Does the Opposition still belong in the nation?

Rao had appointed Opposition leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee to head the delegation sent to the UN

In 1994, the then Prime Minister Narasimha Rao sent a hodgepodge political team to a UN session in Geneva. The goal was to argue India’s case on the Kashmir problem and thwart a resolution backed by Pakistan that would have censured New Delhi.

The effort was overwhelmingly successful, but the team was more notable for who was on it. Ever imaginative in his foreign policy, Rao had appointed Opposition leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee to head the delegation. With him were Kashmir’s own indomitable Farooq Abdullah and Rao’s Minister of State for External Affairs, Salman Khurshid. To bolster the delegation with in-depth insight on the UN, India’s then ambassador to the UN — Hamid Ansari — was roped in.

That was such a long time ago and everything has now changed. Since then, Abdullah, Khurshid and Ansari have all at various times been branded traitors. Kashmir itself remains arguably more tenuous than it was even in 1994. And both Rao and Vajpayee are long dead.

Yet, more importantly, such an ideologically diverse team can no longer represent India abroad.

In truth, Rao was not really a pioneer in this regard. Nehru was famous for inducting dissidents into his cabinet — including, at one point, the feisty Hindu nationalist ideologue, Syama Prasad Mookerjee himself. But having built an enviable empire through mocking, deriding and detaining its political rivals, today’s ruling party can’t be reasonably expected to enlist an Opposition leader to represent it abroad.

Ideological polarisation is also forbiddingly high. Proponents of Hindu nationalism live in a vastly different India from its critics. One would struggle immensely to represent the interests of the other. The common ground has simply vanished.

So, you might criticise Rahul Gandhi for going all the way to Britain only to disparage Prime Minister Narendra Modi. But if you were him, what would you even do? How would you perceive your sense of belonging in the India story if you shared his beliefs?

By its very nature, India’s democracy is lopsided. The ruling party has far more leverage and influence than the Opposition. That is why the burden of involving the Opposition in policy and decision-making lies far more with the ruling party than with the Opposition.

The ruling party can, of course, choose not to do that. It can dismiss the Opposition as a vile, treacherous and anti-national cabal. It can throw the Opposition’s supporters in jail. It can kick the foreign press out for reporting on that. And it can use all of those means to, in fact, win even more votes than it might have if it was more benign and inclusive.

Yet, that ultimately leaves the voters poorer. A supporter of the ruling party today might become a dissident tomorrow, and yet, will find no platform for their ideas, no means to power and therefore, no sense of belonging in the nation. It’s a process of filtration that whittles down nationalism and loyalty over time: if you don’t fit well with the ruler’s personal beliefs, you don’t really fit well in the nation’s story.

Fortunately, India is far too large and diverse to last long as a one-party State. Even Mauryan rulers, Mughal emperors and British colonialists had to enlist the support of local nobles and princes to stay abreast with India’s dizzying diversity. When that effort was not inclusive enough, empires inevitably crumbled and the political order was reset.

That’s why Nehru, Rao and others involved the Opposition in their national governance efforts. It wasn’t simply an effort to keep them in good humour nor merely kind-heartedness. It was smart politics.