October 09, 2000

Mamata, Jaya and the dharma of regional power
Sisters under the skin

If Jaya finds herself in the wilderness or Mamata comes up short in attempts to storm West Bengal, it is because they don’t have a coherent political ideology

"NO one has the right to hold the government at gunpoint. She will have to go.’’ Who said this about whom? And when? It’s one of the more fascinating aspects of Indian democracy that situations and circumstances are constantly repeating themselves. In August 1998, Mamata Banerjee, having lent ‘‘outside’’ but ‘‘firm’’ support, to the Vajpayee-led government, found Jayalalitha an unmitigated spoiler. Today, looking back after her five-day stand-off over oil prices with the same government, of which her Trinamool Congress is now a part, she may perhaps find herself more kindly disposed towards Jayalalitha’s hit-and-run brand of politics which, in many ways, is not unlike her own Didi-or-die variation.

The parallels between the two are too many to be simply brushed aside. Both women are driven by the obsession to acquire power in their respective states — with the one difference that while Jayalalitha has had a shot at chief ministership, Mamata, after 20-odd years of streetfighting, has often been able to shake Jyoti Basu but not quite stirred him from his pedestal. So while Jayalalitha once fought for a Tamil Nadu package, Mamata demanded a Bengal package. While Jayalalitha projects herself as the Puratchi Thalaivi, or revolutionary leader, Mamata claims that her party is ‘‘the baby of the people’’.

Both women have vast reserves of raw courage and an instinct for the dramatic, whether through the mysterious disappearances that Jayalalitha once specialised in, or the intriguing appearances like Mamata sometimes staged. Remember that famous entry into Parliament she had once made, all bandaged on a stretcher? Or the time that she escorted a handicapped girl who had allegedly been raped by a CPM leader into Writers’ Building one fine morning in January 1993? When she was arrested for her pains, Mamata refused to leave the Lalbazaar police station until they had to literally push her out. That same year in July, Jayalalitha got the nation’s attention by moving a bedroll to Marina beach in her bid to get Tamil Nadu a fair share of Cauvery water.

The crowd-pulling skills and ability to articulate popular feelings of both women are legendary. To this day, the memory of the one-kilometre long pandal Jayalalitha strung up to commemorate her first year in power as chief minister boggles the mind. And if the numbers who turn up at Mamata’s numerous public meetings were a criterion, she should have been presiding over Writers’ Building by now. The two women also have a well-nourished sense of persecution. Understandably so, given the attacks that they have had to suffer at the hands of their political opponents. Mamata estimates that there have been six or seven murderous attempts made on her, while Jayalalitha has had several ugly brushes with lumpenised political cadres, which includes the brutal treatment meted out to her on the floor of the Madras assembly in 1989. In an interview, Mamata once told me that the biggest problem women in politics face is the potential threat of violence. ‘‘When they can’t fight us politically, or ideologically, they attack our person or our characters,’’ she had observed.

But the comparisons between the two stormy petrels do not end here. In fact, what is arguably the most significant similarity between them is their distinctive style of politics. Both women have realised the value of building a grassroots cadre that owes allegiance not so much to the party as to themselves. The tattoos of their leader that the Puratchi Thalaivi’s fans routinely sport, or the shrill cries of ‘‘Didi, didi,’’ that follow Mamata, symbolise relationships premised on personal loyalty and patronage, rather than on any democratic principle. There are many senior leaders in both the AIADMK and the Trinamool Congress who could, if they had the courage, vouch for the authoritarianism and insecurities of their respective leaders.

It is a style of functioning that creates its own dependencies. Mamata, at one stage, had to defend the nefarious activities of a Binodananda Banerjee, a district Youth Congress president who had allegedly murdered a party colleague, because he happened to be a valued loyalist. Jayalalitha’s tenure as chief minister saw her increasingly come under the influence of close aide, Sashikala, and her husband, N. Natarajan, leading to the widespread alienation of senior leaders within the AIADMK. Party politics then, instead of leading to ever broadening avenues, ends up in narrow by-lanes and cul-de-sacs; while grand causes are routinely invoked, everything tends to dissipate in petty politicking.

This, ultimately, is the tragedy of both leaders. If Jayalalitha finds herself in the wilderness or Mamata comes up short in her attempts to storm the Left Front citadel, it is because they have very little to offer in terms of a coherent political ideology, or even philosophy, and have shown very little propensity for good governance. While corruption seeped into every crevice of the Jayalalitha administration, Mamata’s stint as Railway minister has, thus far, seen very little apart from blatant attempts to squeeze in projects for West Bengal — at least half of which are just on paper. Both women had no compulsions about contracting shotgun political marriages to shore up their regional clout. Not surprisingly then, the first demand both leaders made once they had joined ‘‘their’’ government at the Centre was the dismissal of the existing governments in their respective states. It’s another matter that every move the Vajpayee government made in this direction has failed thus far.

This dogged pursuit of personal agendas has led, in turn, to serious compromises, including their ‘‘secular’’ credentials. To Jayalalitha should go the singular honour of making the BJP acceptable in Tamil Nadu; and Mamata, in her desperation to cobble together a coalition against Jyoti Basu, has given the BJP a presence in West Bengal that it previously did not have. The 1998 Lok Sabha elections in West Bengal saw the newly-formed Trinamool Congress fight on a joint plantform with the BJP. While the Trinamool emerged with seven seats, the BJP garnered the Dum Dum constituency and 14 per cent of the total votes.

So what does the future hold for these two women, one who made her appearance on the political scene riding in a peacock chariot in the heady days when MGR ruled Tamil Nadu, and the other, by dancing on the bonnet of Jayaprakash Narayan’s car as a young Youth Congress worker? This is certainly not to write them off and they may even get their chance to strut the political scene in their respective states. But, going by their past record, it is unlikely that their politics will be characterised by political sagacity or statecraft, or even a genuine commitment to people’s welfare.

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