified by hugely popular, and "saint like" Anna Hazare, towards sharp, retorting, reactive and "aggressive" Arvind Kejriwal. The brand transition happened with every passing day and increased at mammoth pace ever since Arvind Kejriwal started his own political party. Some even felt that whole people's movement started by IAC has been "abducted" by him. I salute Anna Hazare's leadership, clear vision and boldness to demand that Kejriwal should stop using IAC's name and brand, given that their ways have gone the separate ways. Therefore, it is satisfying for people like me to see that Arvind Kejriwal has announced a new name for the political party - Aam Aadmi Party. (Though I still see much harm and dilution done to IAC's brand due to being used by Kejriwal's political outfit so far.)

I was surprised at this name "Aam Aadmi Party" and initially I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw news about it on TV. The term "Aam Aadmi" has been used extensively by INC (Congress Party) during all these years and it looked like it was an attempt by Kejriwal & team to make a dig at it while using the term for their own political party's name. Now every time Congress leaders will call us "Aam aadmi", they will in a way take their rival's name. But I was in a way disappointed by Kejriwal & team. Choosing this name indicates their lack of vision and imagination. Could not they have named their party more 'appropriately' for better presentation and matching its vision? In a way, this over-zealousness to "steal" Congress party of its oft used term "Aam aadmi", Kejriwal & team became victims themselves of their negative politics. If you keep thinking about your rival or keep hating someone, gradually you become used by your own hatred. It appears to be a huge opportunity lost by Kejriwal & team to not being able to show some courage and imagination in naming their political party. If IAC and Anna Hazare's successes were also marketing case studies, then this name 'Aam Aadmi Party' comes as their poor cousin. 

The name "Aam Aadmi Party" is 2/3 Hindi and 1/3 English; perhaps ironically just like Kejriwal's politics is 2/3 "anti" things and only 1/3 as "pro" other things. It is typical of upstarts lacking vision in basing politics on the "anti" or the negative plank - it takes you only to an extent. I was also surprised how Kejriwal had the courage to accept this negative politics in naming his party openly in front of us. He made the following comment as published in today's TOI:

"Cong could never hijack the aam admi despite using the term 'aam admi'. Now they have lost the word too." - Arvind Kejriwal.

First, if his "hijacking" means making people of this country believe in the party and its vision, then Congress party did it successfully! The party is still in power and has enjoyed power for all these years. If Kejriwal thinks that the party "could never hijack" aam admi, then why did the aam admi elected Congress to remain in power for all these years? Obviously, Kejrwal sees things differently, which can be called hallucinating perhaps at times. 

This politics of "hijack" has weird dimensions. Hindustan Times has this article titled "Arvind Kejriwal ‘hijacks’ Cong’s aam aadmi". It is widely seem that Kejriwal "hijacked" the term "aam aadmi" from Congress party either to enjoy making fun of them (as can be seen in the comments from Digvijay Singh and Manish Tewari), or it was named like this because Kejriwal and team could not think of any better name. On any account, it looks like a huge opportunity loss. 

For the man who was accused of "hijacking" Anna Hazare's social movement for his own political agenda to hijack IAC to start a political party, it is ironical to see him boasting that he has "hijacked" the term Congress party used so many times. 

Anyways, I am happy that finally India Against Corruption (IAC) brand is free from being used by Kejriwal and his team for their political party. We had lost the moment once when we allowed Indian National Congress (INC) brand being used in the post-independence era, and glad that this time there was a man who did not allow history to be repeated for the wrong - Anna Hazare. 

- Rahul

Note: Views are personal and do not represent views of any organization associated with the author. [Detailed disclaimer]

What India thinks of Kejriwal

Ever since Arvind Kejriwal took the controversial decision to turn into a politician and start a new political party (which will subsequently fight all Lok Sabha seats after making a beginning with Delhi Assembly elections), he seems to have lost much of his fan base. Though it is also controversial to say that even before joining politics he enjoyed so much fan following personally, because most of his fans of today are basically followers and admirers of Anna Hazare who had to stop his non-political social movement against corruption because of unknown reasons. Many people blame Mr. Kejriwal's political ambitions for breaking up and failure of Anna Hazare's anti-corruption movement also. No matter what, it is certain that after joining politics, Kejriwal has lost many admirers. 

Let us see what India's best achievers, leaders of their fields who are looked up to by young Indians, are speaking about M. Kejriwal and his "brand" of politics: 

Deepak Parikh, Chairman of HDFC Bank

Deepak Parikh said, "I think the manner in which he (Kejriwal) is going about is not right. When asked whether he would help Kejriwal if he seeks his advice on economic policy matters, Parekh said he will never do so and would never vote for his candidates as he does not approve of the way he is going about with his plans. Parekh also slammed the media for incessant coverage of Kejriwal & Co. and asked it to report other important issues. "I would like to blame you, the media...you have nothing else to report other than Kejriwal. Why do you give so much of importance to all this? Give us some news, don't tell us what Kejriwal said," Parekh said. [Ref1], [Ref2], [Ref3]

Nandan Nilekani, Chairman of Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and former CEO and MD of Infosys

Nandan Nilekani said that he does not believe Arvind Kejriwal‘s style of fighting against corruption is good for India and especially slammed Kejriwal for focusing his campaign on grabbing TV talktime and eyeballs. He said, “The notion (that) you can bring corruption by having bunch of OB vans, I think that’s not going to solve the problem.”There is a lack of appreciation of the long term institutional and systematic changes required to get to the desired goals, he added. “I’m as much for fighting corruption as the next guy. But, I certainly don’t believe that by passing a law or putting more penalties on bureaucrats or creating more inspectors is going to solve the corruption problem. That’s absolutely the wrong prescription,” he said. [Ref1], [Ref2]

NR Narayana Murthy, founder and ex-CEO of Infosys

NR Narayana Murthy has revealed that he had spurned a request last month from Arvind Kejriwal, the activist-turned-politician, to fund his political activities. "Mr Kejriwal approached me in September 2012 asking for financial assistance, I declined. I have not financially supported Mr Kejriwal's political activities," Murthy said. "Mr Arvind Kejriwal approached me in 2008 to donate money to raise awareness about the RTI Act by instituting awards to recognise the contribution of public information officers, public information commissioners, NGOs and citizens. I agreed to give Rs 25 lakh a year for five years and requested Tatas to contribute an equal sum, which Tata Social Welfare Trust was kind enough to agree," the statement said. In all, the Infosys founder contributed over Rs 1 crore between 2008 and 2011 for RTI related work. [Ref1], [Ref2], [Ref3]

Javed Akhtar, veteran poet, lyricist and scriptwriter

Javed Akhtar hit out Kejriwal hard during the event Agenda Aaj Tak 2012, accusing him of being like a journalist, pointing out problems but with no solutions. [Ref1], [Ref2]. Javed Akhtar wondered if Arvind Kejriwal's dislike and non-belief was in a particular set of politicians or all politicians and accused him of not believing in the system including India's constitution and the parliament. He said that he would believe what BJP or Congress leaders say because they have been elected by the people of India, but Arvind Kejriwal has self proclaimed to be people's voice and uses undemocratic means to demand what he believes is good for India. At the near end of his speech, Javed Akhtar challenged Arvind Kejriwal, asking him to visit Pakistan once and when he would return to India, he would love our nation. 

Note: Views are personal and do not reflect views of any person or organization associated with the author.