BJP’s succession blues

It must hurt Lal Krishna Advani to be called a “rancid pickle” by someone young enough to be his son. It must hurt to be called a liar by a former cabinet colleague after they fell out over Jinnah. It must hurt to be told by one’s ideological mentors that one should step down from the party one helped build from scratch. The loneliness of being Bhishma pitamaha in a party like the BJP is truly unenviable. 

No one, least of all Advani, can be in any doubt that the party needs new faces, younger leaders. But the intriguing question is this: why are democratic parties like his unable to handle succession with grace when dynasties, caste-based parties and Stalinist cabals are able to do it easily enough? Even after an electoral drubbing, the Communists are carrying on as though nothing happened, but the BJP — which continues to do well in many states — is all at sea.

The party is washing its dirty linen in public and by the time the succession issue is finally settled, it may be months, if not years. Why does a party like the BJP find it so difficult to practice the discipline of inner party democracy? Why can’t it simply solve its succession problems by holding an election instead of hoping to get a leader anointed from above?

It must be something in the Indian character. We are afraid of the outcome of democracy. We are afraid that if we make party elections a free-for-all, we may end up with someone unexpected. In short, we are more fearful of change than we need be. Which is why in our transition from feudal society to modern democracy, we have stopped for shelter with caste-based and dynastic parties. Barring the BJP and the Communists, all Indian parties are run by dynasties or caste-based aggregations, or both. There is almost no exception.

Why is this so? The answer lies in the nature of caste as an institution. Unlike many others, I don’t believe caste is only about hierarchy and oppression. It was created as a social cocoon to protect its members from the winds of change. It was intended to give communities a sense of permanence when the world around them was experiencing rapid, possibly frightening, change.

Just as religion today provides a refuge to people anxious about the pace of modernisation and globalisation, caste performed — and continues to perform — the same function in India. This explains why despite the entry of religions like Christianity and Islam, caste still rules.

In fact, the threat from these two religions ended up strengthening caste. Caste is like the shell of the tortoise. When faced with predators, the tortoise withdraws into its shell. Caste was the protective shelter under which the Indic peoples withdrew when confronted with the radical new ideologies of Christianity and Islam. So successful has caste been as protector, that even the others have adopted it. Caste now permeates Indian Islam and Christianity, not to speak of Sikhism, Buddhism and Jainism. Put another way, caste is a force independent of Hinduism.

This digression into caste was essential to make this point: centuries of caste-based protection has made Indians reluctant to change. They are afraid to abandon the old, even when it had outlived its utility. We change leaders only when there is no option, and even then we fret about it. We prefer feudal leadership to open democracy because the former gives us a sense of permanence while the latter brings us the threat of change. This is why the RSS, with its feudal and paternalistic culture, is easily able to replace old leaders without fuss, but its more democratic affiliate, the BJP, is not.

The BJP is the oddball in Indian politics. It is the only party apart from the Communists which does not encourage dynasties. Take any state, and you will see only dynasties. Kashmir? The Abdullahs. Tamil Nadu? The Karunanidhi and Maran clans. Maharashtra? The Pawars and Chavans. UP? Mulayam and son. Bihar? It’s the only state where an arrested CM elevated his unlettered wife as successor. Punjab? The Badals rule the roost.

Orissa? Naveen, son of Biju, is king. The Congress is, of course, the ultimate dynastic party having had a succession programme running from the early 20th century to now, from Motilal Nehru to Rahul Gandhi.

Dynasties work in India because they have a reassuring leadership structure. Caste-based parties also work because castes have a way of creating patriarchies and their own way of organising succession. What we do not have is a democratic way of succession planning. We are still afraid to let the people decide what they want.

In a way, Advani is paying the price for it. The insults hurled at him are not really intended to hurt: they are an expression of frustration from the young. “Rancid pickle” is the party’s way of saying the succession should have been organised better.