Mamata lacks niceties

Neerja Chowdhury
First Published : 26 Jan 2010 11:22:00 PM IST
Last Updated : 25 Jan 2010 11:53:38 PM IST

Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee’s decision to stay away from the funeral of Marxist leader Jyoti Basu has kicked off political dust, raising wider issues about democratic functioning of our parties and the polity. The Trinamool leaders expressed their unhappiness privately at Mamata’s decision not to attend Jyoti Basu’s funeral where lakhs of tearful people turned up to bid farewell to a man who steered the state as its chief minister for all of 23 years taking his party to victory in five successive elections. But obviously, they could neither counsel her nor persuade her to come. Instead, she had her way, and all of them boycotted the memorial service held for Basu last Sunday.

This demonstrates the unchallenged position Mamata enjoys in her party and the supreme authority she wields. The latest events however also show something else. That hardly anyone in her party is in a position to question her or to dissuade her once she has made up her mind.

This is akin to the Mayawati/Jayalalithaa phenomenon, though it also applies to other parties. There was a time when AIADMK leaders could not attend a ‘DMK wedding’ or vice versa. It is common knowledge that neither BSP leaders nor those in the AIADMK dare do anything without the approval of Amma or Behenji. While Sonia Gandhi has a final say in the Congress and the RSS has shown that it can crack the whip in the BJP, there is some internal debate in both these organisations before decisions are taken.

There is supposed to be forgiveness in death — a norm the world over. Even more so in India. The Mahabharat has stories of the Kauravs and Pandavs getting together to condole the death of one of their own, even as they were at war with each other. Today, this is also expected in the wider political family, as a democratic expectation as well as an established tradition. Politicians may be bitter foes but they are expected to behave like opponents, not as enemies, and extend sympathy and cooperation to each other in moments of personal — and national — tragedy.

Call it a democratic nicety. But it is niceties that build a tradition and without a democratic tradition an incumbent may not, for instance, make way for the successor after a poll. A powerful Indira Gandhi would not have lifted Emergency or allowed the Janata leaders to take over when she and her party were humbled all over north India in 1977. We feel proud of the fact that there has been a smooth transition of power after every election without the outbreak of violence.

In addition to the Constitution which lays down the rules of the game, relationships, despite political differences, have been at the heart of decision-making in Indian politics. When Sanjay Gandhi died in an air crash in 1980, Atal Bihari Vajpayee — he and his party had opposed Indira Gandhi tooth and nail during Emergency and been jailed by her — rushed to see Indira Gandhi at her residence. Without saying a word, he just held both her hands. And Indira Gandhi wept.

Jayaprakash Narayan had handed over to Indira Gandhi the personal letters her mother Kamala Nehru had written to JP’s wife Prabhavati, confiding in her about her problems in the Nehru family. JP told Indira that he did not want the letters to fall in the wrong hands. This meeting took place after Indira Gandhi had thrown JP in prison in 1975-’77, when his kidneys were damaged permanently, tying him to a dialysis machine for the rest of his life.

Mamata may have much to be bitter about Jyoti Basu and his successor Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee — she did not want to go inside the Assembly where Jyoti Basu’s body lay while Buddhadeb was inside — who she blames for many of her travails and those of the state. Once, when she was MP, she came into the Lok Sabha, bandaged all over, in a wheel chair to graphically make the point of the violence unleashed against her by the Left goons.

At the individual level she has the right to decide whether or not she will go to a funeral. But Mamata Banerjee is more than just an individual today. She has emerged as the main challenge to the Left in West Bengal. Pranab Mukherjee had announced only last month that his party, which has an alliance with the Trinamool Congress, would project Mamata as their chief ministerial candidate.

Whatever her reasons for not going, her absence at Basu’s funeral was also bad politics. A realistic critique of Jyoti Basu’s contribution and role will follow but the funeral represented an emotional moment for the people of the state. Mamata was missing when the state bade farewell to a leader being projected as amongst the tallest West Bengal has produced. The Bengalis, as Mamata knows, are sentimental people. She has every intent of winning them or retaining their support, as the case might be. The CPI(M) leaders are already making much of her absence, saying it was an ‘insult’ to the people of West Bengal.

The recent events have needlessly gone to highlight the tensions that are cropping up in the Trinamool Congress-Congress alliance, which means Advantage Left. Mamata has found the PM’s proximity to Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee quite galling and protested when the PM went to call on an ailing Jyoti Basu and then again to attend a function at Kolkata’s St Xavier College in the company of the West Bengal CM, forgetting that it is a constitutional requirement for a CM to receive the PM. The Congress finds Mamata’s maverick difficult to handle, though this does not mean the alliance is shaky or about to give way. But given Mamata’s volatility, the Congress may not like to close all its channels to the Left.

A woman of high personal courage and austere living — Mamata continues to live in a two-roomed house in Kolkata and is seen only in cotton bordered sarees and rubber chappals so as to identify with ordinary people — she has risen from the ranks through sheer grit, built her party from scratch, and has today shaken the foundations of the Left’s three-decade, entrenched rule in West Bengal. She is also among the rare group of women who have made it in politics without godfathers or the support of a family. And yet the recent episode has made her come across as a mercurial character who cannot rise above her dislikes, who is exhibiting authoritarian tendencies in her party and who does not care about democratic niceties. She could do without this image, just when she has been going from strength to strength and expectations from her are very high.

It was her state Congress ally Subrata Mukherjee who, while paying a tribute to Jyoti Basu, summed up what was required of all of them: “The great leader… never insulted the opposition. Basu used to say that unless you have a great heart, you cannot become a great leader.”.

neerja_chowdhury@yahoo.com

About the author:

Neerja Chowdhury is political editor, ‘The New Indian Express’