Power & Politics/ The Sunday Standard Magaine/August 28, 2011

LOKPAL CRISIS AMPLIFIED BY PM'S DISCONNECT WITH PARTY

“Success comes in cans, failure in can’ts” goes the saying. The utter collapse of the authority of the Prime Minister and his Government stems from their inability to think out of the box. The handling of Team Anna and their agitation will, perhaps, become one of the most popular case studies in ‘How to Convert an Opportunity into a Threat’. Undoubtedly, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is equally, if not more, committed to strike at the roots of corruption. His track record is his great asset. But degree and pedigree don’t guarantee success in political management; instead, both have been a liability, as is evident from the bruised image of the Government and its leadership. With well-spoken and highly educated ministers like P Chidambaram, Kapil Sibal, Salman Khurshid, Pranab Mukherjee, Jairam Ramesh and others batting for it, the Government was much better placed than Team Hazare. But a 74-year-old village-educated mass leader mauled all the wise men because they believed in their own words of wisdom rather than well-tested political tools. Instead of chanting the “Yes, we can” mantra, their chorus was, “No, they can’t do this, and that.”

To begin with, the Prime Minister and his colleagues refused to talk to Anna. Then, they gave in, sitting with his team to draft a Lokpal Bill. When Anna sat on fast to protest the Government draft, the UPA first refused to consider the Jan Lokpal Bill—only to be back on its knees within a week, pleading with Anna to give up his fast, saying it would consider his bill too. Earlier, it had ignored the entire Opposition and told Team Anna that it didn’t need them. But within a month the Government had to beg all political parties to bail it out of a mess of its own creation. Almost 75 per cent of Parliament’s time was wasted in harangues between the Government and the Opposition.

While the civil society leaders came out of the crisis smelling of roses, the Congress and the Government was still struggling to salvage its reputation and credibility. Most senior Congress leaders blame the Prime Minister and his advisers for keeping the party out of the dialogue. This is not for the first time that the Congress has faced a serious threat to the institution of the prime minister and the government. Indira Gandhi did twice: in 1974, Jai Prakash Narayan led a movement that paralysed the government. Again in 1984, Indira was confronted with the Punjab terror menace that eventually led to her assassination. Three years later, Rajiv Gandhi had to face serious challenges from within on corruption; his finance Minister V P Singh revolted on the Bofors issue which snowballed into a national protest. Though both suffered electoral humiliation, they used the party to their full advantage.

It is surprising that Manmohan hasn’t involved the party and Congress chief ministers in his battle against Team Hazare. With 13 chief ministers, the Congress could have mounted a major offensive against the Opposition and Team Anna. In the past, the strategy followed by all prime ministers facing popular dissent was to orchestrate a full-throttle campaign by issuing statements against their adversaries, organising demonstrations in their favour, and prodding opinion-makers to make powerful counter-arguments. According to Congress insiders, its earlier prime ministers could control politics because they had aides like R K Dhawan and M L Fotedar who could mobilise important Congress leaders at short notice. But retired civil servants and technocrats control Manmohan Singh’s office. When the Anna situation worsened, technocrats like Montek Singh Ahluwalia, deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, and Nandan Nilekeni, chairman of the Unique Identity Authority of India, were the ones drafted to support the Prime Minister.

This raises pertinent questions about the relationship between the Congress and the Government. With Sonia Gandhi recuperating in the US, Manmohan hasn’t been able to rally the Congress in the Government’s favour. Worse, no Congress chief minister has spoken against Hazare. On the contrary, a few young ministers and MPs have expressed their disapproval of the way the Government is dealing with the issue. Barring a couple of meetings of the core group, neither the Prime Minister nor the party thought of calling an extended meeting of the Congress Working Committee to discuss ways and means of dealing with the challenge. A section of the party believes that by depending on non-political persons, the Prime Minister has lost an opportunity to unite the entire political system. Most parties are against many of the clauses in the Jan Lokpal Bill. The Prime Minister could have turned them into allies by involving them in the dialogue process right from the beginning, and not mid-way. At the end of his seventh year in office, Manmohan is yet to learn the rules of the political game, let alone play it better than his foes. The time has come to prove that he failed not because he didn’t try. But because he tried his best.

prabhuchawla@newindianexpress.com

Race Course Road/ The Sunday Standard/August 28, 2011

PM’s Crisis Managers Lack Political Skills

The success of a leader depends on the team he chooses. His effectiveness also lies in trusting some who may have been part of his predecessor’s kitchen cabinet. If Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is passing through an agonising phase, it’s because he ignored those who possess formidable skills in political manoeuvering and negotiation. Many senior Congress leaders feel that by drafting in his team only those who haven’t handled political crises in the past to deal with Crisis Anna, the Prime Minister walked into a trap laid by civil society leaders and the Opposition. Some feel that those who were once associated with Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi have been kept out. While they admire both the commitment and talents of the negotiators led by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Congressmen also argue that involving experienced persons would have yielded better results. For the past few months, a high power group comprising Mukherjee, Home Minister P Chidambaram, Law Minister Salman Khurshid, Human Resources Minister Kapil Sibal and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Bansal have been dealing with various political catastrophes, including the Anna Hazare and Baba Ramdev agitations. The team is adept at legalese and procedure, but none among them has the necessary experience to deal with complex, relentless social activism. For Team Pranab, excessive use of authority, instead of dialogue, or invoking statutes appears to be the best tool to defeat dissent. Even Manmohan has no experience in handling powerful social or political agitations. Congress insiders are wondering why ministers and leaders like Ghulam Nabi Azad, Kamal Nath, Anand Sharma, Veerappa Moily, Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Ambika Soni et al were kept out of the negotiating team. All of them are known as champions of political wrestling. They possess enough talent to tire their opponents out, and do whatever it takes to break the opposition. Both Indira and Rajiv used them to handle difficult political situations in various states as well as at the Centre. They may have got ministerial berths in Manmohan’s Cabinet, but the Prime Minister seems to be more comfortable with those who carry no past baggage.

Sonia’s Civil Society Allies Ignored

If the Government left out political leaders from the Indira-Rajiv era from the mainstream dialogue with Anna, even the few VIP civil society leaders associated with Congress President Sonia Gandhi have also become irrelevant. Some of them are members of the powerful National Advisory Council. They have always been part of the Government’s consultative process for formulating any new legislation. But when Sonia fell sick and left for a surgery abroad, the Government didn’t involve even highly vocal NAC members like Aruna Roy and Harsh Mander in the process of finalising the Lokpal Bill. Finally, Roy had to submit her version of the Bill to the Standing Committee for consideration, forcing the Prime Minister to include her speech in his proposal as well. In the absence of a direct invitation from the Prime Minister or the Government, Mander and Roy are actively participating in TV debates and pushing their own variants of the Lokpal Bill.

Manmohan’s Governor Surprise

Even as the entire nation was discussing the Lokpal Bill, the Government sprang a surprise by appointing 78-year-old K Rosaiah as the Tamil Nadu governor. The former Andhra Pradesh chief minisiter was charged by the state Anti-corruption Bureau in March for passing an order regularising occupation of prime land worth over Rs 200 crore. The Centre delayed his appointment till the court acquitted him. However, an appeal has been filed against the lower court’s order. Rosaiah is one of the four new governors appointed; two others were merely shifted from one state to another. Another surprising feature of these gubernatorial appointments is the preference given to antiquated politicians. Both Ram Naresh Yadav, a former Uttar Pradesh chief minister, and Vakkom Purushothaman, a former speaker of the Kerala Assembly, are in their mid-eighties. But the Prime Minister seems to have learned some lessons from the conduct of Hans Raj Bhardwaj, the governor of Karnataka. Manmohan has chosen as governors only those Congressmen who do not have a reputation for confrontationist posturing. Purushothaman, Yadav and Rosaiah are known for their objectivity and genteel behaviour. Even MOH Farook, the new Kerala governor, has always avoided confrontation with chief ministers. Rosaiah and Yadav have been sent to states ruled by non-Congress governments like Tamil Nadu and Madhya Pradesh. According to top government officials, the Prime Minister was under pressure to appoint aggressive Congress leaders in various Raj Bhavans, but he resisted. He, however, agreed to move Farook to Kerala, which is now ruled by the Congress. It’s obvious that these appointments didn’t reflect the hand of Congress President Sonia Gandhi.

Ministers Make Their Own Drafts

Anna Hazare has not only made duly elected representatives irrelevant, his movement has also made the steel frame of the Indian civil services dispensable. For the first time, the political class took over the function of formulating laws and legislation. Normally, the Cabinet Secretariat and its senior officials are involved in drafting legislation, along with the officers of the concerned ministry. But this time round, the ministers themselves decided to do the job. Various drafts were circulated, written by politicians; these reflected their politics, instead of being feasible or legally robust. The newly appointed Cabinet Secretary was, in fact, learning about the contents of the proposed laws from television debates. Ministers and interlocutors were so confident of their skills that they even kept the officials from the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs and the Law Ministry at bay. Only the private secretaries of the concerned ministers were trusted. But civil servants are having the last laugh as none of the drafts have cut any ice till now.

Race Course Road/The Sunday Standard/August 14, 2011

Manmohan's UPA Clueless, Comatose

The past two weeks in Parliament have been disastrous for both Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the UPA Government he leads. The chaos in the House also exposed the internal weaknesses of the Congress Party in handling the business of governance. The politics of confrontation has led to a complete breakdown of dialogue between the ruling party and the Opposition. Moreover, it also exposed the truth that the recent Cabinet reshuffle hasn’t made the Government more effective. The Congress was fighting a lonely battle, with its allies sitting on the fence and letting it suffer political humiliation. The Government failed to get even three of the 35 bills listed for Parliament’s approval passed. The Prime Minister had to skip the session for a day after coming under relentless opposition fire. He was relying on the team of three Cabinet colleagues headed by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Bansal, to ensure smooth sailing in the House. But not one of them could strike a deal with an unusually aggressive Bharatiya Janata Party, or strategically divide the opposition to rescue the Government from periodic embarrassment in both Houses of Parliament. Over 50 per cent of the total Parliament time was lost in boycott, filibustering and adjournments. Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi’s absence made life even more difficult for the Prime Minister and his trusted colleagues. While the young ministers were missing in action, the confrontationist approach of the senior ones made communication with the Opposition difficult. The premier seemed clueless; for example, he would spot a minister he believed could open informal talks, either with the BJP or non-saffron parties, to end the impasse, but he would hesitate to take the matter forward being unsure of the political implications of involving senior ministers like Sharad Pawar or Trinamool leaders. Finally, the hapless Manmohan turned to Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee as usual, to contact and plead with the BJP leadership and others to let the Government get some of its legislative business done. Pranabda walked the whole mile, but he wasn’t successful. Now, the trapped Prime Minister has initiated a search for a new set of troubleshooters who will save him from the troublesome Opposition in Parliament.

And the Babus are Infected Too

Troubles for the UPA Government never seem to end. Most of its ministers are unable to take decisions because senior civil servants are avoiding putting files up to their ministers. Even the agenda for Cabinet meetings is prepared at the last minute. There appears to be an informal agreement among top babus that they would only follow instructions and not take the initiative. Moreover, upright and efficient officers based in various states are unwilling to come to the Centre. All of them are particularly peeved over the inability of the political leadership to protect them from over-active and coercive investigative agencies and Comptroller and Auditor General of India reports. Earlier, CAG reports were filed away, after submitting an Action Taken Report. Now, adverse reports involving even minor procedural delays are referred to the CBI, or other agencies, for scrutiny and possible prosecution. Due to bureaucratic inaction, many infrastructural projects, important policy decisions and even proposals for foreign direct investment are not being processed. Babus are now passing the buck to the Empowered Group of Ministers with the message: take it or leave it.

Can the PM Hold the Fort?

Minister Manmohan Singh will be the first non-Gandhi Prime Minister to address the nation for the eighth time from the ramparts of the Red Fort. Before him, Atal Bihari Vajpayee had the privilege of making six speeches. But the record is still held by Jawahar Lal Nehru and Indira Gandhi who made 17 and 16 speeches each, from the Red Fort. Both would speak extempore while Manmohan Singh still reads from written notes. And that has posed fresh problems. For the past two weeks, officials from the Prime Minister’s Office have been seeking inputs from all the Union ministries to draft a speech that would restore Manmohan’s credibility and re-establish his authority. Since his last speech on August 15, 2010, Manmohan has suffered a severe blow to his personal reputation, thanks to various scams. His last seven speeches dealt with predictable subjects like agriculture, terrorism, infrastructure, North-East, Jammu and Kashmir and the usual flattering references to the Gandhis and a Nehru. The Prime Minister’s unofficial think tank and aides have run out of ideas for a speech that would be an ideal mix of politics, economics, diplomacy and social issues, which will project Manmohan as a statesman and not just a UPA leader. This time around, he was advised to emphasise his resolve to fight corruption and ensure a stable economy. The real challenge for PMO speechwriters, who are formulating the Prime Minister’s speech, is how to erase negative perception with an emotional outpouring of purple prose, from the mind of an economist-turned-politician.

Union Cabinet Has MoS Hiccup

Some of the newly appointed Ministers of State (MoS) with independent charge are yet to understand the protocol involved in attending a Cabinet meeting. According to the rules, no MoS is expected to attend a meeting of the Cabinet, unless an item relating to his or her ministry is on the agenda. Once a decision on the item has been taken, the MoS has to leave the meeting so that other MoSs may join. But for the past two meetings, newly appointed MoS Jayanthi Natarajan forgot to follow the format due to sheer ignorance or forgetfulness. She had been an MoS earlier too, but without independent charge. Now, after becoming the MoS with independent charge of the important Ministry of Environment and Forests, Jayanthi has been landing up earlier than necessary for Cabinet meetings, even if no matters related to her ministry are listed on the agenda. It was left to Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, with a polite signal, to remind her about procedures regarding participating in a Cabinet meeting. Jayanthi would have been saved from the embarrassment if only the newly appointed Cabinet Secretary had given her a proper briefing.

Race Course Road/The Sunday Standard/July 31, 2011

Rahul shows his intent with
Delhi inauguration

It’s official now. If the Congress wins the 2014 elections, Rahul Gandhi will be the prime minister. Rahul’s presence as the chief guest at a Delhi government function on Friday appears to be the beginning of his yatra towards Raisina Hill. Until now, he has been evading all invitations from state governments and Union ministries to inaugurate official functions. For the past seven years, whenever he has visited a non-Congress state, it was only to attend political rallies and conclaves, leaving government events to be presided over either by his mother, or the prime minister. Last week, however, he drove all the way to the Delhi-Haryana border to dedicate the Guru Tegh Bahadur Memorial to the capital’s Sikhs. His mother, Sonia Gandhi, laid the foundation stone four years ago. Spread over 12 acres, the project cost over Rs 22 crore. Since the memorial is meant to pay homage to the ninth Guru of Sikhs, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, a devout Sikh himself, was expected to be the chief guest. But Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit pulled off a coup by getting Rahul to shed his reservations about openly associating himself with Government-sponsored functions. She was determined to get Rahul, and only Rahul, to do the honours. According to local Congress leaders, the Gandhi scion hadn’t responded to her request for months. However, considering the coming civic elections in Delhi and Punjab state Assembly elections, Rahul was advised by his aides to grab the opportunity to connect with the powerful Sikh community. He made stirring speeches about the sacrifices made by the community and its gurus. Rahul even praised the prime minister, who he described as the community’s most precious gift to the Congress. By accepting Dikshit’s invitation, Rahul has sent a clear signal to all other chief ministers and Union ministers that he is now available to promote, inaugurate and launch new projects and schemes at official inaugural functions. The competition to get Rahul over to other states will ratchet up now—he will also get excessive media and political exposure at government cost. Does it mean less exposure for Sonia and Manmohan until the 2014 elections? Stay tuned.

Loyalty is Key for PMO Positions

Along with the Cabinet, the PMO has also been restructured. Like with the Cabinet reshuffle, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has played a game of musical chairs. While Pulok Chatterjee, a Gandhi loyalist IAS officer from the Uttar Pradesh cadre, has been brought in to replace Kutty Nair as the prime minister’s principal secretary, Nair will serve as the prime minister’s adviser with Minister of State rank. Some officials who have completed seven years in the PMO are being moved out. Chatterjee’s appointment has created ripples in the upper echelons of the Indian bureaucracy. For the first time in decades, a person far junior to around half a dozen secretaries, including Cabinet Secretary Ajit Kumar Seth, has taken over as principal secretary. Retired senior civil servants like Nair, Brajesh Mishra and A K Verma were chosen for the job because the principal secretary’s authority is so exalted that he even presides over various official government meetings, including those held by the chiefs of the armed forces. He also gives directions to all other secretaries. Chatterjee, a brilliant and efficient officer, is however junior to Deepak Gupta, Secretary, Non-Renewable Energy Ministry, Alka Sirohi, Secretary, Department of Personnel and Training, and K M Acharya, Secretary, Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment. Even some state chief secretaries are senior to him. The prime minister usually follows protocol while filling sensitive posts; he opted for seniority while choosing the new foreign secretary and the cabinet secretary. Chatterjee was in the race even then. But when it came to choosing his own chief of staff, he had to accept loyalty over seniority—for the second time Manmohan had to keep the Gandhi connection in mind. Earlier, he inducted Bharat Vir Wanchoo as Director, Special Protection Group, superseding over a dozen senior IPS officers. Wanchoo also has been associated with the Gandhis for over two decades.

Chief Ministers Play Lokpal Game

Why are most chief ministers not protesting the prime minister’s exclusion from the purview of the proposed Lokpal Bill? Because if passed by Parliament, it will give them an excuse to keep themselves out of a Lokayukta probe. If the Bill is passed in its current form, the chief ministers are likely to insist on an amendment to the Lokayukta’s powers. Stung by recent Lokayukta activism in Karnataka and Delhi, most chief ministers are arguing that a politically motivated Lokayukta could damage their moral authority by launching frivolous inquiries. However, none of them have made a formal move yet; but some prominent chief ministers, cutting across party lines are lobbying within their own parties to make the suggestion during the Parliament debate on the Lokpal Bill.

Khar in J&K a Net Gain for Omar

While Union External Affairs Minister S M Krishna and his trusted diplomats were dismissing Hina Rabbani Khar’s meeting with Kashmiri separatists as a minor irritant, Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah was taking her on. Using his huge Twitter following, Abdullah reminded the attractive lady from Pakistan that she could have returned home better informed had she met leaders of the state’s mainline political parties and other opinion-makers. He conveyed to overtly pro-Pak diplomats and bleeding heart liberals that the genuine Kashmiri leadership doesn’t care for the looks of a dignitary who is of no substance or consequence to the state.

Power & Politics/The New Indian Express/April 19, 2011

Night of the long knives

Even though the battlelines have not been publicly defined, the knives are clearly out for Hazare’s Hunters. There is nothing unusual about the venomous diatribe being levelled against the man who’s perceived as an outsider, with a mind and mannerisms of his own. Success, of any kind, tends to attract detractors. And this is success of stupendous scale. But what is baffling is the behaviour of the detractors. They have not been able to find any fault in his message. So they’ve chosen to attack Hazare’s fellow messengers. What they seem to have forgotten is that these are not people of his choosing. These are the people who have credible record of taking on the establishment irrespective of its colour.

But the overall objective of their adversaries seems to be to demoralise, defame, tame and eventually maim Team Hazare.

Though the first meeting of the joint government-civil society meeting on the Lokpal Bill ended on a happy note, suspicious smirks were all too visible on the faces of the pro-establishment forces. They seemed to be openly gloating about their (so-far limited) success in defaming some prominent members of the panel.

You don’t need a telescope to spot the elitist vandals who’ve begun mining Hazare’s movements for dirt. If one goes by both the intensity of the attacks and the instruments used for weakening the anti-corruption campaign, the establishment would seem to be playing an invisible hand. Old and mischievous reports are being dug out, illegally-tapped-and-acquired telephone conversations are being circulated, and a communal angle is being touted to discredit Hazare.

Funnily enough, the tirade is being led by leaders of the most fashionable NGOs, their sponsors based in India and abroad and individuals who have been recipients of liberal government patronage and/or funds from either the government or in known entities operating from other countries They have never subjected themselves or their incomes to public scrutiny. But they are ever willing to hold up the magnifying glass for others. So if Hazare puts up a painting of Bharat Mata behind him on his stage, he becomes communal. If he endorses Modi’s Mantra for Development, he is anti-minority. Some people seem to be under the illusion that it’s their presence at Jantar Mantar that made Anna Hazare credible and acceptable.

But then, such reactions are expected from those who spend the morning sitting in dharna, their afternoon at a seminar, evening in a TV studio and weekends in salubrious surroundings. Over conversations with like-minded souls, they make and unmake prime ministers and chief ministers, decide the fate of the world and generally live in a world of their own.

But what is astonishing is the behaviour of the political class. Their grouse against Hazare seems to be that he has taken up a single point agenda. They have a point, but they should have been at the forefront of expanding that agenda. They paralysed Parliament on a JPC for the 2G scam but didn’t stage even a walkout on the Lokpal Bill, which has been pending for 42 years. None of them has made an attempt to strengthen the Lokayukta in his own state. How many chief ministers, ministers or civil servants have been punished by Lokayuktas in this country? Hardly any. Instead, most of them have either been tamed or maimed and made ineffective.

Hazare may not be another Jayaprakash Narayan in the making. JP was a wily strategist who took the political class into confidence and co-opted student leaders as active partners in his Sampoorana Kranti (Total Revolution). But you can’t deny that Hazare has demolished the established social and political order. He is not a creation of Tweeteratti or TVratti. In fact, those two entities got more followers because of him. Some of their members even camped at Jantar Mantar to be seen or to participate in live TV shows.

But now, they are the ones who feel threatened by Hazare. Because he is shaking the system which helped social and corporate oligarchies to make mountains of money and climb up the social, corporate and political ladder. The system ensured that being seen with each other would generate more business and many more opportunities. Debates in Parliament would be followed by cosy dinners at some lobbyist’s residence, with stars from every sector on display. Decisions about who would get what and where would be taken at these rendezvous.

Mumbai may be the financial capital of the country but it’s the drawing rooms of New Delhi which have become parallel South Blocks and North Blocks over the past decade of massive economic growth. A social audit of the membership of elitist dinner clubs will reveal the beneficiaries of the government’s munificence. Millionaires have turned billionaires, directing and dictating the pace and face of economic policies along the way. How else can one explain the frequent changes in policies relating to national highways, telecommunications, civil aviation, car manufacturing and real estate development? And what about the zero tax on the billions made through manipulative trading at stock exchanges? The revenue lost due to tax concessions to the corporate sector amounts to Rs 5 lakh-crore.

Hazare has just won a minor battle. The frequency and fire power of the attacks to come will strongly test his survival skills. Unless, he targets the origin of corruption, the establishment might just get the better of him.

prabhuchawla@newindianexpress.com

Power & Politics / Don't Forget Party Funding Mess/ April 17, 2011

Don’t forget party funding mess

It’s definitely a great victory for a thought germinated by the even-greater Anna Hazare think tank. As legal eagles from both sides ready themselves for a war of words on the framing of the Jan Lokpal Bill, the nation has thrown up another issue for discussion. Even those who actively participated in the debates, televised 24x7, on the well-choreographed happenings at Jantar Mantar are now pointing at the inadequacies in the Hazare argument. The question being raised is: Can a Lokpal institution, however powerful, solve corruption at all levels? A powerful Lokpal may serve as a lethal deterrent for the people who occupy top posts. But can he or she contain the virus that has infected all levels of bureaucracy and political establishment? Hazare and his team haven’t had the time (or inclination?) to track and attack the source of the scourge. The truth is corruption has become an integral part of our political life. It begins at village offices of a political party and ends at its fortress-like headquarters in the state capitals and/ or Delhi. Has anyone of us or any member of the Hazare team raised a question about the source of funds that political parties collect every year? According to conservative estimates, 765 registered political parties—six national, 57 state-level and 702 others—together spend over Rs 25,000 crore on elections every five years. Here’s the math. All the political parties together spend over Rs 50 crore a year to maintain their offices and office-bearers. The Election Commission has fixed a limit of Rs 35 lakh for a Lok Sabha election. But which candidate covers a constituency of over 12 lakh voters and spends only Rs 1 lakh a day? According to Income-Tax sources, each candidate ends up spending over Rs 5 crore on an average. Even if we take four serious candidates for each of the 542 constituencies which go to polls, we are talking about an expenditure of Rs 10,000 crore. Top that with the 15,000-plus candidates who contest 4,500 Assembly seats in the states, with an average expense of Rs 1 crore per candidate, and we’re talking about a total poll expenditure of around Rs 25,000 crore. And the story’s not even done yet. Most of our political leaders have forgotten the contours of the pot-holed roads that crisscross their states, since they travel only by chartered jets or custom-made raths. All national and state-level parties have posh state and central offices running the organisation. Even the district-level officebearer of a ruling party owns a big house and a fleet of cars. All the political parties are bound to file their balance sheets with the Election Commission every year. Most of them do so. But these are balance sheets that would shame even a small-scale entrepreneur. While the truth is that, on an average, both the Congress and BJP spend over Rs 2 crore a month on their offices and office-bearers. So, where does the money come from? The BJP initially decided to collect money through cheques only, but had to give up because people were unwilling to pay that way and party leaders were not ready to change to a more transparent system. The Congress has not even bothered to pretend to cleanse the system. Even the Manmohan Singh Committee, which was appointed by the party in 2003 to suggest how to raise finances for the party, ignored the role of tainted money in politics... In its three-page report, Manmohan skirted the issue of election funding and ended with a high-sounding sentence: “The committee is convinced that the Congress must take the lead in bringing about a new culture of transparency, accountability and integrity in financing.” He conveniently forgot his own report after becoming the prime minister. Sonia Gandhi, who was part of the committee, also forgot to take it forward. The fault doesn’t lie with her or other political leaders. They have become slaves of a system which encourages cash-for-votes for winning an election, and Cabinet notes in exchange for currency for getting the Government policies changed. The past three decades of economic reform have opened new avenues of raising big money by manipulating economic policies so that India’s GDP can grow at 8 to 9 per cent. The rise of crony capitalism and the emergence of a highly powerful coalition of the urban elite, irrespective of their political affiliations, have insulated the decision-making process from scrutiny. The chosen few may fight and shout against each other on TV screens and on the floor of the legislature, but once the cameras are off, they hang out together in the same city or abroad, wining and dining. Real estate tycoon Shahid Balwa is a classic example of a cultural, corporate and political coalition that has total control over the system. Even the beneficiaries of both the CWG scams and Adarsh Society reflect the growing affinity between the rich and mighty. What else could explain the ruling elite’s reluctance to give up the discretionary powers of ministers, chief ministers and other authorities? It is through these powers that the Chavans, Rajas and Kalmadis make their money and use it for winning elections. Unless the business of elections is tackled, valiant fights put up by even hundreds of Hazares will not be able to defeat the coalition of the corrupt.