Live exchange of futures and options in Maharashtra polls

Maharashtra is verily a live laboratory, an open political exchange for exercising futures and options, for possible mergers and expedient acquisitions.
Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray (L) and Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde.
Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray (L) and Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde. File Photo | PTI
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This week, voters in Maharashtra have a date with democracy. The verdict will set the tone of national politics as it unveils a parade of epitaphs and obituaries on politicos and parties.

Maharashtra matters beyond the parameters of seats in the Lok Sabha and the size of its GDP. It is the hub of soft power and hard cash. It hosts India’s commercial capital, but more critically, Maharashtra has illuminated the process of political venture capitalism. Mirroring the cinematic world, political regimes in the state have migrated from solo starrers to multi-starrers. Parties in the state validate the cliché ‘politics is the art of the possible’.

Maharashtra has designed and re-designed the political idiom—it has been a trend-setter of sorts. In the 1970s, over a dozen parties came together as Sharad Pawar defined political agility. In 1995, Bal Thackeray and Pramod Mahajan engineered the template for sharing the spoils of war. In 1999, warring divorcees NCP and Congress hooked up again to clinch power, and since 2019, the parties have redefined the concept of political fidelity.

In a sense, this week the state’s voters have a blind date with democracy. After all, in the past five years, the pathway to power wasn’t crafted in EVMs, but in the political stock exchange. The lexicon defines futures as a contract obliging the buyer to buy or sell an asset at a specified date, while options give the buyer the right but imposes no obligation to buy or sell an asset. All bets are on the table. Maharashtra is verily a live laboratory, an open political exchange for exercising futures and options, for possible mergers and expedient acquisitions.

The index of investment depends on the math of seats won by the parties. For sure, both alliances—the Maha Yuti and Maha Vikas Aghadi—claim they will win a clear majority. The quiet consensus, though, is not ruling out a hung assembly in which case ‘impact substitutes’—to borrow a phrase from IPL—will come into play. The large field of over 2,000 independents affording choice for pickings. As in 1995, regional satraps have promoted proxies within alliances to whittle down the chances of competition. The chaos caused by a legion of party hoppers is aggravated by the confusion of symbols, or what is called the battle of trumpets, pitting 163 independents with trumpet as the symbol and NCP candidates fighting on the symbol of the trumpeter.

There is no guarantee, however, that a clear majority will not alter alliances. The battle for chief ministership and the quest for relevance demands that parties within the alliance win enough seats and hope or ensure that other constituents do not do too well. Like in telecom, voter connectivity depends on the efficacy of the roaming arrangement, transfer of votes across alliances—and the Ajit Pawar NCP and Uddhav Thackeray Shiv Sena are seen as vulnerable. A tally of around 100 for the BJP could affect the chief ministerial aspirations of Eknath Shinde, lower than 50 seats could alter the picture for Uddhav Shiv Sena, and a tally of 130 between BJP and Shinde Sena will haunt Ajit Pawar.

The strike rate of parties depends on the geography of politics—essentially, quota corridors. All attempts at social engineering are governed by the statute of limitations. Effectively, attempts to woo any one segment—for instance, the play for OBC consolidation across the Mali, Dhangar and Vanjara communities—has triggered anger and counter-consolidation among Marathas in Marathwada and the tribals in North Maharashtra.

For both alliances, victory is a sum-of-pieces game. There is no disputing the pockets of domination—of Sharad Pawar in Western Maharashtra, the BJP in North Maharashtra and urban areas, and the Shinde Sena in Thane and even Konkan. The key will be how the Congress does in over 35 seats where it faces the BJP, particularly in Vidarbha, and the Uddhav Shiv Sena in contests facing the Shinde Shiv Sena face-to-face in 53 seats across the state, particularly in Mumbai and Konkan.

Indeed, the outcome will be determined in the grand battles being fought in Marathwada, Vidarbha and North Maharashtra—the three regions representing the ‘zone of discontent’. Take Marathwada and Vidarbha. Beyond the simmering caste quota cauldron there is a history of neglect—the backlog of development first identified by the fact-finding committee under V M Dandekar in 1983 continues to be an issue and is manifest in regional disparity of per capita incomes.

Now supplant on the caste map the issues of neglect, agrarian distress and anger among farmers. In Marathwada and Vidarbha, farmers facing issues with access to credit and inputs struggle to ramp up output. In North Maharashtra, the challenge is to monetise what is harvested, thanks to constant changes in policies on produce slotted for exports.

The state of play is covered in a fog of war and outlined by the results of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. On the face of it, the Maha Yuti was outwitted by the Maha Vikas Aghadi, which won 30 of the 48 parliament seats. Granular details suggest the fight was tighter—the MVA led in 153 assembly constituencies, while the Maha Yuti led in 127. The question is, can the pontoon bridge of populism, led by the Ladki Bahin scheme unveiled by the Shinde regime, and the election management capabilities of the Maha Yuti can overwhelm economic angst and political anger.

Shankkar Aiyar

Author of The Gated Republic, Aadhaar: A Biometric History of India’s 12 Digit Revolution, and Accidental India

(shankkar.aiyar@gmail.com)

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