Harihar Swarup
The trend of dynastic succession has been visible in India for quite some time and it has touched an all time high in Madhya Pradesh where assembly elections are due in November this year. Sons and daughters of politicians, who have jumped in the political fray, unlike their parents, are well educated, articulate and dedicated but they lack experience. Take, for instance, son of former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Digvijaya Singh, who had joined Congress last week. The 27-year-old Jaivardhan, is an MBA degree holder from New York’s Colombia university and is likely to contest in the coming assembly election from his father’s pocket borough– Raghogarh.
Jaivardhan is part of Madhya Pradesh’s jet set, whose visibility in public functions has been on rise as assembly polls draw near. The group includes Pradesh Congress President, Kantilal Bhuria’s son, Vikrant, Industry Minister Kailash Vijayavargiya’s son, Akash, Vidhan Sabha Speaker Ishwardas Rohani’s son, Alok, Sports Minister Tuko Rao Pawar’s son, Vikram and a dozen other children of MLAs, Ministers and MPs.
A number of them, such as Jaivardhan and Vikram are from erstwhile royal families.
Younger progeny of leaders are in the process of being trained. For example son of Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan, Kartikey and Union Power Minister Jyotiradiya Scindia’s son, Mahanaryaman have just turned 18. Kartikey, a law student, runs a voter-awareness campaign in his father’s constituency. Mahanarayaman has already been addressing public meetings in Gwalior region.
There is no doubt that dynasties abound in India. In regions, there are powerful dynastic patriarchs, for instance, Mulayam Singh Yadav in North, M. Karunanidhi in South, and Naveen Patnaik in East. It has been estimated that that a little over 28 per cent of the current MPs are dynasts.
Indian politicians need a strong leader to keep them in order. There must be some in the BJP, who seeing the disarray in their leaderless party, wish Atal Behari Vajpayee had an heir. A reluctant dynast Sonia Gandhi played an important role in undermining authority of Narasimha Rao from behind the scenes. One wonders where the congress would have been, if she had not eventually decided to pull off a coup and take control of the family party.
With the passage of time, the nature and dynamics of these dynasties too changed. The nation watched with disdain how Lalu Prasad Yadav, who had to abdicate his chair, following his involvement in a multi-crore scam, brought his wife in his place. Now he has brought his son in politics with great fanfare.
Historians say it was not Nehru but his daughter who created the dynasty that now dominates the congress. Indira Gandhi brought Sanjay Gandhi in politics. When he died in a plane crash, she brought Rajiv Gandhi in public life.
Two stars-Akhilesh Yadav of the Samajwadi party and Sukhbir Singh Badal of the Shiromani Akali Dal-sparkled by steering their parties to impressive victories in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab respectively.
Badal senior was hardly visible, although he is the Chief Minister, as Sukhbir too charge and ran the campaign without the help of his father. That he managed the impossible, by bucking a historical trend and bringing an incumbent government back to power, has sealed succession debate within the party in his favour.
It has been evident for many years that politics has increasingly become a family business in India. But what the recent elections have emphasized is that political parties themselves have become family run companies to be handed over from father to son or daughter, as the case may be. Once upon a time only the Congress could be accused of running on dynasty levers. Now the same charge can be applied to parties across the political spectrum, except the BJP and the Left Parties.
Anyone who dares to challenge the succession line, even if he belongs to ruling family is cut to size swiftly. Raj Thackeray, nephew of the late Shiv Sena Chief Bal Thackeray, and Manpreet Badal, cousin to Sukhbir, were charged with anti-party activity and summarily expelled when they laid claim to leadership.
Down south, DMK Chief Karunanidhi is still trying to decide who to make his political heir, but since claimants are all direct descendents, no one has been axed. Karunanidhi has to choose between sons, Azhagiri and Stalin, and daughter Kanimozhi, who seems to have developed stronger political ambitions after her stint in jail.
DMK veterans, who defend Karunanidhi’s tenacious grip on power say, that Stalin is efficient but has none of his father’s charisma, oratorical skill or sense of drama. Even at 88, Karunanidhi thinks he has enough political fire in him to hang on to the DMK throne. Prince Stalin looks set for a long wait for the top post.
The new generation that is taking over is bringing with it interesting changes, usually for better. Akhilesh, for example, with his military school background and Australian post-graduate education, attempted a huge makeover of his party’s medieval image. Some of his decisions are well known, like laptop who finish class XII.
In Punjab, Sukhbir Badal did similar make-over. The old churidar-kurta clad, kripan carrying , Jathedar, who used to be face of Akali Dal in his father’s time, has made way for younger , well-educated , English speaking tech-savvy Sikhs. Sukhbir insisted that all his nominees start Face-book pages to keep in touch with voters. (IPA)
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