University Grants Commission fund cut for women’s studies centres will lead to complete disruption of teaching and research functions across WSCs
Ranjan Solomon
All we have is a bus full with each passenger jostling for more space and influence on the question of which direction the journey will take and what the finishing destination will be
Goa will try to settle back into governance mode after over a year of being more or less crippled by the Chief Minister’s illness and death a few days ago. But the arrangement under which the alliance has been stitched together does not engender public confidence.
As the fortunes of political parties rise and fall, there arises the need for new lines of political new possibilities for political co-operation. Long-standing adversaries may even unite to ward off political uncertainty and instability. What political compulsions prompt and guide such relations? The ethics of political alliance is an evolving subject and the Goa experience is a classic example around which it may be useful to set some standards and critique the present.
Pacts are often forged across the political spectrum to satisfy strategies to defeat a party in power or to keep an opposition out of power. But in the ideal world, an alliance must imply a coming together to pursue a progressive cause. To shun the dangers of sheer opportunism, an alliance must, of necessity be form consequent to collective action.
A prerequisite is that an alliance is in pursuit of a common agenda and has accountability to the public at large. Part of this accountability must presuppose that it is not clandestine. If it is even remotely based on surreptitious deal(s) unknown to the public, it is harmful to the people who are ruled under such a regime. In other words, an alliance is desirable only when it is transparent at the time of its formation and remains open to scrutiny within democratic frameworks. Transparency of an alliance is an indicator of its democratic credentials.
If alliance participation is typically appropriate in Goa for the time being, on what grounds can it reasonably be advocated? Some questions are in order. Is the Alliance between BJP, MGP, and Goa Forward intrinsically valuable because it enriches the political outlook of each? Does the alliance participation facilitate the emergence of new perspectives superior to the initial programmes of the parties involved? Is the alliance driven by political compulsions of narrow power or conditions of needing to serve counterproductive political forces that translate into a powerful development agenda? Does the alliance lean towards giving voice to citizens, and thereby express the ideal of democratic inclusion better than any single party or group of parties?
The passing of Manohar Parrikar brought new dynamics into play over the last few days. The death and funeral did not turn out to be the watershed event his supporters would have liked to witness. A few thousands were what TV crews reported.
The MGP did not show up surfacing fissures in government formation. His legacy is what it was when he was alive. It was a cacophony of governance mantras and out of beat outcomes.
It is clear that the renewed alliance is not outcome of common perspectives or even a common minimum programme. It is born of sheer opportunism and the final political product was developed from hard bargaining about the loaves and fishes of power arrangements. The consequence turned out to be laughable for those who take politics seriously, not as members of any political formation, but as a means of governance.
A Chief Minister with two appendages in the form of Deputy CMs does not bode well for the political stability of the State. It’s the equivalent of handing the two deputy CMs a veto. Twelve MLAs belonging to the alliance are now cabinet members.
All we have is a bus full with each passenger jostling for more space and influence on the question of which direction the journey will take and what the finishing destination will be.
The absence of a previous agreement on the destination could mean it will go where the loudest voices commandeer the bus and what pressures the driver will yield to. There will be no coherence and the common project, if there is one, or one will actually be put in place, will revolved the lowest common denominator. It would not be even remotely a project that fits in with the ideal alliance principle of the highest common denominator. Individual Ministers may accomplish useful work. By and large, the rest will be busy building their nests for the political future.
Goa today does not have a political arrangement at the helm of affairs. It has a tentative pact between individuals who now make up the government. Even the once-rigid (in ideological terms) BJP has opted for power as primary and governance as the side show, notwithstanding the slogans of Vikas, Goemkarponn, and whatever else. If benefits accrue, it will more by coincidence than design.
We, the people, must now fend for ourselves. As much as government has failed the people, the people have also failed to be responsible in making democracy stick.
In the final analysis, history has shown that the political class will never part with power voluntary. They and their corporate masters, supported by a pliable bureaucracy will direct our destinies. Our futures seem headed in the direction of social and economic decay. Unless we develop alert and agile civil society formations on multiple fronts that audit the government at every twist and turn of their decision making and in every sector. A government is only legitimate when its authority has the consent of the people.
