Wounded by One's Kith and Kin

When the venerable late Jaswant Singh had just been expelled from the political party of which he was a founder member i.e., the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), he had invoked a Churchillian quote to explain the conundrum, 'The opposition occupies the benches in front of you, but the enemy sits behind you'.

When the interviewer tried to curry militaristic step with the erudite scholar-Statesman by suggesting a case of 'friendly fire', Jaswant Singh gently corrected the interviewer that the term 'friendly fire' was inappropriate as it had a different connotation, and that he was actually, "wounded by my own kith and kin". The former soldier with pucca English would always describe himself to be a proud 'liberal democrat' (the word 'liberal' hadn't acquired a pejorative context, as yet).

He was naturally given to an era, flavour and sensibility with which his party's foundational manifesto had explicitly sworn, 'allegiance to the Constitution of India as by law established and to the principles of socialism, secularism and democracy….." (Then, even the word 'secularism' wasn't lampooned, and no one complained of 'too much democracy').

But within his own party, a starkly different air and aesthetic took charge and Jaswant Singh was to fade away along with the likes of Arun Shourie, Yashwant Sinha, Maj Gen BC Khanduri etc., all dignified men of letters, each made irrelevant as Jaswant would poignantly describe, "wounded by my own kith and kin".

But this is not an exclusive narrative of any one political party, but that of all Indian political parties. It is rarely the 'enemy' in the front in terms of the other opposing party, but in fact the enemy 'within' that threatens any topical party leadership.

The purges within could almost be Stalinist in terms of brutality and unemotionality. Many popular names that were associated with the 2011 Anna Hazare movement that ultimately morphed into the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), were soon excommunicated from the young party within a few years of its formation. The grand old party i.e., Congress deals with its own internal strife that is basically predicated on leadership wrangling and preferences, and the ideology per se is never the issue (think, G-23 rebellion).

The regional strongman in Uttar Pradesh i.e., Akhilesh Yadav, is perennially looking over his shoulder at his own 'kith and kin' who threaten his political inheritance, as opposed to rival parties in the front – familial intrigues consume the party's news and agenda. It is no different with TMC (All India Trinamool Congress) in Bengal where accusations of 'heir apparent' do the rounds or in DMK (Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam) in Tamil Nadu, where a tactical truce belies the tensions within the 'family'.

While conflicting and ruthless ambitions within the leadership of all political parties are a global phenomenon, rarely is the same a matter of primary focus, governance or manipulation, as much as it is in the 'world's largest democracy'. Battered ruins of the battle of the 'kith and kin' have already imploded the Shiv Sena into several claimants of Bal Thackrey's true inheritors. Perhaps it is only the Leftist parties that can be said to have atrophied owing to truly ideological concerns and other issues, as opposed to 'palace intrigues', necessarily.

Most recently, serious murmurs of being politically wounded by own 'kith and kin' albeit from within the same partisan parivaar abound in the recently concluded Himachal Pradesh elections. Ostensible turf wars amongst the three warring factions with considerable say within their own boroughs is being bandied as amongst the serious reasons for the BJP's defeat, despite the fiery campaign led by no less than the Prime Minister himself.

It is believed that a young Central Minister had given signals of the brewing trouble when he shed tears 'in praise of the hard work' done by his father (a former Chief Minister), who had coincidentally been denied a ticket in these elections. He then alluded to rebel candidates from his own BJP who suddenly propped up and supposedly had 'their reasons' but were 'part of our family' – when the results came out, all five seats in the Hamirpur Constituency went to others. The area has traditionally been a BJP stronghold.

But this is also possible where the 'kith and kin' are allowed the freedom to disagree and perhaps express the disagreement, but in Gujarat where the same partisan persuasion had the iron discipline of removing all Ministers (including the sitting Chief Minister) in a single stroke without a murmur – the results were a staggering win of unmatched scale for the same BJP. However, India's political history consistently confirms a finite shelf-life for individual cult appeal that can override the issues of internal 'kith and kin' phenomenon temporarily with an iron hand, as was seen with Indira Gandhi, Jayalalitha, Mayawati et al, who often sought unquestionable right to decide their political party's narrative, exclusively.

Given Indian landscape of diversity, imagined civilisational wounds and the 'argumentative nature' in the land of antiquity, perhaps the most nuanced and deft approach is the ideal combination of inclusivist instincts (by and large), and with a supreme ability 'to manage contradictions' – four political leaders across the partisan divide mastered this art, namely Jawaharlal Nehru, Narsimha Rao, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh.

But this template is also susceptible to looking indecisive, enfeebled or even manipulable, as was the case of Manmohan Singh in the last couple of years of his Prime Ministership – but hard data beyond rhetoric and bombast will also validate the times of their respective rules as the golden years of national progress and enlightenment, relatively. All four managed dissent and disagreement, and some like Atal Bihari Vajpayee even had the magnanimity and grace to encourage intellectual disagreement from the likes of Jaswant Singh, Arun Shourie, Yashwant Sinha, KK Khanduri.

But the change of political hands and consequential winds also changes cultures within and those who do not fit into the 'new normal' are automatically ejected out – it happened with the BJP, Congress, AAP and all regional parties without exception. To return to Churchillian quotes, "You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life", is by-and-large true for all Indian political parties as most of those who have survived the vicissitudes of time and leadership purges are often the ones who have not stood for something, sometime in life!

Lt General. BHOPINDER SINGH (Retd), is the Former Lt Governor of Andaman & Nicobar Islands and Puducherry. Views expressed are the author's own.