The red herrings in Indian politics

It is unfair to blame the mindless television news channels for staging mock battles of ideas on the so-called burning issues of the day. And it cannot be blamed on politicians, the usual scapegoats of all that is rotten in the country, either. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and finance minister Pranab Mukherjee sincerely believe that foreign direct investment in multi-brand retail will take India to the next level of economic growth. Bharatiya Janata Party mentor LK Advani is not deceiving himself or his party or the country when he says with all the authenticity at his command that getting back the black money that Indians have stashed in foreign banks is the burning issue of the day.

The maverick Gandhian agitator Anna Hazare thinks it is a self-evident axiom that the creation of a powerful Lokpal will drastically reduce the inflationary rate of corruption in the country. And there are enough articulate people on all sides to argue how each of these issues is important and how they need to put into action immediately because any delay will make life unbearable. There is no need to grudge these worthies on the national stage their falsetto flourishes. They want to do what is good for the country and that is an honourable thing to do.

There is, however, a catch in this rhetorical rigmarole. Every one of them is claiming that what they have singled out as the issue is the most important and that it is the most effective solution to the problem they have chosen to tackle. Take for example, the issue of FDI in retail. Both Singh and Mukherjee and their merry colleagues in government and in the Congress say that this is the best thing that can happen to the Indian farmer, consumer and unemployed rural hand.

But uncomfortable questions remain. There is a need to streamline the supply chain from field to shop to home. The question is whether the multi-national retail majors can really do this? And why are the Indian investors and capitalists unable to do this? And at this moment of financial crisis in the developed western world, how can there be financial flows from there to here? The premise on which the argument is based is shaky.

Turn to the demand for Lokpal, which Hazare and his cohorts — with a little help from the nitwits of civil society — argue at a time when people are worried about rising prices and falling job opportunities, that everything else can wait and an all-powerful Lokpal should be set up forthwith. Their moral passion drowns out the little rationality that they can muster to argue their case. But it is not so difficult to see that Lokpal is not the do-or-die issue that it is made out to be, and that corruption can be fought quite effectively within the existing framework. But the Lokpal janissaries will brook no delay or opposition. What is more evident is their rage rather than the good that a Lokpal could possibly bring.

The demand to retrieve black money being made by Messrs Advani and his BJP lieutenants from foreign banks is as bad as the one being made for FDI in retail and for Lokpal. Black money is really a non-issue at the moment. It is a long-term process and it requires patient and persistent pursuit. It makes for an attractive political slogan but does not solve ordinary people’s immediate problems.

The claim on all these issues — FDI in retail, Lokpal and black money in foreign banks — is that it will revive the country from the troubled economic and political situation. Here is where the lie creeps in quite unnoticed and the political — Hazare and his band are politicians too in the same way that Singh, Mukherjee and Advani are — ploy reveals itself. There is no need to blame Singh, Mukherjee, Advani and Hazare for playing politics because it is their trade. The rest of us have to listen to them but not believe what they say.

Politicians generally sense the pressing problem vexing the people and set themselves to address it and in the process win the approval of the people. But now politicians are choosing problems they want to solve in their own way and pretend that these problems are indeed the main concern of the majority. In this battle of nerves and wits, one group of politicians is keen to outwit the other. Singh and Mukherjee want to edge out Advani and Hazare, Advani wants to score over Hazare and Congress, and Hazare thinks that he would like to push out the rest of the politicians and strike the jackpot of success and fame. For the people, the agendas of politicians remain red herrings far removed from the real problems they face at the moment.