Organizer: Reeta Chowdhari Tremblay, Concordia University, Montreal
Chair: Harold A. Gould, University of Virginia
Discussant: Paul Wallace, University of Missouri
The 1999 Indian parliamentary elections followed the two indecisive parliamentary elections of 1996 and 1998. The thirteenth general elections followed the short-lived United Front and Bharatiya Janata coalitions and the re-emergence of the Congress Party under Sonia Gandhi, the subsequent split of that party by the Sharad Pawar faction, and the Kargil war. On the basis of fieldwork conducted in 1999, this panel will analyze India’s thirteenth general elections within a comparative historical perspective that focuses on changes in caste and class voting, local economic issues, campaign strategies, political factionalism, the Kargil war and identity-based political mobilization.
The panel members were participants in the Smithsonian Institution’s studies of the eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth general election studies. The 1996 and 1998 election studies were published by the Economic and Political Weekly and Sage. In this panel, Harold Gould of the University of Virginia explores the social characteristics of electoral constituencies at the federal and provincial levels and addresses the process of cooptation and selection by the political parties at the grassroots level in several provinces. Arthur Rubinoff of the University of Toronto discusses "The Never-Ending Election Campaign in Goa." Sikata Banerjee of the University of Lethbridge analyzes "The Appeal of Hindu Nationalism in the 1996, 1998, 1999 Elections in Maharastra." Reeta Tremblay of Concordia University examines differing responses to the Lok Sabha Elections in the Kashmir Valley and Jammu Region. Paul Wallace of the University of Missouri is the discussant.
The Appeal of Hindu Nationalism: The 1996, 1998, 1999 Elections in Maharashtra
Sikata Banerjee, University of Lethbridge
The rise of Hindu nationalist parties in the Indian political landscape has created the possibility that this country’s commitment to diversity and tolerance of minority rights may be under attack. Although Hindu nationalism or Hindutva varies according to context and the political party that articulates it, generally all forms of this ideology claim that if minorities (read Muslims) choose to live in India then they must accept Hindu cultural dominance. The state of Maharashtra provides an interesting case study of the popular appeal of this ideology as two Hindutva parties—Shiv Sena and BJP—in alliance have posed a challenge to Congress dominance in this state. In the 1996 elections the Shiv Sena/BJP won a majority of the parliamentary seats in Maharashtra, while in 1998 Congress regained most of the seats it lost. It is tempting to read the Congress victory as a decisive blow to Hindu nationalism. But, as this paper will argue, by looking at changes in caste voting, local economic issues, campaign strategies, and political factionalism, while the BJP/Shiv Sena has lost credibility this by no means indicates a widespread popular disillusionment with Hindu nationalism, particularly in light of the split of the Congress party by the Sharad Pawar faction.
Natural Selection and Selective Cooptation in the 13th General Election
Harold A. Gould, University of Virginia
The outcome of Indian elections has always been determined by the fact that politics at the grassroots level are what some anthropologists call acephalous. This is a relative term, of course, and it cannot be used in the Indian case to imply that centrality is absent from the political system. However, in establishing a modern democratic political system, the architects of that system were compelled to recognize that only a relatively decentralized, federal system of government was possible under these circumstances. The social characteristics of electoral constituencies at the federal and provincial levels reflect linguistic, cultural, and historical distinctness and compel political parties to engage in a relentless process of pursuing victory by identifying and coopting successful proprietors of personalistically integrated local structures of power (and the voting blocks they command) and combining them into winning pluralities. In this kind of "Darwinian arena," ideological purity is secondary to material interests in determining attachment to any given political party, and for this reason there is a constant process of shifting allegiances, somewhat on the analogy of what Frederick Barth found in Swat. My study of the 13th general election will address these processes in terms of data gathered from election results at the polling stations and assembly segments level in several provinces and my paper will discuss these results as evidence for and against this "Darwinian" theoretical formulation of how Indian politics works at the grassroots level.
The Never-Ending Election Campaign in Goa
Arthur G. Rubinoff, University of Toronto
After having only three Chief Ministers in its first seventeen years, India’s smallest state has had eleven in the past nine years. After the Congress was returned to power with a minority government in 1994, the situation has been particularly unstable. The conflicting ambitions of politicians had ramifications in the 1996 parliamentary elections, and enabled the BJP to nearly win both seats. Although the Congress won a one-seat majority in 1999 Assembly elections, its government is not secure.
Differing Responses to the Lok Sabha Elections in the Kashmir Valley and Jammu Region
Reeta Chowdhari Tremblay, Concordia University, Montreal
This paper suggests that any realistic interpretation of elections, both Parliamentary and Assembly, and their success or non-success in the Kashmir Valley must inevitably be intertwined with the larger issue of the intervening role of the state to reconcile state and popular nationalism in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. In this study, I suggest that the Kashmiri Muslim population has indeed not abandoned the cause of azadi and that instead, participation in the elections (1996, 1998, and 1999) should be seen to imply the Valley’s need to return to pre-insurgency state of affairs. The Valley’s Muslim population has, in effect, reverted to a familiar state of politics where electoral participation and azadi are two distinct domains: participation in the political process is linked to obtaining economic and political goods, while azadi demands relate to the issue of distinct identity. Jammu region politics, on the other hand, is dictated by both the azadi movement in the Valley and changes in the national politics.