While losing the Lok Sabha election is certainly a downer, a Rajya Sabha seat is definitely an upper. In Britain, the Mother of Parliaments, the Upper House accommodates aristocrats. Indian Parliament copied its alma mater to lodge its political aristocrats in its own Upper House — the Rajya Sabha. The indolence of acquiring power sans hard work is their privilege as the people’s unelectables become politicians’ selectables. Last week, the Election Commission announced the dates to elect new RS MPs to fill 57 seats. The battle is on to seize seats in the 245-member House of Elders, not necessarily by seniors but political newcomers as well. Both national parties, BJP and the Congress have adopted a goulash strategy of fielding young and old faces.
The regional parties prefer unknown faces, but with the right connections in the right places. Since more than 90 per cent of RS MPs rarely get a chance to speak for more than a few minutes during their six-year term, their presence is required only to shout and vote and follow the party whip. But they do enjoy perks that cost the taxpayer around `10 lakh per month per member.
In vogue is a new Rajya Sabha model of choosing between the fresh and the frozen. The BJP prefers the fresh items, with over a dozen sitting MPs including former Union ministers and other parliamentary paratroopers left out in the cold. The Congress is betting on frozen ones with experience, and to hell with the expiry date. The BJP dumping its three Muslim faces indicates that it no longer bets on, or cares about, the minority vote. An internal party assessment indicated that these ejected MPs were incapable of netting additional Muslim votes for the party; maintaining a symbolic farce at the cost of ideologically committed workers looked counterproductive. Ostensibly, the BJP is undertaking a full-spectrum social re-engineering exercise by accommodating various sections like women, tribals, most backwards; and to some extent building new state leaders.
PM Modi is prioritising local leaders over outsiders. He has kayoed defectors claiming their pound of flesh in the form of Rajya Sabha seats; turncoats from Congress and regional parties with Lutyen’s backing had been expecting rewards for acting as TV marshals on BJP’s behalf. His selection is effectively eclectic. Six of the 16 candidates are women. Only Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, a Tamilian by birth and an Andhraite by marriage, is fielded for the third time from Karnataka. The BJP leadership has chucked the appeasement policy of re-nominating leaders for three to four terms; Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi was dropped after completing three consecutive terms. Previously, netas who lost elections were gifted tickets to the Upper House. Now, the BJP’s 75 years age limit for candidates has become flexible.
Ghanshyam Tiwari from Rajasthan is 72 and would be 78 after his retirement. According to BJP sources, he has been elevated to be projected as the party’s Brahmin face. Moreover, Vasundhara Raje is his bête noire. BJP continues its tactic of breaking other parties by putting up extra candidates in Rajasthan, Maharashtra and Haryana who are persons of eminence and resources. However, the fifth round of Rajya Sabha elections since Modi came to power will completely Modify the look, composition and demeanour of the saffron elders. Modi needs an army in the Upper House to get various Constitutional amendments passed to achieve his mission of restructuring the establishment.
It looks like the Congress is clued into the Modi Army’s long term plan and is filling the Upper House with faithful foot soldiers. Its promoters claim that Sonia’s choice reflects a unique method in missionary and visionary madness. Clearly her mission is to retain and consolidate her complete control over the party’s organisational and legislative wings in spite of its shrinking geographical domain. She aims to collect enough loudspeakers in the Rajya Sabha to match the din unleashed by the treasury benches. Her advisors feel that most of the 35 odd Congress MPS are either too docile or afraid of the ruling party in the House. And some of them have become bench fixtures for ages and are compromised by the government.
Sonia’s choice also reflects her usual determination to keep out any leader who can pose a political threat to Rahul. She has taken a huge gamble by fielding only outsiders for its three winnable seats from Rajasthan. What baffles insiders is that her Rahul roulette is happening in a state facing Assembly elections next year. The BJP sword has been hanging over the Ashok Gehlot government’s head for the past two years. Instead of choosing local luminaries and uniting warring factions, the Gandhis backed individuals with resources and loyalty. For example, Pramod Tewari, a permanent Congress leader from UP where the party has been reduced to a cipher, gets the third seat. He has been the Congress legislature party leader for decades and has never lost his Assembly seat.
Obviously, the Congress has no future in UP for at least the next two decades. The Gandhis prefer resourceful and experienced politicians like Tewari in the Rajya Sabha for their networking skills and support in times of trouble. Rat racer Randeep Singh Surjewala trumped local leaders due to family fidelity. He has both won and lost elections in Haryana. But the Gandhis have also concluded that Haryana can’t be won under his leadership. Moreover, he has been at loggerheads with former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda, the most powerful and popular Congress leader in the state. The Gandhis had been ignoring Hooda for the past few years and trusting Surjewala. But reality has dawned on them at last. Now Hooda has been given a free hand to lead the state and prepare the party for 2024. The Gandhis dropped Kumari Shelja, a Dalit leader from both the state party presidentship and the Rajya Sabha, and fielded loyalist Ajay Maken who is acceptable to Hooda. Maken is a hard-working Congress worker. Mukul Wasnik, a Dalit from Maharashtra has been part of the establishment run by three generations of Gandhis. He is required at the AICC to coordinate with the old and the new generations of the Congress since he was once the Indian Youth Congress president. Sonia has chosen Imran Pratapgari, a Muslim leader from Uttar Pradesh, to contest the lone Congress seat from Maharashtra.
Both Tewari and Pratapgarhi hail from the same district. While Tewari represents the Brahmins, Pratapgari is one of the party’s most aggressive Muslim voices and an expert at delivering provocative speeches. In Chhattisgarh, the Gandhis have chosen Ranjeet Ranjan, wife of Pappu Yadav, an infamous Bihar don. She had lost in 2019 but has been rewarded with an RS ticket because the Congress expects the couple to push its agenda in Chhattisgarh with resources and muscle power. The selection of former Finance Minister P Chidambaram, jesting jackanapes Jairam Ramesh, leading legal light Vivek Tankha and Rajiv Shukla in uniform civil mode is driven by their legal expertise and ability to formulate intraparty and alliance strategies on behalf of the Gandhis.
Even the rapidly growing AAP is betting on resourceful and new faces. It is the fifth largest party in the Upper House but half of them have business connections or have previous links with other parties. Some regional parties have stuck to loyalists. Odisha’s Naveen Patnaik and Tamil Nadu’s MK Stalin resisted all attempts to give tickets to outsiders with money power.
Looking back, the Rajya Sabha has been a springboard sanctuary for the unelectables. Dr Manmohan Singh, who lost one election became PM through the Upper House’s backdoor. Dynasty enjoyed its moment in the son, as third generation dynast Jayant Chaudhary of the RLD got himself an RS seat after losing the ballot war. It is evident now that the outcome of the current round would influence the next Presidency and lay the contours of future political paradigms of the BJP and its foes and friends. This configuration will also define the road map for Mandate 2024. “Respect your elders” is an old and valued advice. Now, respecting the elevated Elders will depend on how they finally perform for democracy.
Prabhu Chawla
prabhuchawla@newindianexpress.com
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