I.N.D.I.A vs Bharat is a needless debate

The Opposition’s I.N.D.I.A will be tested time and again because the bonds that hold this coalition are weak, and there are many stress points for the BJP to exploit.

The India vs Bharat debate is a decades-old one. It has an economic connotation to it, with India referring to urban part of the country as against to Bharat representing the rural parts of it. Here the juxtaposition is to highlight the gap in economic wellbeing, and development achieved, among others. This was in focus during the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020, when urban/well-to-do India could cope up with the sudden lockdown, while the rural parts/underprivileged sections of society were near abandoned overnight by the State.

A political angle to it is where the social elitism of India’s political class is countered by the grassroot leaders from Bharat. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s narrative that a tea seller has disbanded Lutyens’ Delhi’s ‘Khan Market gang’ is part of this rendition.

There is also a debate that India is colonial, and Bharat is the ‘true’ identity — whatever that means. But that’s material for the burning questions on ill-informed TV debates.

It’s a mouthful

This India vs Bharat binary is yet again in the news, because on July 18 an alliance of 26 opposition parties named the combine ‘I.N.D.I.A’ (Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance). Try saying it, and it does not roll off the tongue easily, the way, say, a United Front or a United Progressive Alliance does. The length of the acronym comes across as either a childish attempt at it, or shows how much ‘accommodation’ went into finalising the name. Thank goodness there are just 26 political parties in the alliance!

It might be a mouthful, but the Opposition has beaten the BJP in its game of neologism. Since 2014, this BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government has shown a juvenile stubbornness in coining acronyms for just about every initiative by it.

Thanks to Modi

Is a name of an alliance as important as it is made out to be? A good and catchy name can help if there is sum and substance in the Opposition’s action. Electoral battles are planned in war rooms and won in the heat and dust of the hustings. The Opposition’s I.N.D.I.A means little if there is no political unity and planning among the allies. This alliance will be tested time and again because the bonds that hold this coalition are weak, and there are many stress points for the BJP to exploit. It must be seen if the enthusiasm seen in christening the alliance is reflected in its ideologies and, of course, in a common minimum programme.

Assam Chief Minister and BJP leader Himanta Biswas Sarma’s reaction was a peek into how the BJP is likely to counter the Opposition’s I.N.D.I.A. Sarma jumped the gun to pitch it as a “civilisational battle”. The political inaccuracies in his tweet apart, Sarma’s effort was to dumb down the discussion on why (or whether at all) there is a need for a united Opposition.

The Opposition, perhaps anticipating this line of attack from the BJP and its allies, on July 19 added a tagline to the alliance name: Jeetega Bharat (India will win). This to a great extent is expected to blunt the India vs Bharat debate over the alliance name.

Blunt Claim

Political alliances have always been byproducts of the ruling party’s brute strength and electoral opportunities that present themselves from time to time. If in the 1970s and 1980s it was the Congress that brought the Opposition together, today it is the BJP’s turn. That disparate (and desperate) leaders of political parties have come together and are sitting across a table is no mean feat — and Prime Minister Narendra Modi must be credited for achieving this seemingly impossible political confluence. Thanks to the Centre’s indiscriminate use of central agencies, mainly the CBI and the ED, to hound opposition party leaders.

Modi’s (and by extension, the BJP’s) constant retort that the Opposition unity is a mob of the corrupt trying to protect their vested interests is an accusation that is losing its edge. Corruption charges against BJP leaders aside, the list of political leaders facing corruption charges or accused of corruption either joining the BJP, or allying with it is on the rise: Suvendu Adhikari, Narayan Rane, Bhavna Gawli, Himanta Biswas Sarma, to name a few. Most recently, Ajit Pawar and other Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leaders who joined the Eknath Shinde government in Maharashtra were accused of corruption by the BJP, and even had the ED on their heels. What moral authority does the BJP have of speaking about corruption after it has allied with such leaders?

Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge said that arriving at a common name I.N.D.I.A was a “great achievement” for the untied Opposition. This is hardly an achievement, and BJP leaders are needlessly fretting over it. If a name and a star-studded cast could save a product, Ram Gopal Varma’s Aag would have been a blockbuster hit.

(Twitter: @VijuCherian)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.