By Patricia Mukhim
Let me not begin this article by analysing the Tura by-election results but look at the larger picture. The verdict of the electorate in four of the five assembly elections (Assam, West Bengal, Tamilnadu, and Kerala) are all votes against the Congress. The Congress tie-up with the Left Front in Bengal cost the latter heavily as former communist voters who have inherent enmity with the Congress veered towards the Trinamool Congress while Congress voters who see the Left Front as their rivals also shifted their allegiance to Mamata Banerjee. Then there are the unattached voters who see no alternative but to vote the Trinamool which is seen as the lesser evil (despite the Saradha and Nardha scam and the recent videos released by opponents showing the Party in a bad light). To be fair to the TMC it has tried to change the face of Bengal from a decrepit communist ghetto into a more progressive state. The changes in the landscape are evident in the city of Kolkata and the several beautification projects there. But rural Bengal is also getting a facelift!
In Tamilnadu the AIADMK returned despite the electorate’s habit of voting out an incumbent government and voting in a new dispensation. The corruption charges against A Raja and Karunanidhi’s daughter Kanimozhi are still fresh in people’s minds. Besides, here is a typical case of dynastic politics with all the political and economic resources being appropriated by one family – Karunanidhi’s. The wheel-chair bound octogenarian had nominated Stalin as his successor which is the anti-thesis to democracy where people should have a role in deciding who they want as their leader even in a political party. In fact, careful analyses would reveal that this time the vote was against dynastic politics.
Assam is a classic case of a vote against the dynastic politics of Tarun Gogoi. The 81-year old Gogoi wanted to foist his son Gaurav Gogoi on the people of Assam by first sending him to Parliament but with the long term goal of seeing him safely ensconced as the chief minister of the state. Since the All India Congress Committee is led by the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty where elections for the top posts of Youth Congress President and AICC President are never by election but by nomination, the Party has no moral fibre to prevent other regional satraps from doing the same. This time in Assam about 34 seats went to the children or family members of sitting MLAs! People are disgusted by this proclivity of the Congress to take them for granted. Added to all this anti-incumbency factor. Gogoi has been in the driving seat for 15 long years and his government has got into a stasis. But the poor performance of the Congress in Assam is also because Himanta Biswa Sarma, once Tarun Gogoi’s blue-eyed boy revolted against his mentor’s dynastic politics (blue blooded politics as he calls it). Biswa Sarma left the Congress and joined the BJP. That he is is a vote-catcher was evident from the large crowds that gathered at his election rallies. He untiringly addressed about 7-8 rallies per day. The Congress with an aged and tired leadership just could not keep pace with Biswa Sarma. The BJP also projected Sarbananda Sonowal as its CM candidate. As Union Sports Minister, Sonowal had brought the South Asian Games to the North East. This is a credit to him and to the NDA Government
The Congress in Assam had always projected itself as a secular party but with a slant towards the Muslim ‘minority.’ This minority however is threatening to become the majority since it comprises a large chunk of illegal immigrants. Perhaps this is what drove the indigenous Assamese (Muslims and Hindus) to vote the BJP. As far as the Bodoland Peoples’ Front (BPF) is concerned, it still has a hold over the voters who would not shift allegiance no matter who the Party aligns with. And with the NDA Government at the Centre it is commonsense politics for regional forces to align with the government in power. The AGP which was on its last legs was also energized by aligning with the BJP. On the whole therefore the BJP chose its allies very carefully.
The voters of Assam have shown their political maturity. They have voted the BJP despite it being projected as a Hindu communal party that would intrude into people’s cultures and eating habits. This plank adopted by certain Leftist forces and the Congress, no longer works. That the people of Assam also rejected Badhruddin Ajmal’s communal party – the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF), which had surreptitiously built a vote bank of illegal immigrants, also reflects their distaste for communal forces. Also the call given by a section of Assam’s Left leaning intellectuals not to vote the BJP only boomeranged on them. There was a clarion call by non-partisan voters before the Assam election that this election would be akin to the last Battle of Saraighat – a do and die fight against illegal immigration from Bangladesh which the Congress had not addressed in its 15- year rule. All these factors worked in favour of the BJP and its allies.
In Kerala the Oomen Chandy led Congress Government was voted out as a matter of course since the people of Kerala have the political wisdom to never give a second chance to any single party. Hence the Left Democratic Front is back in power!
Now let me come to Meghalaya where a bye-election was necessitated following the demise of sitting Lok Sabha MP from Tura, Mr Purno A Sangma. Here, Conrad Sangma the Nationalist Peoples’ Party (NPP) candidate and late PA Sangma’s son won an unprecedented victory margin of 1.92 lakh votes against the Congress candidate Dikkanchi D Shira, the MLA from Mahendraganj and wife of Chief Minister, Mukul Sangma. While Conrad Sangma is the son of PA Sangma he has proved his mettle and evolved into a politician with acumen and a political leader in his own right. He left his mark in state politics as Finance and Power Minister in a non-Congress government that presided over Meghalaya between 2008-2010. The NPP is a constituent of the NDA and the BJP refrained from setting up a candidate of its own. It decided to campaign for the NPP instead and it launched a vigorous campaign right from the word “Go.” So much so the Congress targeted the BJP instead of the NPP!
Let’s face facts. Dikkanchi Shira was a proxy for Mukul Sangma. He campaigned in the Presidential election mode. Dikkanchi is no match to Conrad Sangma in terms of analysing issues and articulating them in Parliament. When people elect an MP they also want to see him/her holding forth inside the 545 member Lok Sabha. It is not enough to be a woman in politics. It is important to have the political bandwidth to fathom national politics and the varied issues that one is expected to vote on. I sometimes wonder why Dr Mukul Sangma, an otherwise intelligent politician, took this desperate step. Is there no one else in the Congress other than his immediate family members who can contest the Tura Lok Sabha election? He has himself suffered reverses in the past; his brother too lost against PA Sangma. Then Dr Sangma foisted Daryl Momin a rank newcomer into politics and pitted him against PA Sangma in 2014. Daryl Momin’s only credential is that he is the grandson of Captain Williamson Sangma, Meghalaya’s first chief minister.
These unilateral decisions taken by Congress leaders is what has destroyed the Party. If there is no democracy while electing people to the topmost post in the AICC there is also no democracy in the selection of candidates for state assembly and parliamentary elections.
The Tura Lok Sabha result is a vote against the Congress as much as it is a vote for the NPP and indirectly for the BJP. That Dikkanchi could only win from one assembly constituency (Ampati) and lost even from her own constituency (Mahendraganj) is a definite vote against both the candidate and her Party. If this is not a wake- up call for the Meghalaya Congress then you wonder what else is. For a long time now there has been no visible leadership other than that of Mukul Sangma. He faces no real challenge to his leadership. There are no free and frank deliberations within the Party to assess the trajectory that the Government is taking. In such a situation dictators take roots. And the grand old party whose claim to fame is that it led the freedom movement had long since degenerated into a family fiefdom both in Delhi and the states.
Now that the BJP has a foothold in Assam and a toehold in Meghalaya, it might not be long before the political rumblings begin and the clamour for leadership change becomes a real challenge. The BJP will certainly not remain a passive observer. Its aggressive campaign for the Tura bye-election says it all! Let’s wait and watch real-politik playing out in Meghalaya!