The policies taken by the Union government of India from 2014 have been threatening the very federal spirit of the country. But the way a majority of the regional parties have responded to these policies is equally upsetting. They were simply silent on major decisions, starting from the Goods and Services Tax (GST) to simultaneous elections to the Lok Sabha and state Legislative Assemblies, which were designed to create a ‘one nation, one system’, which goes against the very spirit of India’s federal system and multi-culturalism. The strength and beauty of India is its cultural diversities represented by its different regions.
Indeed, the regional parties began making ground in Indian politics in the late 1960s on the foundation of long-established regional cultures. In a way, the regional parties initially represented regional aspirations and socialised democracy in India. In history too, regional rulers posed a serious challenge to mighty empires like the Sultanate, Mughals, and even to the British empire. It is important to look at the evolution of regions in Indian history at some length here.
In India, the evolution of regions has many interesting trajectories. In the early historical period, regions were associated with tribal chiefdoms, but they began emerging as cultural and political identities from the early medieval period. That is after the decline of the Gupta empire. The development of regional language scripts was crucial in shaping the regions of this period. All the Indian regional languages developed between the 8th and 12th centuries. The literature produced in these languages was not only used for cultural identity but also for political unity. The regional states were indeed formed on this cultural foundation of the region. That’s why regional states, including the Qutb Shahis, promoted the local Telugu literature by patronising regional language literary personalities.
Importantly, the regional states not only avoided imperialist tendencies in their states but also challenged the external imperialist aggressions. Notably, the western and southern Indian states had very tactical relations with the imperial powers of the Gangetic region. They submitted to the imperial power when it was strong and declared independence when the imperial power weakened. With the decline of the Mughals, regional states reemerged afresh. Realising the cultural and political specificities and significance of the regions, the British did not disturb them. Rather, they formed the provinces on the basis of existing cultural zones or regions, such as Madras Presidency in southern India, Bombay Presidency in western India, Bengal Presidency in eastern India, United Provinces consisting of the Gangetic region, and Central Provinces in central India.
Each province represented a broader cultural specificity. Thus, care was taken to keep the regional culture and aspirations intact while forming the provinces. And the provinces acted as autonomous administrative units with legislative powers. The Governor-General and the imperial legislative assembly of India had very superficial control over the internal matters of the provinces.
Interestingly, during the anti-colonial movement, these regions became foundational in the imagination of nationalism and self-rule. Each province had a particular experience with the colonial state, and regional issues were crucial in articulating anti-colonial consciousness. Particularly, regional languages and their literature were vital in spreading nationalist ideas among the masses, certainly not English as generally understood. Linguistic nationalism developed as part of the national movement led to the formation of linguistic states in post-colonial India. From the late 1960s, a new tendency of sub-regionalism was also witnessed within the linguistic states and has deepened democratic values further on Indian soil. Why I recount this long history is to delineate how the different regions and regional states have been markers of democracy and the federal system in Indian history.
The question now is how and why have the regional parties – said to be the champions of the regional cause – become so imprudent when the Union government is destroying the country’s federal system. Every regional party has its own reason for not responding to national issues. However, this can be attributed to three things: feudalist foundation, family-centric politics, and corrupt practices.
All the regional parties, at least in the south, were founded by Shudra dominant castes who were peasants and feudalist in practice. When the people strongly expressed regional aspirations, these castes capitalised on it and converted those emotions into a political movement and, thereby, a political party. However, once the party captures political power in the state, the party’s supremo starts exhibiting his feudal avatar on a daily basis. Prostrating before the supremo is a regular condition for party leaders and cadres to impress him/her. Over a period, the supremo becomes an individual cult.
As the supremo acquires more control and power in the party, their family members start appearing on stage, signalling the next successors. Only the family members are given key positions and decision-making powers, both in the party and in the government if the party is in power. Since power is concentrated in the hands of the family, there are no limits to its financial corruption and nepotism. Because there is no internal democracy in the party, there are no checks and balances either. This allows things to happen. Even the Union government allows it to happen, but will keep filing all the corruption scandals. And it uses its agencies against the corruption charges of the state government on specific occasions when it needs the state’s support in passing controversial bills in Parliament or for an electoral alliance that favours it.
Coming to the Union government’s one nation, one system policies, except for the DMK, a few other Dravidian parties, and the Trinamool Congress Party, almost all the regional parties enthusiastically supported them. These regional parties did not oppose the ‘one nation, one entrance exam’ for undergraduate and postgraduate programmes such as NEET and CUET, which pushed millions of students and parents into a traumatic situation. They did not open their mouths when the Indian armed forces hunted down university students across the country. Same was the case when the New Education Policy of 2020 was announced, a big blow to states that took away their right to design their education policy. Neither did these regional parties respond to major violence against Dalits, Adivasis, and religious minorities. They were silent supporters when the Muslim-dominated state of Jammu and Kashmir was broken into pieces. They were just spectators to the recent series of violence, starting from the Gujarat genocide to the Manipur massacre. At the most, they respond to incidents in their respective state. Incidents happening in other states hardly matter to them.
The irony is that the regional parties have continuously been winning election after election despite their disastrous role in national issues and national politics. It appears that populist welfare schemes are their winning mantra. Although these schemes offer temporary relief to the poor, they reduce them to perpetual ‘begging hands’. The welfare schemes are designed on the feudalistic principle of the patron/client system, which impedes the possibility of independent development of a citizen. The parties have even opened food outlets for the poor. They generally let the people perish for the first four years, and implement the promised welfare schemes only in the last year before the next Assembly election, that too poorly. Indeed, for them, people are just voters not citizens. This approach is dangerous to the development of the country.
On the other hand, in recent times, elections in India have become events to be managed. Regional parties can easily manage the polls with their accumulated corrupt money. Businesses and corporate entities now provide added strength by funding these parties lavishly during the polls. They think that it is easy to deal with one person instead of approaching too many people, as the supremo is the sole point of contact in the regional parties’ government. After the election, they get lavish return gifts from the government in the form of subsidies and land allotments for their houses. It’s a win-win situation for both corporate houses and regional parties. Of course, it’s a national phenomenon now – corporate houses are deciding the fate of India and its people by influencing the country’s political economy.
The other serious challenge is that regional parties do not own any ideological positions as they are founded on regional identity, except the Dravidian parties, which are founded on an ideology of social justice. India has now moved to alliance politics at the national level. It has become a challenge for national parties to keep their allies intact, as the regional parties keep changing their positions overnight. This tendency of the regional parties poses a dangerous threat to the Indian parliamentary democratic system.
Prof Bhangya Bhukya teaches history at the University of Hyderabad. Views expressed are the author’s own.