Ramachandra Guha wrote and subsequently gave an interview to Karan Thapar. I was interviewed by the latter and thought I might write as well.
Ram Guha is an honourable man and a robust intellectual. That he combines an interest in cricket with perspectives of history makes him endearing to thinking persons. So when he hands down a political CV of the Congress leadership it cannot just be brushed aside. People like Ram Guha should be supporting the liberal alternative to the incumbent party in power.
Of course, not to get it wrong, Ram Guha is willing, even wanting to support the liberal alternative but has expressed doubts about whether the Congress is, at present, up to the task. He then goes on to tell the Congress what to do. He surely knows that the Congress is going through an unprecedented and extraordinary crisis and correctly links the future of Indian democracy with the revival of the Congress.
But as a liberal is he right in portraying himself as the definitive gospel? In questioning some imagined Mughal sense of entitlement he believes the Congress exhibits, Guha forgets that attempting to impose one’s opinion on others is another version of entitlement and infraction of liberal values.
Ultimately it is all about dynasties or a dynasty if you like. The two parliament defeats are explained away as a rejection of dynasties by the electorate. He even argues that all dynasties have been squarely rejected of late. But how does he explain the BJP’s win in Himachal Pradesh, the Shiv Sena and NCP in Maharashtra, the Badals in Punjab, YSR Congress in Andhra Pradesh, the Abdullahs and Muftis in J&K, the Chautalas in Haryana, Tejaswi Yadav and Chiraq Paswan in Bihar, et al?
Also read: ‘Gandhis Have No Coherent Ideology’: Full Text of the Ramachandra Guha Interview
Social mobility is, of course, desirable. But if all these survive, not to mention Bollywood, media, civil service, military, judiciary, lawyers and other professionals thrive on dynasties, why must the Congress be singled out? Ram Guha cannot be controverted for concluding that we have hit a bad patch as far as electoral performances are concerned but to deduce that this is due to a conscious, popular rejection of a supposed sense of entitlement has little data to validate the claim.
The Gandhi potential to draw vote might have ebbed but only the blind would say that right now there is an alternative that can swiftly turn the graph around. The nature of the dynamics in the party needs to be understood before making false analogies with the Mughals and Sher Shah Suri. Besides, it is paternalism to be telling us that we are mistaken about our life choices.
So there is much difference between questioning the Gandhis per se and believing them to have failed to do their politics right. Unfortunately, Ram Guha tries to push them to a place between a rock and a hard place. He questions their commitment to secularism only because they visit temples as though in this vast country with a majority of Hindus, a leader who is Hindu must hide his faith to be secular. Being Hindu means you are not secular and visa versa is just the absurd proposition that the BJP tries to entangle us in and now an ardent secularist and a confessed liberal is pushing it to prove a point.
Watch | We Have Faith in the Gandhis, Rahul Will Lead Congress Back to Power: Salman Khurshid
Then there is the question about economics: questioning the conduct of a few big business houses becomes for Ram Guha a confused position on economic reform. But whoever in the Congress said that deregulation and reform was to give a free run to a few, favoured business houses? We have consistently supported a welfare state with a robust safety net for the disadvantaged. We can be wrong but there are a lot of questions about ethical standards and cutting of corners in the business-government relations in recent years. Had it not been for the unimpeachable intellectual reputation of Ram Guha, there would inevitably be questions about a lobby trying to push the Congress leadership.
In the end, there remains the concern about saving liberalism, almost like Saving Private Ryan: surely it is everyone’s responsibility. Of late although, there is much mouthing of the concern as each one waits for the other to make a sacrifice. In any case, secular opposition cannot expect to survive, even prosper by taking generous morsels from the body of the Congress.
Also read: Unless the Congress is Reborn, It Can’t Be the Vehicle for Transformation India Needs
Liberal India must first learn to unite, whatever it takes, before it can hope to reverse the slide engineered by the BJP. And that does not mean political outfits alone. Every person who believes in the idea of liberal, inclusive India must indeed stand up and be counted. But liberalism entails some scepticism about the right answer, not rock hard self-conceit.
What appears to some people to be an obvious answer to the liberal crisis needs honest introspection. And liberals need to talk amongst themselves with passion but sympathy. It is curious that the other side does not dissect each other as we do. We are all in it together.
As John Donne said, ‘Ask not for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.’ When the history of our times is written posterity will know what we did during the crisis. Hopefully, it would be better than the famous American retort about what the protagonist did in World War II: “I shovelled sh*t in Louisiana.”
Salman Khurshid is a Congress politician and a former minister for external affairs (2012-2014). He has also served as Minister for Law and Justice, and for Minority Affairs.
