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| Vol. 4, Issue 5 May 2012 |
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Perspectives |
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Politics |
Politics Perverted
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| As the recent crisis shows, governance in Karnataka does not even pretend to be incorruptible; politicians have declared themselves for sale |
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Published : 1 November 2010 |
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AIJAZ RAHI / AP PHOTO |
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| Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa and BJP leader Sushma Swaraj address their
supporters at a rally in Bangalore in June 2010.
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OLITICS IN KARNATAKA HAS TOUCHED A NADIR, and governance has been reduced to a parody by
corruption and opportunism. The open venality
in the workings of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government headed by Chief Minister BS Yeddyurappa—
the first state in southern India to be governed
entirely by the right-wing Hindu nationalist party |
without
a coalition— has overshadowed the almost equally corrupt coalition and Congress governments that preceded it. Since its incumbency two years and four months ago, the state government in Bangalore has lurched from one shameful political crisis to another.
As the rest of the country celebrated the festive season,
Karnataka was crippled by a constitutional crisis. Uniformed
policemen entered the precincts of the Vidhana Soudha, the
state assembly, to control unruly legislators, one of whom
rather primally jumped on a table, tore his shirt and bared
his chest for the media’s cameras. Then, whole batches
of Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) were
deposited in fancy resorts in Goa to prevent them from
getting ‘enticed’—which is rather transparent politesse for
‘horse-trading’—by rival affiliations. It came to light that
the MLAs had hardly been shanghaied: they had made
themselves available to the highest bidder.
The worst in politics emerges when there’s a fight for
survival, and the BJP hit back by repeatedly questioning the
neutrality of Governor Hans Raj Bhardwaj, a former Union
law minister and long-term Gandhi-family loyalist, who had
made clear his intentions to dismiss the state government.
To the BJP’s delight, Bhardwaj and the Congress high
command fell out on the issue of autonomy. (Of course, a
Constitutional functionary such as a governor is, in theory,
supposed to be above party affiliations, but history shows
that few governors have been deterred by such niceties.)
On 10 October, just a day ahead of a trust vote by
Yeddyurappa, the Speaker of the Karnataka assembly
had disqualified 11 purportedly ‘rogue’ BJP MLAs and
five Independent MLAs under the provisions of the anti-defection
law. Amidst a cacophonic, chaotic legislative
session, the speaker then went on to declare the chief
minister’s confidence motion carried by a voice vote. This
was challenged by the Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular)
led by HD Deve Gowda.
The governor called the proceedings unconstitutional
and recommended President’s rule in the state. The next
day, however, he gave Yeddyurappa a second opportunity
to prove his majority, which the chief minister did on
14 October, scraping through by a thin majority (106 to
100) in a thinned assembly. Taken aback by this flicker of unexpected gubernatorial independence, the Congress high
command then washed its hands of Bhardwaj.
The genesis of the sorry mess in Karnataka can be traced
to the 2004 assembly elections, which had left no party with
sufficient legislators to form a government on its own. Of
the 224 seats in the state assembly, the BJP had won 79, the
Congress 65 and the JD(S) 58. Both the BJP and the Congress
were initially reluctant to rule by coalition. But to keep the
BJP out of power, Deve Gowda of the JD(S) decided to tie-up
with the Congress. The resulting coalition government,
headed by the Congress’ N Dharam Singh, survived for all
of 20 months. Deve Gowda’s son, HD Kumaraswamy, then
switched back and struck a deal with the BJP in February
2006 to form a government with him as chief minister and
Yeddyurappa as his deputy.
The two parties entered into an informal power-sharing
agreement in which the post of chief minister would be
rotated, with each party holding it for 20 months, until the
next elections. It was unique to a parliamentary democracy
that in this period the Karnataka government was headed
by three different political parties—the Congress, the JD(S)
and the BJP—without any elections to decide incumbency.
The state assembly was eventually suspended on October
2007 and federal rule imposed after Kumaraswamy refused
to honour the bargain and make way for Yeddyurappa.
A month later, though, the BJP and the JD(S) formed a
government, now with the former heading the coalition.
A week later, the coalition fell apart when the two parties
failed to come to an agreement over power-sharing. Fresh
elections were called.
A snafu of this kind is hardly a new thing in Karnataka
politics. In May 2008, when the BJP had realised that it was
three seats short of a majority in the state assembly, it had no qualms about buying over
independent MLAs using money
from the infamous Gali Reddy
brothers and their associates,
who control major iron ore
mining and export operations in
Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.
Blind to irony, the BJP crowed
that it had formed, for the first
time, a government in a south
Indian state “on its own.”
In November 2009, after Chief
Minister Yeddyurappa called for a ‘contribution’ of 1,000
rupees—ostensibly meant for the flood-affected—from the
owners of each truck that carried iron ore out of Bellary
district, the Gali Reddy brothers, two of whom had by then
become influential ministers, precipitated a political crisis
that threatened the survival of the state government. The
crisis was resolved only after the BJP leadership in New
Delhi intervened and after the chief minister removed one
of his confidantes (Shobha Karandlaje, former minister for
rural development and panchayati raj) and transferred key
government officials.
Yeddyurappa’s payback wasn’t late in coming, though, as
subsequent investigations of the Gali Reddy brothers by
various agencies, including the state Lokayukta (People’s
Ombudsman), revealed that their cronies were involved
in large-scale illegal mining. Yeddyurappa decided to
reshuffle his cabinet and re-induct Karandlaje. In the
process, he offended another set of MLAs (including some
Independents) that had become attached to the unofficial
perks of office. The state government teetered yet again. To
a large extent, Yeddyurappa has no one to blame but himself
for the capriciousness of his legislators: it is no secret that
members of his family and his associates are themselves
embroiled in land scams.
So, the developments in Karnataka have left observers
shocked, but not surprised. State politics has long been overrun
by lobbies. Not too long ago, the liquor lobby and education
barons, who took hefty ‘donations’ (capitation fees) to
give admission to students, controlled the levers of power in
the state. It’s a state in which corporate entities that create
state-of-the-art computer software co-exist with a mining
mafia of stunning rapacity. It is a state that has governance
of the kind that defies the logic of democracy.
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