National honour and the foreign origin
The last nationalists of India have finally succumbed.
One of the important Nationalist Congress Party leaders, the national face of the party from North East India has met the Indian National Congress President and apologized for the displeasure caused to her in 1999 on the issue of her foreign origin. (http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/000200906051481.htm)
The Nationalist Congress party was formed in 1999, by a few prominent leaders of the Indian National Congress, on the issue of the foreign origin of the party president. In a moving letter, they requested her to honour India’s national pride and renounce the claim on the office of the Prime Minister, should the party come to power. Let me quote a passage from the letter(http://www.ncp.org.in/sonia1.htm) itself,
“Madam President, India is a country with a history and tradition going back for 1000's of years. It is a confident culture and a proud nation. Above all it is a country which is self sufficient in every sense of the word. India has always lived in the spirit of the Mahatma's words "Let the winds from all over sweep into my room" but again he said "I will not be swept off my feet". We accept with interest and humility the best which we can gather from the North, South, East or West and we absorb them into our soil.
But our inspiration, our soul, our honour, our pride, our dignity, is rooted in our soil. It has to be of this earth. Soniaji you have became a part of us because you have all along respected this. We therefore find it strange that you should allow yourself to forget it at this crucial juncture. It is not possible that a country of 980 million, with a wealth of education, competence and ability, can have anyone other than an Indian, born of Indian soil, to head its government.”
Every word of this passage embodies the truest spirit of nationalism. After receiving the letter, a hurt Congress President offered to resign. Strong voices of protest arose from rank and file of the Indian National Congress, the president was convinced to stay on and the writers of the letter were expelled from the party along with their supporters.
There can be a cynical interpretation of the whole episode, which many would say is the correct one. After its defeat in 1996 elections the Congress party seemed to be in a state of terminal decline. The party had lost successive elections with unprecedented fall in the number of Loksabha seats and loss of presence in large swathes of the country. The Bharatiya Janata Party on the other hand seemed to be the party destined to rule India for the times to come, on the tide of an overwhelming popular support. The writers of letter estimated that the issue of the foreign origin of the Congress President would probably be the last nail in the coffin of the Indian National Congress. One of the ambitious leaders of the group sensed an opportunity he had been waiting for long. He probably thought that if the issue was raised in the party, the morose Congressmen probably would swallow his argument and choose him instead, as their leader. But the endeavour backfired and they were expelled.
There might have been several miscalculations, which I dare not claim they did not consider. It was a calculated risk on their part. They knew that they were up against a formidable challenge of overthrowing a dynasty which had been the life blood of the Indian National Congress for the history of independent India. They knew the complete subservience of the party to the family, after all, taller leaders were vanquished earlier when they dared to confront it.
Most importantly, they might have miscalculated the potency of the issue of foreign origin itself, as many of Indians did.
For nationalists, even the existence of this issue can simply be described as, complete national disgrace.
The party which claimed to be the harbinger of freedom from colonialism and foreign occupation, having a person of foreign origin - whose only competency was membership of a particular family - to be a potential candidate for the post of prime minister of India, was the ultimate irony. This should never happen to a great, sovereign nation boasting of a rich civilization and millennia of history. The sense of national consciousness and pride should never have let it happen.
Sadly, there are other powerful factors. The effects of centuries of colonial and alien occupation have not completely subsided yet.
The other powerful leaders of the Indian National Congress might have sensed the ulterior motives, if they can be so called, of the dissenting leaders. The principle of “let us be equal slaves, instead of unequal neighbours”, which has been an important factor throughout India’s history of her struggle with foreign invaders might have played its part. One of the most important leaders of the coup had been a major aspirant for the top post in the party and hence its candidate for the post of Prime Minister, but his bid was thwarted each time so far. Many of his colleagues thought of him as a person of dubious integrity, an opportunist, and unfit for the top post bypassing them.
Hence their expectation that, the party, at least its significant part, would rally behind them, was frustrated. Neither of their hopes, the fear of complete defeat at the hands of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the minds of the top Congress leaders (on the account of this issue), or the nationalism of common Congress workers, would aid them, fructified. Also, they had limited popular support from only certain parts of the country.
Since then lot of water has flown from the Himalaya and Sahyadri to the oceans and the wheel of fortune has now turned in the favour of the Indian National Congress under the leadership of the same president.
The Nationalist Congress Party subsequently aligned itself with the Indian National Congress in the Maharashtra Vidhan Sabha elections and the 2004 Loksabha elections. For the Vidhan Sabha, there was no issue of foreign origin as no person of foreign origin was a potential candidate for chief minister’s post in Maharashtra. For the Loksabha, the stand was that the issue of prime minister was to be settled after the election results were out. After the results were declared, it was clear that National Democratic Alliance led by the Bharatiya Janata Party, the expected winner, was defeated and it was possible for the United Progressive Alliance under the leadership of the Indian National Congress to form the government with outside support of the left front. This unexpected victory led to an upsurge of support for the Indian National Congress President. There was an unprecedented scene in the central hall of the Parliament, in which the entire Congress Party, most shamefully, prostrated in front of its president of foreign origin requesting her to accept the ultimate prize of victory, the post of the Prime Minister of India. Even the allies of the Indian National Congress made a beeline to tender that request. But then the inner voice spoke and thus the honour of the nation was saved by the potential offender herself.
What prompted her to take that decision is not clear. Was it a genuine feeling of agreement with her opponents, of not subjecting an independent and sovereign India to a rule by a person of foreign origin? If yes, why did she not hear this inner voice earlier, when she was repeatedly projected as the candidate for the Prime Minister’s post? Was it a fear of the dire fate which some her close family members, her husband and mother in law met?
But one cannot deny the fact that only she was in a position to save India’s honour and dignity at that point of time and she did. She also has conducted herself in the most dignified manner subsequent to that incident, and has earned the respect of people across the country by nominating one of best leaders to lead the nation.
The political power and authority flows from her to the government. This is not to claim that the day-to-day activities and decision making process is interfered with by her, or each decision is ratified by her and then implemented. But a major part of the credit of whatever success the government claims to have achieved, is attributed to her. The policy and agenda of the government is said to have her imprint, and popular programmes started by the government are said to be her pet projects. This makes her the supreme extra-constitutional power center and with the Prime Minister acknowledging that he enjoys no mass base, makes her the primary authority if not the chief executive. This satisfies the nationalists’ demand that no person of foreign origin should hold the high office, in letter, but violates it in spirit.
How much of the blame for this should pass to her? Is she responsible for it or is the rest of the party, for which devotion to the family is the life blood with sycophancy as the haemoglobin? One can compare this with the issue of replacement of Marathi by Hindi in public spaces in Maharashtra’s cities. Who is responsible? If all Marathi speaking people used Marathi in public arena, wouldn’t it make the adoption of Marathi by others possible? Others would speak Marathi if Marathi speakers did so. If the Congress Party behaved in accordance with the principles of national dignity, her elevation to a position of the supreme leader of the nation would not have been possible. Our own people, of the Congress Party, have not been exorcized of the ghost of feudal mindset and colonial hangover.
Staunch supporters of the Indian National Congress President loudly claim that the opposition’s argument on this issue has been conclusively defeated. This has left many nationalists completely disillusioned and many claim that the issue of foreign origin is now dead.
The Nationalist Congress Party itself says that since she has declined to accept the post the issue is now not relevant, but they have never reiterated their original stand of opposing a person of foreign origin from holding the office of the Prime Minister. Now, they have dropped the pretense completely and say that the issue is closed. There are reports that there may be a merger with the parent party, now that the future of the Nationalist Congress Party looks dim.
Has the nationalists’ stand on the issue of foreign origin really been defeated? The fact that the Indian National Congress won the elections under her leadership does not prove that. The elections to the parliament are by no means a referendum on a particular issue.
One has to acknowledge that this was not the only issue which decided which way people voted, for either side. People have voted on many issues, and some issues on which they perceived that the nationalist side was not the best option, they went for the Indian National Congress.
There are other issues, bread and butter issues, which people feel are more pressing. There is a significant trust deficit between the nationalists and large sections of society on many accounts, which needs to be addressed. These issues are much higher in the hierarchy of issues which enables people to decide which way to go. Also, they lack presence in significant parts of the country. Had these issues been solved, one is certain that people of India would have voted positively on this issue, and the national honour would have been restored in a much clearer way, if this alone was a major issue in the elections.
(Except in the first sentence, wherever I refer to “nationalists” they are not the Nationalist Congress Party, but the Bharatiya Janata Party and its affiliate organizations which are the perceived right wing nationalists of India.)
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