Updated: November 4, 2020 7:34:24 am
Suhas Palshikar spoke on Zoom with Vandita Mishra, National Opinion Editor, The Indian Express
On what is at stake in the elections in Bihar, in the Center and in the state
This election has something very important, because five years ago, when after the first victory of the BJP under the leadership of Narendra Modi came the election of Bihar, the BJP could not do very well. At the time, this forward march of the BJP was said to have stalled (which it was not, after Bihar, UP came along and the whole policy discourse changed). For the BJP now, it is a time of reckoning, a time of doing something they could not do in 2015, that is, win Bihar generously and with their strength. Of course, if NDA wins it would be a win for both JD (U) and BJP, but from the way the BJP operates, it’s pretty clear that they would say that the JD (U) overlapped and therefore will be BJP’s. . victory. That statement would not be completely wrong. Thus, in these elections, Prime Minister Modi’s reputation as someone who can win state elections is at stake. At stake is the reputation and political future of someone like Nitish Kumar, who has survived many ups and downs and has managed to be Prime Minister for 15 years. And all the politics that Lalu Prasad started is also at stake.
One, the choice of Bihar is important because India is experimenting with continuing a democratic political process even in the face of a very dire pandemic. Two, it is important to the BJP. Three, it will decide the kind of politics and the future of politics that Lalu Prasad started three decades ago.
On recasting Lalu Prasad’s social justice policy into Tejashwi Yadav’s economic justice policy
What Tejashwi is probably doing is neutralizing both the BJP and Nitish Kumar. But if I did it sincerely, if I followed it later, it would actually be a paradigm shift, not just in Bihar but in the way we understand politics. Social justice politics, or Mandal politics, as it was known then, has outlived its role, and today it is only the label that stands out. Two contradictions emerged in the social justice policy. One was that a policy of only one predominant backward community emerged. In the case of UP and Bihar, it was the Yadav, and outside of their politics, many other preeminent political castes in the west and north of India are now emerging and calling for reservations as well. The other contradiction was: social justice, even the word itself, never really excluded the question of economics. But some of us who have been advocates of social justice misunderstand it as if the economy doesn’t matter at all, and as long as there is pratishtha, as long as there is status, as long as there is prestige, through the oppressed caste, all is well. Mayawati probably made that mistake at some point in UP too. If Tejashwi, due to political compulsions, is now shifting gears, I think there is a possibility of reformulating the policy.
On whether a consequence of this recasting has been that the parties apparently turn away from Muslims
There are so many complications involved in this. Yes, the policy of social justice opened possibilities for greater representation by oppressed communities. But at the same time, why then did we have to make a distinction between the backward and the most backward? The reason is that the most backward are the most backward not only because they are oppressed in the social sense of the term, but also in the economic sense of the term. Nothing could be further from the truth than the fact that Muslims from Bihar and UP or from many other states are predominantly equivalent to the so-called OBC at least, if not the SCs. But to have them excluded not only from the social justice discourse, but also from the policy making that emerges from social justice … Why did someone like Nitish Kumar have to talk about Mahadalits? This speaks to us of the contradictions inherent in overemphasizing, in a singular way, the question of castes. The caste is useful when you have to commit atrocities against the lower communities, the caste is not enough to defeat the caste. And that is something that was lacking in the social justice policy of our three decades; correction is required. I don’t know how many politicians are willing to take the bait. If you see that you are deviating from that [social justice politics], he can very easily be accused of betraying his father’s legacy in the case of Tejashwi.
On the perceived potential of caste to undermine communalism
That is a difficult question. Lalu did it and we are always talking about how he stopped the Rath Yatra. He did so because for his social justice project he had no other way than to unite as backwards rather than as Hindus. But here are two things. One, history has shown over the past three decades that since the same backward communities, since the 1996-98 elections, a large portion of CBOs have been drawn to the BJP’s Hindutva politics. Second, even in the OBC’s own politics, there is an undertone of majorityism, which we often tend to ignore. The claim is not about delay, the claim is by the majority, we are a majority and, therefore, we should obtain a certain right. Look at what the Jats say, what the Marathas say in Maharashtra, what the Lingayats say in Karnataka. In a sense, the social justice agenda has failed to counter the mainstream politics of the Hindutva variety. In fact, it must have indirectly legitimized it.
On the historical role of Lalu Prasad
It is an election in which the architect of this new politics in Bihar is absent from the current political theater. That is Lalu. But it’s not just about Lalu’s social justice agenda, it’s not just about Lalu arresting LK Advani; It is more than that. You know, Lalu in his own right broke the Lutyens Delhi that Modi speaks so fondly of: Lalu was the first politician to understand Lutyens politics and he broke the threshold, stepped into it and made his politics the centerpiece. I say it not just as a personality, I don’t say it as a brave or old Lalu Prasad, I say it because that was actually the time when Indian politics was changing course and you had a contradiction. You had a policy in the style of Rajiv Gandhi, a policy in the style of Sam Pitroda, a scholarly policy in the style of Narasimha Rao, and at the same time, a very different policy, not just rustic: actually, rustic is not a very good word. for Lalu. just the rooting of his politics, but as a symbol of a different kind of politics. I wish politics had expanded. It is indifferent whether Lalu became important or not; it is indifferent whether Lalu could have become prime minister or not. What is important is this different kind of politics, because liberal democratic politics always has this tendency to become routine, predictable, and elitist. Although he also became an elite himself, Lalu changed the ideas of our elitism, he changed the ideas of our democratic politics. That is why Lalu is important. That’s not just Lalu, because then he was Mulayam, then he was Mayawati, and then, in a sense, he’s also Modi, in a very different way where he does politics.
So when the story is written I don’t know if he will be that nice to Manmohan Singh, but he will definitely have to be nicer to Lalu Prasad despite the fact that he has been indicted and convicted on certain charges. He hesitated and many politicians have failed like him, but even though he hesitated, there would still be a qualitative difference between Lalu and his arch rival Nitish. Ultimately there would be a difference between the two.
Questions from the audience
On conventional satta parivartan (power shift) versus the need for vyawastha parivartan (systemic shift)
Fundamental question, and my really superfluous answer would be that all vyawastha parivartan has to happen through satta parivartan in democratic politics. If we were thinking of democracy, then we should not imagine a dichotomy between the two. I agree that this dichotomy exists and therefore our task as citizens is actually to find ways to close the gap, but cutting these two and then imagining systemic change is impossible. Even the great national mentor who emerged from Bihar, Jayaprakash Narayan, who wanted the so-called vyawastha parivartan, had to dedicate himself at the end of his life to satta parivartan in order to have vyawastha parivartan.
On the opinion expressed that the sufferings of people in the pandemic could harm JD (U) more than BJP
The BJP and the current government are politically very astute. Therefore, they do not worry about the suffering of the migrants, but they make sure afterwards that a supposed package is announced and the goodwill of the Indian government and its leadership will remain intact. Furthermore, as the largest party, the BJP will always be interested in ensuring that its state partners are vilified rather than itself. So if that happens in Bihar, it would be an advantage for the BJP, because what happens then is that a migrant goes back to Bihar and he really thinks about the responsibility of the state government, rather than the government in Delhi. .
Transcribed by Mehr Gill (edited excerpts)
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