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In the halcyon days immediately following Independence and for some
years thereafter, it was often said that "India is Bharat that is
Uttar Pradesh." At the time the people of other states in the
country had reason to feel jealous of UP's pre-eminence and the
lead it provided in national affairs. No longer does this state of
affairs exist. Today, most aspects of life in UP are an object of
contempt and ridicule. The Union home minister, Indrajit Gupta,
himself stated on the floor of the Lok Sabha very recently that UP
was heading for "anarchy, chaos and destruction." His later
"clarification" in the Rajya Sabha that he was referring to
political anarchy, social chaos and economic destruction, hardly
improved matters. Now UP is all set to point the way to another
political "experiment" which promises to be even more problematic
and convoluted than the coalition experiences of recent years. The
new BJP-BSP alliance has come up with the idea of a rotating chief
minister every six months, the only way they could forge an
understanding to take over the reins of power in this already
deeply troubled state.
Most people had thought that by the early Nineties, UP had reached
its nadir. They had plainly not reckoned with the infinite
capacity of the political leaders in this state, aided and abetted
by pliant bureaucrats, to plunge the state into political, economic
and social turmoil. This has had a devastating impact on complex
ground realities. The failure of the UF coalition government in
Delhi to provide any direction and remain supine when UP was being
systematically destroyed, has only compounded matters. Galloping
criminalisation under President's rule, with a compliant governor
functioning purely at the behest of his mentor in Delhi, has
virtually turned the state into a desolate desert. Little had been
expected from the present incumbent of the Raj Nivas in Lucknow,
and his past performances in Tripura and Goa were a pointer to the
fact that under bin UP's decline would only become accelerated, but
even his worst critics hardly expected him to function in such a
blatantly partisan manner. So much so that the governor had become
as much the problem as the problem-solver.
Much has been written about the state of law and order in the
state, but more cold statistics of the exponential growth (a nearly
30-40 per cent increase) in heinous offences like murder,
dacoities, road hold-ups, and robberies during President's rule can
hardly convey the gravity of the situation that prevails.
Pervasive fear stalks much of UP. There has been a total collapse
of law and order and the attempts of the governor and the state
administration to put a gloss on their poor record has not cut any
ice with people who face such dangers daily. Democratic norms and
principles of governance have been trampled upon bringing the state
to a near total collapse. Attempts such as moving the Supreme Court
seeking withdrawal of all pending cases against Phoolan Devi (now a
Samajwadi Party member of Parliament) as per the party leader's
directive, the refusal of permission to the CBI to prosecute former
Samajwadi Party health minister, Balram Yadav, in the Ayurveda Seam
are only the tip of the proverbial ice-berg. They are merely
indicative of the extent to which the administration under the
governor has blatantly interfered with the criminal justice system.
All these pale into significance before the effrontery displayed by
the governor in publicly contradicting (at a Press conference
called by him for this purpose) the Union home minister and his
assessment of the state of affairs in UP. Few people have doubts
that the governor would not have done so without the wholehearted
backing of the Union defence minister, and that he was only acting
as "proxy" for the latter who is separately engaged in
behind-the-scenes conflict with the Union home minister. Worse
still is that the Prime Minister has chosen to remain a mere
spectator to such goings-on and failed to intervene strongly on the
side of the home minister, thus giving an impression of siding with
the defence minister in the tussle within his Cabinet. Degradation
of the principles of democratic governance more than this can
hardly be envisaged.
The intelligentsia and the nation at large remain aghast at such
deliberate and wanton desecration of constitutional norms. This
gravely threatens the future of democratic polity not only in UP
but elsewhere as well, for it is to be expected that this will act
as a catalyst for others in the future. If the home minister's
estimate of the situation in a state under President's rule - made
with due solemnity in the course of a Parliamentary debate - can be
so nonchalantly challenged by a state satrap, and the home minister
is then forced to backtrack on account of intra-coalition
manoeuvrings and the exigencies of coalition politics, then the
Centre's image gets irreversibly damaged. Once a dignitary of the
standing of the home minister is belittled in this fashion, the
Centre cannot hope any longer to exercise any kind of moral or
other authority vis-a-vis a state government. This has far-reaching
consequences for a federal polity.
Equally dangerous is the emerging trend that with the rapid rise in
the influence and authority of regional political leaders in
national affairs, pre-eminence means disregarding of democratic
practices and denigrating of constitutional niceties to satisfy
personal whims and ambitions. It is indeed a sad day for Indian
democracy if a coalition government were to mean that a Prime
Minister cannot any longer exercise either his right or authority
as the "first among equals," or effectively intervene in a serious
crisis to ensure that democratic governance is sustained and
constitutional norms are observed.
There can be little doubt that all this is emasculating democracy
and the nation itself is threatened. The "original sin" was the
governor's refusal to call upon the BJP - as the largest single
party in the UP Assembly - to form the government openly flouting
the healthy practice followed by President Shanker Dayal Sharma in
May 1996. A series of constitutional "illegalities" have since been
perpetrated, including allowing President's rule to lapse after the
statutory period of six months and then reimposing it almost
immediately claiming that Article 356 was being invoked afresh. In
the name of upholding secularism, far more heinous constitutional
crimes have been committed creating a democratic wasteland. All
this has severely dented the image and prestige of a majority of UF
partners, who had come together in a coalition to ensure more
openness and transparency in government functioning.
The silence of some of the more urbane elements and parties in the
United Front, and their silent acquiescence in the "rape of
democracy" in UP is also deafening. The CPI, whose nominee, the
home minister, has been humiliated and worsted, has remained a mute
spectator. Neither the party's national council nor its central
secretariat has come out with any unequivocal statement condemning
what had taken place in UP and assailing the role of the governor,
specially since it related to so basic an issue as that of law and
order. The CPI(M) similarly has seen fit to maintain a stoic
silence, though this is perhaps less surprising considering that in
the debate over economic issues and the Budget, it remained long on
rhetoric but short on the specific steps needed to rectify the
situation. The bankruptcy of thought in the CPI(M) stands even
more fully exposed for even as the "command model" of the economy
is being demolished and the simulated battle between India Inc. and
Bharat seems to be going in favour of the former, it has been less
high and dry, limited to a few sputtering remarks about the
concessions granted to the rich at the expense of the poor by the
finance minister in his latest Budget.
The finance minister also needs to heed the message that comes out
of UP - a message that is loud and clear. Very recently, speaking
at a conference jointly organised by the Asia Society and CII, he
put forward the claim that a multi-party government was much better
placed than a single party government to carry out quality reforms.
According to him, the previous Congress government being a single
party government had been unable to implement the bulk of the
reforms because it could not arrive at a consensus with those
outside. One would like the finance minister to react to the vote
of "no-confidence" in the multi-party coalition's inability to
restore order and democracy in UP. Not only this, but it has
struck a body-blow as far as the economy of this state is
concerned. According to the figures available, less than eight per
cent of promises of new investments have been converted into
Letters of Intent in the past couple of years. All fresh
investments into the state have dried up. Most of the large
business groups who had made, or hoped to make, investments like
the Aditya Birla Group, the G.P. Goenka Group and the Eicher Group
have since pulled out of the state. With the bureaucratic
machinery having come to a grinding halt in UP, it is no longer so
much a "zero-sum" game as much as a "zero-investment" situation.
All that the multi-party government at the Centre has managed to do
for UP is to allow a central minister to rule over UP by "proxy"
through a pliant governor, and destroy the edifice of democracy in
India's most populous state.
It is imperative that all those involved in governance should at
least now understand the dangers arising from a dichotomy between
the real and an imagined situation. They should realise that while
talking about democracy, or for that matter mobility or flexibility
of the market place, and of principles and ideals, the truth is
that the majority are worried and despairing about the future.
M.K. NARAYANAN is former director-general of Intelligence Bureau
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