Ganashakti ’s Coalition Debate
The CPI(M)’s Bengali organ Ganashakti hosted a high profile seminar in Kolkata, inviting political leaders from the entire spectrum from Right to Left to express their views on Coalition Politics. The speakers included not only Laloo Yadav, Kapil Sibbal, VP Singh (through video conferencing), Buddhadev Bhattacharya and Jyoti Basu, but even Sushma Swaraj. As it is, this move of a Communist party of inviting a BJP leader as a guest on its platform, is unprecedented enough to generate question. One must ask, on the eve of Lok Sabha Polls, rather than debating the strategies of combating fascism, why did Ganashakti find it so urgent to conduct a debate on the models of coalition governments? Why was the whole debate framed in a manner so as to allow the CPI(M) to invite Sushma Swaraj to air her views on the NDA coalition? Even after the Gujarat genocide, is the nature of the NDA coalition still a matter of debate for the CPI(M)?
At this unique debate on coalition dharmas, what did the various parties have to offer? According to Ganashakti’s report, Sushma Swaraj said that the NDA believed in a model of coalition based on a Programme and a common leader, rather than one based on ideology. Kapil Sibbal said that the Congress did not favour coalitions. But under compulsion, his party would be willing to form coalitions based on a common programme. Laloo Yadav said that coalitions were inevitable to accommodate regional aspirations. As for the programme, he said there could only be one common minimum programme as of now – Defeat BJP!
VP Singh stressed that coalitions allowed forces with marginal or negligible representation in Parliament, to get a sense of belonging and participation in national governance. However, he warned that coalitions should not be misused; those who have failed to gain a majority should not be allowed to come to power by cobbling together a coalition through money power. He said that while the National Front coalition led by him eventually didn’t last, it was through such experiments that the country realised the role of coalitions. As this realisation deepened, coalitions became more stable.
Jyoti Basu said that in today’s reality, coalitions are here to stay. The BJP-led NDA coalition was pursuing a communal fascist agenda. However, at the present time, a Third Front was impossible. Still, to save the country, BJP must be thrown out. While the CPI(M) would not go for a coalition with the Congress, it believes that the Congress has an important role to play. So it will support the Congress and other secular parties where the CPI (M) and its allies are not contesting. He called for the formation of a secular coalition Government as the need of the hour. He said equidistance from the Congress and BJP (the erstwhile ‘Third Front’ principle) would be a mistake, but the Congress must be self-critical, and correct its mistake of opportunist compromises with communal forces. In addition, he also held up the example of the LF Government in West Bengal as a stable coalition. He said that common principles and credibility of the leaders of constituent parties could guarantee the stability of a coalition.
Buddhadev Bhattacharya too said that principles and ideology should be the basis of coalitions, citing the instance of the LF Government as a coalition forged through sacrifices, blood and toil. He said the CPI(M) would not join any coalition led either by BJP or Congress, but to defeat the BJP, they could support the Congress, since efforts for a third alternative had failed. He said that the Congress’ economic policies had caused its disintegration, but despite the fact that its monopoly was broken, it retained its arrogance.
The consensus across the spectrum at the seminar was that coalitions were inevitable. Most parties also hailed coalitions as a permanent and desirable feature of Indian politics; the exception was the Congress, whom Comrade Buddhadev accused of ‘arrogance’ for their grudging approach to coalitions. Jyoti Basu rushed to claim the credit for pioneering coalitions for the Left in WB and Kerala. Elder statesman VP Singh suggested that stability of coalitions is a mark of maturity in a polity. Since he made no critical remarks about the NDA, it certainly seems that he was referring approvingly to the stability of the NDA, when he said that coalitions have become more stable since the days of his NF, due to deepening realisation. Even Comrade Jyoti Basu upholds ‘stability’ as an abstract, desirable quality, and both he and Buddhadev assert that the LF’s stability is based on high morals and principles. It doesn’t seem to occur to them that ‘stability’ in itself need not be an indicator of ‘blood, sweat and sacrifices’; the ‘stability’ which is precisely the NDA’s USP, can be achieved just as easily by fascists based on a right-wing, opportunist consensus.
VP Singh and Laloo Yadav indicate that coalitions by definition have a democratising effect on the polity, and the inevitability of coalition politics is both a result as well as a guarantee of a share in power for marginalised sections. At no point do the two Left leaders, Jyoti Babu and Buddhadev, question this unqualified celebration of the inevitability of coalition politics. It is Advani, in a recent interview with a TV channel, who identified the real implication of the current coalition paradigm. He said that the NDA should be credited with ‘achieving’ what the country (read the Indian ruling class) had long been striving for – a Two Party system as in most Western countries. Indeed, bipolarity is the need of the ruling class the world over – it serves to maintain the façade of democracy and ‘open choice’ while keeping all real alternatives and options closed. The total collapse of the Third Front option, to which Jyoti Babu and Buddhadev keep referring, means that all fronts, whether directly or indirectly, are led either by BJP or Congress. In this situation, ‘inevitability’ of coalitions invariably means that all political formations will be pushed to accept the ‘inevitability’ of joining either of the two ruling class blocs or camps- led by Congress and BJP.
What does such ‘inevitability’ imply for the Left or genuinely struggling forces? How much space do such coalitions, whose contours are dictated by the ruling class, offer for the truly marginalised sections and their aspirations and struggles? Can the aspirations of the working poor, represented by the Left, hope to find expression in such coalitions? The ruling class attempts to push for a polarisation of the polity into two camps, both of which have a virtual consensus on liberalisation, US-dictated economic policies, and anti-labour black laws, is meant to shrink the space for the agenda of struggles of poor and deprived masses. As for the secularism line which is supposed to divide the two camps, so many of the parties have crossed and recrossed it so often that it is quite blurred!
At the seminar, the debate on coalitions was reduced to that of ‘principled’ vs ‘opportunist coalitions. Kapil Sibbal and Sushma Swaraj accused each other of forging opportunistic alliances with the likes of Jayalalitha. N Ram, Editor of the The Hindu, who was the Chair, asked Sushma if the BJP had to make ‘compromises’ with its core agenda in order to run a coalition for 5 years with a record number of partners. Comrade Buddadev in turn virtuously said coalitions should be principled, and accused the NDA of having no principled basis, since the RSS-BJP kept its agenda opportunistically hidden.
This assumption, that the compulsions of coalition politics would tame the Hindutva edge of the BJP, force it to give Hindutva a back seat, is a fiction that can no longer hold any water. Has the CPI(M) forgotten that the BJP succeeded in retaining the backing of the NDA partners despite the Gujarat genocide, and won their consensus for POTA? The BJP never lost sight of its fascist aims throughout its tenure, in fact it succeeded in achieving a right-wing consolidation. In fact, it was the CPI(M) and the CPI which readily jettisoned the principles of the Left, especially on economic policy, in order to be a part of the UF coalition. Comrade Buddhadev said the WB Govt. could not be a model for an alternative government at the Centre, since it was merely a state govt. operating within the framework of overarching policies imposed by the Centre. However, he said, the LF Govt. would never implement disinvestment as ‘heartlessly’ as the BJP or Congress. In other words, the WB Govt. will work to legitimise liberalisation by giving it a ‘heart’ and a ‘human face’! Whether it be in the State or at the Centre, the CPI(M) seems only too eager to accept the ‘compulsions’ imposed by the ruling class.
Sushma in turn accused Buddhadev of double standards, saying ‘You fight the Congress in Bengal but have lunch with Sonia in Delhi’, to which he replied jovially that ‘I have had lunch with you too, Sushmaji’. True enough, Comrade Buddhadev not only has lunch with Sushma, but often has tea with Advani to discuss strategies to fight Naxals and ‘terrorists’!
One would have thought that a discussion on coalitions organised by the Left would have introspected on the failure of so many ‘secular’ coalitions to check the advance of the BJP. But the only lesson the CPI(M) seems have learnt from the debacle of NF and UF is that supporting the Congress is a must, and that the Third front is a No Go! Shouldn’t the Left introspect as to why the BJP emerged stronger with every ‘secular’ coalition experiment? At a time when the Mandir campaign was gathering steam, the NF served to legitimise the BJP by taking its support in the name of opposing the Bofors scam. It was in that phase that the BJP dramatically increased its seats in Parliament. The raison d’etre of the UF coalition was to offer a secular resistance to the communal BJP. Yet, not only did this coalition collapse, many of its key constituents including its Convenor Chandrababu Naidu crossed over to become loyal camp-followers of the BJP. Chandrababu, Farouque Abdullah, Jayalalitha, all these former allies of CPI(M) crossed over, and now even Mulayam is flirting with the NDA. Why doesn’t the CPI(M) stop to think why its trusted ‘secular’ friends are so opportunistically ready to join the fascists? Instead of reflecting on this unprincipled and opportunist nature of ruling class formations, CPI(M) keeps trusting them to put up a resistance to fascism. At this seminar, CPI(M) leaders exhort the Congress to ‘realise’ that its anti-people economic policies and compromises with communal forces have weakened it, and advice it to change its ways. By hoping the Congress will take their advice and realise its role of leading an anti-communal resistance, is to refuse to locate the roots of Congress’ vacillations in its class character. The Left must realise that fascism is not the project of a single party – it is the project of the ruling class. As a result, ruling class parties are not committed to secularism in principle. Since they compete with the BJP to emerge as the chosen representatives of the ruling class, they are quite willing to embrace components of fascist ideology, or even join the fascist camp.
Why must the ruling class provide the models for coalitions? Why can’t electoral coalitions reflect the solidarities forged by people during struggles? Why does the CPI(M) reserve the National Platform of Mass Organisations (NPMO) for movements, choosing to ally with the Congress and other ruling class parties rather than the Left during elections? Rather than agreeing to curtail the Left’s independence and radical edge in order to tail behind coalitions that are dismally unable to check the fascist advance, the need is for a powerful Left Confederation with a radical democratic agenda.