By Uma Ramachandran
India already has Mayawati as the chief minister of the largest state in the country. The elevation of Mamata Banerjee and Jayalalithaa, as chief ministers of West Bengal and Tamil Nadu respectively, has given a fillip to women power in politics.
Both won with a landslide, which their male counterparts did not manage in the recent assembly elections. Oomen Chandy formed a government by the skin of his teeth and Tarun Gogoi scored a hat-trick but without the runaway success the two women notched up.
Both won because they emerged as clear alternatives to the entrenched incumbent regimes in their states. Jayalalithaa was the beneficiary of the wave against corruption and nepotism in the Karunanidhi family.
Mamata, however, was the recipient of both a negative as well as a positive vote. She worked very hard for her victory, without giving up, even when she was down to only one Lok Sabha seat. She waged street battles, stormed into Nandigram and Singur. She was dragged out of Writer’s Building by her hair because she dared to demand justice for a rape victim. She was once wheeled into the Lok Sabha, covered in bandages, beaten allegedly by CPM cadres.
Both are highly unpredictable, and NDA leaders remember the runaround they gave the Atal Behari Vajpayee government in its early months in 1998. Mamata is mercurial, Jayalalitha more measured, though you cannot say what will upset the AIADMK supreme when.
Jayalalithaa, on the other hand, was hardly seen around in the last five years, often disappearing to her estate in Ooty for long spells.
Both women have come up the hard way. Jayalalithaa had to enter film industry to take care of her family, when she had really wanted to be a lawyer. Mamata too came from humble beginnings. Both know what hardship – and humiliation – mean.
Both are highly unpredictable, and NDA leaders remember the runaround they gave the Atal Behari Vajpayee government in its early months in 1998. Mamata is mercurial, Jayalalitha more measured, though you cannot say what will upset the AIADMK supreme when.
Both are imperious, but in different ways. Jayalalithaa is known for her inaccessibility, and she hardly comes out of her vehicle while campaigning. A platform built into her vehicle was raised to enable her to address roadside meetings. Even on victory day, she only walked up and down her balcony at her palatial Poes Garden house, to wave to her jubilant workers waiting to get a glimpse of their leader.
Mamata, on the other hand, is totally a people’s person. She chose padyatras as a method to campaign, mingling freely with the crowds. Over the years, scores have thronged her two room house-cum-office in Kolkata with their woes, big and small, expecting her to act on – which she did. She has chosen to make a political statement with her white-bordered saree, hawai chappals, deciding to walk from Raj Bhavan to Writer’s after taking over. Her integrity quotient is also higher than Jayalalithaa.
But no Trinamool colleague of hers, Union ministers included, dare go against her or disagree with her. Soon after her ascent, she did not think twice about giving the Congress a jolt, absenting herself from celebrations of UPA-II’s second anniversary. It was a clear message not to mess around with her. The decision of the PM and Sonia Gandhi not to attend her swearing-in, despite the historicity of the occasion and her personal invite to them, did not go down well with her.
Both women are endowed with sharp political reflexes, and head regional outfits in large states. The parties they have built up are synonymous with their own identity.
There are also striking differences between the two. Jayalalithaa was pitchforked into power initially by her mentor, M.G. Ramachandran, and she also got the benefit of the sympathy generated by the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, though the subsequent victories
were her own.
Mamata has made it to the top without any mentors, nor does she belong to a political family.
There are also striking differences between the two. Jayalalithaa was pitchforked into power initially by her mentor, M.G. Ramachandran, and she also got the benefit of the sympathy generated by the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, though the subsequent victories were her own. Mamata has made it to the top without any mentors, nor does she belong to a political family.
Mamata has so far kept her family scrupulously out of her inner clique, Jayalalithaa’s “surrogate” family, of friend Shashikala, has played a role in influencing her decisions.
Mamata does not have national ambitions, though Jayalalithaa may not rule out a national role, were such an opportunity to arise. She is well versed in national and international issues, with a grasp of complex matters. A Union minister had once remarked that she was one of the few politicians in India who comprehended the intricacies of WTO.
Today, both women face huge administrative challenges, virtually empty treasuries, and pressure to deliver fast. They may not go out of their way to bring women into their parties or in the government. But their decisive victories as CMs – and mass leaders – show that women have arrived on the political scene on their own merit and not just as appendages. INAV