The formation-day celebrations of the BJP this week saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi warning the nation of the dangers of dynastic politics. Clearly, his reference was not just to the Congress party, but also to what has become a general trend in regional politics in state after state. Several states are today run by dynasties, with even blatant displays of ‘father and son’ leading some state governments from the front. What must be stressed is that this scenario has only worsened during the past eight years of the Modi-led BJP governance since 2014.
On the one side, the BJP has neutralized the influence of the Congress run by the self-anointed “first family” or the Nehru-Gandhi family that had been re-christened as the Gandhi family, appropriating for itself the legacies of both Independence stalwarts Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. That political enterprise is steadily losing steam, so much so that Modi and the BJP have less to worry about now. Political dynasties have sprung up across the political spectrum with a new vehemence since the turn of the century. The Mulayam Singh Yadav family in UP and the Lalu Prasad enterprise in Bihar had come upfront, but the latest assembly polls in both these states saw their political defeat for the second time in a row. In Kashmir and Punjab, family and clan politics met with a similar fate. But it is thriving in Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, AP, Telangana, Odisha and West Bengal and closer home in Meghalaya. In these states, both the BJP and the Congress have been left on the sidelines. In Karnataka, while the Deve Gowda clan has been defeated, a Bommai “son” is heading the BJP government. The BJP overall is keeping dynastic instincts under control, thanks to the firmness of both Modi and the RSS. News is that PM Modi has vetoed the induction of Rajnath Singh’s son into the UP government in the present pick of ministers in the state.
In a democracy, it is principally the people’s will that is reflected in successive elections. At the same time, all these political dynasties are wallowing in corruption, which is a guarantee also to the further rise in the graph of corruption in the bureaucracy that they lord over. Starkly, perceptions today are also that not a single file moves from one table to another in the central secretariat in Delhi without someone greasing the palms of the bureaucrats; this even with Modi at its head. An occasional wail from the pulpit by itself will not change the scenario for the better. Modi has to demonstrate that he means business as far as tackling corruption is concerned.
