Lessons from history for PM Modi on 'decisive mandate'

Some of the so-called weak governments, as history suggests, have taken bold decisions

The monsoon session of Parliament is over without any meaningful debate. Not a single piece of legislation was passed. What is worse, the usual blame game between the ruling party and the opposition has touched a new low. This raises doubts about future sessions carrying out meaningful legislative businesses as well. Does this mean another government formed after a decisive mandate is staring at the prospect of falling short of people’s expectations?

We have had a long history of decisive verdicts not delivering. In the post-Jawaharlal Nehru era, the first decisive election verdict was in favour of Indira Gandhi. The massive mandate in the early 70s climaxed with the imposition of Emergency in 1975. Media censorship and forced sterilisation were some of the many excesses during the Emergency, rightly called one of the darkest chapters of our contemporary history.

In 1984, we had another decisive verdict, following which Rajiv Gandhi became prime minister. His government is known for, among others, the Bofors scam and the Shah Bano case. While the former was the first scam involving the high and mighty, the Shah Bano episode came in for severe criticism, as the government at that time was seen to be bowing to the demands of fundamentalists.

We had a decisive verdict in 2009 too, with the ruling coalition having the support of more than 300 Lok Sabha members. However, the same government was accused of policy paralysis and mega scams such as irregularities in the allocation of 2G telecom spectrum and coal blocks.

On the contrary, some of the most enduring decisions have been taken by governments formed through fractured mandates. The V P Singh government, which survived on support from the Left parties and the Bharatiya Janata Party, is credited to have provided reservation in government jobs to Other Backward Classes. The Narasimha Rao government, which was short of clear majority for at least two years, led the country to major economic reforms.

The two not-so-stable coalition governments under the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) gave us, among others, a nuclear test, golden quadrilateral highways project, the Right to Information legislation, rural employment guarantee scheme and the Indo-US nuclear deal.

Why have strong governments failed in the past and seemingly weaker ones succeeded? With the benefit of hindsight, we can say that a decisive mandate almost always results in centralisation of decision-making process, leaving all other stakeholders, even from treasury benches, extremely risk averse. While centralised decision making process works well in a small organisation or a company, it has its limitations, as we have seen so many times in the past, while governing a country as diverse as ours is.

In a decisive mandate, the opposition is reduced to a marginal force. It seeks to make up its number deficiency by shouting more vociferously. It also feels threatened by the ever increasing centralising tendencies.  The cornered opposition resorts to disruption on the slightest of pretext. And strong governments take time to adjust to the fact that in a democratic set up opposition too needs to be taken into confidence on crucial issues.

What we are witnessing now in the form of washout sessions is action replay of what has happened in the past. The entire political class, it seems, has not learnt its history lesson right.

I hope history does not repeat itself all over again and decisive mandate this time breaks the jinx of the past. That hope though seems to be hanging in thin air at the moment.