By Praful Bidwai
29 October, 2007
Kashmir Times

When Mr Narendra Modi walked out of an interview with the CNN-IBN television channel last week after being questioned about the Gujarat communal carnage of 2002, he probably didn't realise he was inflicting grave damage upon his image. The impact of the walkout, which showed Mr Modi as confused, shaky, arrogant and unreasonable, has since been magnified several-fold by Tehelka's exposure of the gruesome violence planned and encouraged by the Modi regime, whose barbarity has shocked the nation.

"The two episodes have dented Mr Modi's contrived image as a swashbuckling, super-confident leader who can ride out any adversity," says Ahmedabad-based activist-analyst Mukul Sinha.
"The man is nothing. His larger-than-life image is everything. But he can longer maintain it. He
comes across as a criminally minded, viciously communal leader."

As he readies himself for electoral battle in December, Mr Modi is likely to find that his
deflated image extracts a high political price. Five years after his Bharatiya Janata Party won
70 percent of all seats in the Assembly despite (or is it because of?) the communal violence of
February/March 2002, it appears much more vulnerable than at any time during its 12
continuous years in power in Gujarat. The vote-share gap between it and the Congress
narrowed from 10 percentage-points to barely 3 between 2002 and 2004, and may now get reversed. Gujarat's Assembly elections are likely to be a national turning-point. If the BJP wins them under Mr Modi's stewardship, the result will greatly influence leadership succession within
the party and strengthen its hard- Hindutva elements. More vitally, in conjunction with the
Assembly polls in Himachal Pradesh-also due in December, in which the BJP is widely expected to displace the Congress-it'll prove a major morale-booster and help the party stem its losses in the next Lok Sabha elections. (A recent poll by NDTV-GfK-Mode forecasts a fall in the BJP's national tally from 138 seats to 116.) If, on the other hand, the BJP loses Gujarat,
it'll be a massive setback for it and a major gain for the secular forces. That'll set the
stage for a long-overdue correction to the ghastly trend that brought about the communal
violence of 2002, in which more than 2,000 Muslims were butchered, many more raped, and
150,000 rendered homeless. This could herald the BJP's relegation to the margins of politics,
where it belonged until the Ram janmabhoomi campaign clicked in the late 1980s. This could
transform Indian democracy qualitatively for the better.

Mr Modi, the chhote sardar who looked invincible just some months ago, now seems beset by
adversity and enemies-ironically, mainly from his own sangh parivar . Not just Vishwa Hindu
Parishad sadhus and RSS cadres, but even significant sections of the BJP, bitterly oppose
him.

They comprise at least 11 MLAs and two MPs, including heavyweights like former Chief
Ministers Keshubhai Patel and Suresh Mehta, former Union textiles Minister Kashiram Rana, and state ex-Home Minister Goverdhan Zadaphiya. Some of them are prepared to quit the BJP and work with or through the Congress to defeat Mr Modi. They have held about 80 anti-Modi rallies in different parts of Gujarat, including an unprecedented 300,000-strong one in Rajkot.
Beneath the leadership-level changes lie major shifts in the BJP's social support-base. Two
large caste groups, the Kolis and Leuva Patils (Patidars), have moved away from it. The OBC
Kolis are among the state's largest castes, comprised largely of small and marginal farmers,
and landless labourers. Traditionally Congress voters, the Kolis gravitated towards the BJP in
the mid-1990s and voted en masse for it in 2002. By the 2004 Parliamentary elections, however, 55 percent of their vote went back to the Congress. The prosperous Patidars dominate Gujarat's agriculture, small and medium-scale industries, and diamond polishing. Their vote is decisive in one-third of all constituencies. They account for 37 of the BJP's total of 127 MLAs; its Koli MLAs number 15. Both groups are upset with Mr Modi because of his extremely abrasive style, readiness to humiliate, refusal to share the loaves and fishes of office, and his government's failure to allow the fruits of growth to trickle down.

No less significant is the anger among Gujarat's tribal community and civil society organisations (CSOs) with Mr Modi's rule. Adivasis comprise 15 percent of the population-among the highest proportion in Indian states-and have 26 reserved seats. Earlier, they would vote overwhelmingly for the Congress, but in 2002, the Congress got only 11 tribal seats to the BJP's 13. Now, however, Lok Sangharsh Morcha, an Adivasi organisation, has decided to take on the BJP and contest seven Assembly seats.

Similarly, CSOs active among the victims of violence are preparing to confront the BJP and
mobilise the Muslim community to go out and vote. The 2002 carnage, followed by constant
harassment, persecution under anti-terrorism laws, and social intimidation, economic boycott
and political marginalisation, ghettoised Muslims and pulverised them into submissiveness. But
resistance to marginalisation is growing and groups like the New Social Movement are planning
to put up solidly secular candidates.

All this offers the Congress and its allies a great chance to defeat the BJP and vanquish
Moditva, that diabolical combination of rank communalism, blatant violation of human rights,
and pursuit of extremely dualistic elitist policies in the name of "development". Mr Modi, who mouths the "Vibrant Gujarat" slogan, boasts that the state is one big SEZ-where 'S'
stands for spirituality, 'E' for entrepreneurship, and 'Z' for zing. India Today magazine and the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Contemporary Studies have rated Gujarat a high performing state with all-round growth and Mr Modi India's most efficient Chief Minister. In reality, Gujarat is a misgoverned state, with unbalanced growth and warped development. Eloquent proof for this comes from the fact that 74.3 percent of Gujarat's women and 46.3 percent of its children are anaemic. Gujarat's macro-economic indicators are unflattering. It has a higher per capita debt-ratio than UP and Bihar. Agrarian distress has driven more than 500 Gujarat farmers to suicide over the past four years. Sweetheart deals for business groups have sent the prices of basic services and inputs rocketing. Despite high tariffs like Rs 5.32 a unit, the power supply situation remains pathetic. Gujarat continues to attract industrial investment not because of its leaders' dynamism or policies but because of a historical accident-business groups invested there early on, and there's a big petrochemicals cluster around Baroda.

As the official Human Development Report (2004) points out, " Gujarat has reached only 48 percent of the goals set for human development". It lags behind in this thanks to "several distortions in [its] growth path", including agricultural stagnation. Its gains in literacy, education, health, nutrition, welfare and social security are much lower than its GDP growth. Recent "deceleration in [its] achievements", it says, is cause for "serious concern."

Gujarat's human development and gender empowerment ranks actually fell during the 1990s.
Although it's Number 4 among all states in per capita income (down from Number 2), it has fallen to Number 6 in education, 9 in health, and Number 12 in participation.

Gujarat's indices of patriarchy are frightening. The sex-ratio is an abysmal 487:1000 in the 0-4
age-group and 571 in the 5-9 group (national averages, 515 and 632 respectively). Gujarat's
health indices have since dropped relative to other states and are barely higher than Orissa's,
HDR co-author Darshini Mahadevia told me. In social sector spending as a proportion of total
public expenditure, Gujarat ranks a lowly 19 among India's 21 major states.

The industries that have flourished the most in Gujarat are all highly hazardous or polluting:
poisonous chemicals-Vapi is the world's fourth most toxic hub-, textile dyeing, shipbreaking,
and diamond polishing, which turns people blind in their thirties. Gujarat hasn't still recovered
from the de-industrialisation of the 1980s and 1990s with its mill industry's wholesale closure.
In Gujarat, labour rights are virtually nonexistent. On minimum wages, Gujarat ranks
eighth among Indian states.

As for the claim that Gujarat is well-administered, its legislature's Public Accounts Committee has severely indicted the government for awarding contracts in the Sujalam Sufalam scheme without tenders, causing a loss of hundreds of crores. Tax breaks and shady deals have cost Gujarat some Rs 15,000 crores."Hindutva laboratory" Gujarat's law-and-order situation is appalling. Its religious minorities and Dalits suffer extreme discrimination and exclusion. Like Muslims, its Christians face persecution. More than 100 Dalits were murdered in Gujarat over the past three years. The harassment of hundreds of Muslims originally arrested under TADA and POTA continues unabated-although these laws stand repealed. The absence of the rule of law means a hollowing out of democracy.

The Congress has a historic chance to inflict a stinging defeat on the BJP. To do this, it must
offer an alternative vision, take a strongly secular line, build alliances with other anti-communal parties/groups, and run a spirited campaign with a wise choice of candidates, while keeping the BJP dissidents at an arm's length. The fight is winnable-and certainly worth winning.