SINCE May 2004, India’s governing coalition, though led by the Congress, has been underpinned by a working relationship with the left parties. This is an unusual situation in more ways than one. In a sense, given the distinct ideological orientation, cadre base and stable regional roots of the CPI(M), it was bound to play a crucial role in a post NDA dispensation. Today, the relationship lies at the heart of the process of governance even if not formally in the system of cabinet government. The changing dynamics of this relationship, especially that of the Congress and the Marxist party, will have consequences not only for the Manmohan Singh ministry but for the polity as a whole.

To make things even more complex, a person with a political support base of her own does not head the coalition. The Congress has, for the first time since the showdown between Purushotamdass Tandon and Jawaharlal Nehru, been forced to learn to deal with a separation of government from party. The marginalization of successive Congress presidents under Indira Gandhi had eventually given way in 1978 to a unification of both legislative and party leaderships in one person. Today, there is little doubt that the locus of authority lies with the person who has led the party since 1998, Sonia Gandhi.

This is a most unusual situation for a parliamentary democracy, certainly one like India where the PM is the driver of change in the political and economic system. Much more than Walter Bagehot’s ‘keystone of the cabinet arch’, she or he has a role that is bound to be larger than life. This has been the case from nationalization of the banks under Indira Gandhi to liberalization by Narasimha Rao or Mandal by Vishwanath Pratap Singh.

This fact assumes critical relevance in the context of the left’s equations with the Congress. As chairperson of the United Progressive Alliance, Sonia Gandhi engages with the left in a political, not administrative capacity. As head of the National Advisory Council, she also plays the role of agenda setter in a larger sense. It has given her a valuable leeway in dealings with the left.

Just as the key player in the Congress is outside of government, in precisely the same way a key political player, the CPI(M), is extending only outside support. Unlike the older, but now much smaller Communist Party of India, which under Indrajit Gupta joined the United Front government, the left parties as a whole have opted to stay out.

The reasons are not too far to seek. In the three states where they are the strongest, Congress is a major political rival. Most observers point to the assembly elections due in May 2006 as a major stimulus for the renewed attacks on economic policy by the left parties. Yet, there is little doubt that the mood in both Kerala and West Bengal is distinctly one of a return of the Left Democratic Front in the one and a renewal of the mandate for Buddhadeb Bhattacharya in the latter. Neither event is likely to destabilize the UPA government, but it may open up more options for an assertive CPI(M).

But to sense what its options are one has to go back a step in time and ask why this arrangement between the UPA and left came about and what holds it together. It may also help to see how it is qualitatively different from the relations between the other Mrs. Gandhi, Indira, and the CPI that was so central a feature of her politics in the wake of the historic split in the Congress in 1969.

The post 1977 polity saw many changes, but none as significant for the left as the rapprochement between the various parties of the parliamentary left, with the CPI adopting the anti-Congress platform of the Marxists. This led in the long term to the crucial role of these parties in the creation of the governments of the National Front-United Front in 1989 and the United Front in 1996.

What is fascinating is the way in which the rise of Hindutva forces on the national stage in the early nineties forced both the left and Congress to take a hard look at one another. This shift took place in stages, starting with the CPI(M) and the Congress both extending outside support to the short-lived ministries of Deve Gowda and I.K. Gujral. But it was the six year long spell in power of the Vajpayee-led NDA that thawed the ice between the two.

 

In striking contrast to her late husband, who never quite won approval of the left, Sonia Gandhi had unwitting and unstinted assistance from the entire sangh parivar who made much of her foreign origin. Other than Laloo Prasad and vocal sections of the dalit intelligentsia, the only organized political force that defended her rights as a citizen was the left. A clue to her own strategy was evident in her very first party rally as campaigner and not as party president in 1998, when for the first time in years a Congress leader raked up the issue of the complicity of the RSS in the Mahatma Gandhi murder case. From then on, it was only a matter of time for crafting a working arrangement with the left in the event of a non-NDA regime coming to power.

The ground for this was prepared as early as 1998. Even as the election results were pouring in, CPI(M) General Secretary Harkishen Singh Surjeet said that his party would consider issue-based support to a non-BJP government. The opportunity never manifested itself, since a key regional party that had been the pivot of the United Front – the Telugu Desam – decided to back Vajpayee. But even as N. Chandrababu Naidu was shutting one door, another was being opened, if only a chink, by H.S. Surjeet.

 

Foreign policy: The past was a different country. When in trouble, the Congress invoked its strong credentials as an opponent of imperialism. The current circumstances, however, are different. True, the core constituency of opposing the US has been appropriated by the CPI(M) and other left-wing parties. But whatever else, the Congress is not set to follow the lead of the Marxist party, especially on matters of foreign policy.

The Indo-US engagement dates back decades but new ground has been broken in recent years, a consequence of the process of economic reform in India, initiated in the early 1990s. This, in retrospect, transformed the image of India among strategists, political leaders and US corporates who now view it as an emerging economy with potential global reach.

Another strand in the engagement is strategic in the medium and long term. In the immediate sense, India is seen as a potential ally in the war on terror. The long term has to do with a ‘balance of power’ notion from the 19th century European continental context, but applied in this case vis-a-vis China.

The impress of such changes on government policy are all too evident. Vajpayee’s government successfully, and wisely, resisted calls for dispatch of Indian troops to Iraq. But under Manmohan Singh, strategic ties have been given a more concrete shape and form. Not only was a path-breaking accord on nuclear cooperation arrived at but India voted with the US and its European allies on the Iran issue at the IAEA.

There continues to be a deep divide between the UPA government and its left bloc partners on how it should engage with the western powers in general and the United States in particular. Questions on the implications of the nuclear agreement for India’s own weapons programme remain. Similarly, the obligations of India under the strategic partnership need elaboration even as Pakistan’s military relations with the US are deep and abiding.

 

The ambiguities in the Congress become clearer when seen against the record of other parties. The CPI(M) sees the US as a major instigator of instability in the world order and an aggressor on developing countries. The Iran vote or the Iraq war are only touchstones of American bullying of smaller countries. The left parties see a linkage between minority bashing at home and closer ties with the world’s only superpower abroad. It is no coincidence that they joined hands with Mulayam Singh Yadav and other anti-Congress leaders in public protests.

Where Congress fits into all this is not always clear. After all, it is not an ideologically coherent or cohesive force. It is a party whose key defining feature is its pragmatism. This is why a closer engagement with the US has been furthered, not reversed by the Manmohan Singh-Sonia regime.

This does not foreclose options. In an insightful comment on Sonia Gandhi when she was Leader of the Opposition, Strobe Talbot referred to her as ‘all charm, no diffidence and no give’ on the issue of India’s nuclear programme.¹ There has been a shift in emphasis since summer of 2004 from a ‘clash of civilizations’ perspective to one where engagement with Washington has a larger economic logic to it.

 

This became practical due to the changes working their way into the Indian economy as long-term consequence of economic liberalization unleashed in the summer of 1991 by none other than Manmohan Singh, who was then finance minister. The end of the Cold War also resulted in a changed American attitude to India. Evidence of this is clear in the close attention to India by presidents as radically different as Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

India is not Venezuela which, buffered by its oil wealth, has stood up to the US. Nor is it Cuba which has a distinct ideological orientation and has endured years of sanctions. There is no place in the Indian polity for a Hugo Chavez or a Fidel Castro. What is even more certain is that the Congress of 2005 is not the Congress of 1971 when relations with the Soviet Union under Brezhnev were paralleled by a close concord with the CPI at home.

When asked whom she admired the most, Indira Gandhi often pointed to the figure of the French patriot warrior, Joan of Arc. But that was at a time the Congress had in its ranks left-leaning figures such as Mohan Kumaramangalam and the government had advisers like P.N. Haksar. Not to forget D.P. Dhar or T.N. Kaul. It is difficult to identify similar figures in the Congress today. With the exit of Natwar Singh, Mani Shankar Aiyar is perhaps the only one.

But the space within this government for a policy formulation that is strongly critical of the US is shrinking, if it exists at all. The rapprochement with the US post the Pokhran explosion of May 1998 is deeper and wider than the left seems to realize. Unlike the last Congress government to hold office, which was under sustained pressure on human rights issues in Kashmir, this one is seen as a custodian of a growing economy whose future is bound with America’s own.

The left’s space for leeway on foreign policy is limited but not only due to the oft-repeated point about the realities of the post-Soviet world order after 1991. The single greatest domestic shift is the absence of a strong constituency for sustained opposition to US dominance among professionals, business and the media. The software sector is so closely bound up with the US that the issue of H1-B visa caps was probably far more eagerly watched than the fate of the Indian external affairs minister.

There is no doubt a larger domestic constituency that can gain from hard bargains with the outside world and in doing so engages more closely with other economic blocs, whether in Asia or Europe. But here again it is hard realpolitik and not ideology that can be the basis of intervention. In effect, foreign policy is the field where the impact of the left is the least. It can at best act as a sounding board and team up with elements within the state system wary of closer engagement with the US. This became evident by the year’s end on the nuclear agreement, but the same pattern may be replicated elsewhere.

 

Economic choices: Nowhere is this as clear as in the brakes exerted by the left on critical aspects of economic reform dear to the trio of the present prime minister, the finance minister and the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission. Having been key architects of the reform measures of the Rao period, they see the revolution as an unfinished business. Conversely, on issues as diverse as divestment of profit-making public sector units, privatization of airports and the entry of FDI in the retail sector, they have met with sustained and multi-level resistance from the left. The UPA as a whole commands just about 220-225 seats in the Lok Sabha and no legislation is possible without left support. In effect, this makes it well nigh impossible for economic reform via legislative enactment.

The left’s own attitude has been a largely defensive one. The September strike by its unions was a flexing of muscle to warn the government of the power of workers. Given the significance of labour unions in the national level presence and mobilization capability of the left parties, nothing else should have been expected of them.

 

But there are visible and significant changes not only in the bastion of West Bengal but even in Kerala. In the former, Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya has consciously wooed both Indian and foreign capital, not only in software but also in manufacturing. The state has public-private partnerships in town building and is set to induct the Salim group of Indonesia in the 24 Paraganas in a deal that has raised fears of loss of fertile agricultural land to housing and industry. In Kerala, a groundswell of support from upwardly mobile social groups has helped the CPI(M) puncture a key Congress stronghold not only in the Lok Sabha but even in the local body polls. In fact, the key figure to watch is P. Muhammad Kutty, a rising leader who sees no contradiction between being Muslim and Marxist. The world-wide collapse of communism has at least dented the fear of godless atheism among the religious minorities in Kerala.

The dichotomy between state-level policies and a national-level stance is not unique to the left. But it requires closer analysis than is often the case. There are not one but three shifts underway here. Prakash Karat, who became general secretary of the CPI(M) earlier this year, is a former president of the Jawaharlal Nehru Students Union and has in the past headed the party in Delhi. Not only is he a generation younger than H.S. Surjeet, the latter’s exit marks the end of the innings of those Marxists whose roots lay in the freedom struggle.

 

Further, there are increasingly fewer leaders at the helm of the large left parties with a background in the labour unions. Exceptions would include Brinda Karat, the first woman Politburo member of the CPI(M) who has headed a women’s front organization, mostly consisting of women from the labouring poor, and Gurudas Dasgupta of the CPI, a veteran union leader. Third, and this may well be crucial, unlike a P. Sundarayya or an E.M.S. Namboodiripad, none of the leaders in Delhi have a significant mass political base of their own.

The dichotomy between dogged resistance to reform at the Union while promoting their own localized version of it in the states has a logical corollary. The central leadership unifies the rank and file in opposition to liberalization, privatization and globalization. Where in power, and the Salim deal is an excellent case, the party or parties pursue similar policies under the red flag. The rationale for this is a sound one. West Bengal and certainly Kerala require investment. What is unclear is whether there is any sense of being harbingers of a different economic model any more.

 

There are still areas of overlap that will hold together the concord between the two blocs. One is the substantial increase in government outlays for new and expanded welfare programmes aimed at social security and education. The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act is an instance where the Congress had to be pushed to implement a pledge contained in its own manifesto. The expansion of primary education and child nutrition programmes would be another such instance. Still another is culture and education where there are signs of the kind of CPI-Congress bonhomie of the early seventies.

Yet, underneath all this there are genuine anxieties on both sides. If the BJP were to implode and fail to capitalize on the opposition space adequately, there will be a vacuum in the political arena. The CPI(M), though much smaller and geographically concentrated than either of the larger parties, would then emerge as a logical thread linking together various schools of disaffection. Here, it will be hampered in its role as a credible oppositional force by its close association with the Congress. It will be impossible to be an electoral ally of the larger party. But to oppose it with any serious credibility may require a snapping of ties with the UPA, a prospect that the left may contemplate but cannot embark upon.

From the Congress’ viewpoint, there is enough indication that, having ousted the NDA, the party will attempt to create conditions for securing a majority on its own at the earliest. Here, curiously, it faces the same geographical problem as the left, namely its near total absence in the two crucial states of north India.

It is here that the limits to the vision of the present leaderships are in stark contrast to the past. In the post 1969 phase, Indira Gandhi did more than just decimate the Syndicate, consolidate her power or prepare for the coming collision with Pakistan. She also opened the doors to new aspiring social groups at the state level. The expansion of credit and welfare programmes after bank nationalization and the curbing of powers of the old notables underpinned her appeal to the poor and the lower middle class. In the current phase of economic reform, the widening of disparities between town and country, rich and poor, farm and factory, is paralleled by a withdrawal or collapse of the state system in key sectors such as health care and its atrophy in much of education. While the left is fighting a rearguard defence of organized labour, the Congress is looking over the shoulder at its middle class base.

 

The Manmohan Singh government may well complete its term in office and the left-UPA coordination panel achieve its minimal objective of keeping out the BJP led alliance. But to give a new direction to Indian politics will take more than what has been on offer so far. There is indeed room for a calibrated but strong intervention by government as an enabling force and for a release of entrepreneurial energies by those with some capital. The present combination has the potential to come up with innovative ways to blend these aims. So far, it has been touch and go on issues that do have substance but cannot on their own break the impasse in which the polity finds itself.

Neither side may like to be reminded that the Congress-CPI honeymoon ended in disaster for both. As Rajiv Gandhi once said, ‘People’s expectations are scary.’ It is by this standard that the Marxist-Congress tie-up will be examined afresh in the general elections of 2009.

 

Footnote:

1. Strobe Talbot, Engaging India, Diplomacy, Democracy and the Bomb, Viking Penguin, Delhi, 2004, p. 101. Emphasis added.