The Curious Case of A Quasi Presidential Election in India

I have no option but to start this piece with a disclaimer that, the author has no affiliations to any political party whatsoever, and is writing this piece in curious pursuit of the case for a quasi presidential election in India. And why I emphasize upon this disclaimer, will increasingly become clear as we move further into this piece. So what is the 2014 general election all about…..an answer simple enough will be Narendra Modi v/s Rahul Gandhi, an icon of development v/s the icon of the youth. When was such an election fought the last time; who among our previous Prime Ministers were either icon of governance and/or icon of the youth. Some interesting and non-obvious names do come to my mind; I K Gujral, HD Devegowda, Chandrasekhar, V P Singh, P V Narasimha Rao, etc. If you add the Gandhis and Shastri and Vajpayee to the list, still no one would qualify. So the question remains, what is special about these two gentlemen and/or what is special about the 2014 general elections. As Swapan Dasgupta (a senior Indian journalist) says, this is going to be a landmark election (1977 elections after emergency was one landmark election when the historical trends went for a toss and the post independence rule of the Congress came to an end) and all facts of historical significance will be rendered useless. And Narendra Modi is going to be the man to watch out for in these landmark elections.

Let us understand the how of this phenomenon. This election is supposed to be different from all post independent elections so far, in a manner that, this is not to be a contest between two largest political parties, rather, it is to be a contest between the two leaders of these political parties. Parallel can be drawn to the Presidential elections of the United States, wherein the elections are fought between the Presidential candidates of the Republicans and the Democrats. A careful observation will also bring out several other parallels with the United States, such as the campaign by non-political actors(Ajay Devgan and Salman Khan sharing public space with Narendra Modi), invitation for a public debate from Narendra Modi, record use of Social Media for campaigning, reaching out to different voter segments through specific channels (chai pe charcha and addressing students in University auditoriums) and an over emphasis on the Modi v/s Rahul contest consistently through a variety of communication. I am not a Narendra Modi antagonist, but I do have a view point against this serious effort to Americanize the Indian political process.

Officially, some 300 odd crores have gone into this effort. To begin with, let us try and analyze the net effect of such a magnanimous effort. Of all things that were taught to me in the school, one thing that I retain the most is that, in India lies unity in diversity. Not to say that the entire country will unify to elect one individual to fight the perils of the society. Rather, the entire country will unify to acknowledge the problems facing the society (corruption, governance, development, etc.), and will respond in their unique ways to the same. These unique ways may include the Jayalalithas, the Mamatas, the Mayawatis, the Mulayams, the Naveen Patnaiks and so on. Needless to say that the fabric of this country is too diverse to be stitched in a saffron thread only.

This effort is primarily targeted to capture the collective conscious of the country. But the truth remains that, there is indeed no such collective conscious. Unlike the United States, the Indian society is rather a collection of many such collective conscious. Hence, it becomes very difficult for any single leader, issue or incident to have an appeal of the magnitude Mr Modi is trying to achieve. Even the issue of Pakistan looses steam to the south of Maharastra and similarly, Mumbai terror attack looses steam to the east of Madhya Pradesh. And I am sure Narendra Modi is historically much less a turning point than many others.

A classical antidote to this phenomenon exists in this election itself. The Aam Aadmi Party which created its anti-establishment space by targeting the Congress in the Delhi elections, was very quick to realize that there is no Congress any more. The AAP barrels are now clearly pointing towards Narendra Modi, for they have realized that this is the next so called establishment. AAP quickly realized that, what got them to the Delhi assembly will not get them to the Parliament, for the country is diverse in its problems, in its solutions, in its voters, in its lineage, etc. Even the Congress did really well by not playing it to the hands of Narendra Modi. They did not name the apparent heir as the heir, and decided to go into the elections as the Congress party. Rahul Gandhi did ensure no individual attacks on the Modi persona. But the BJP seems too rigid to  amend strategies and is risking putting all its eggs in the Modi basket.

Unlike few months ago, Rahul Gandhi's existence is far more questionable today, and Narendra Modi has lost his most glorified opponent even before the elections. On the contrary, the situation is something like this today – Narendra Modi v/s Nitish Kumar in Bihar, Narendra Modi v/s Naveen Pattnaik in Orissa, Narendra Modi v/s Mamata Bannerjee in West Bengal, Narendra Modi v/s Omar Abdullah in J&K, Narendra Modi v/s Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu, etc. The situation is anything but a quasi presidential election.  

Most exit polls predict BJP to be the single largest party after the elections, and the bookie favorite to form the Government. And some of his opportunistic opponents (understandably so) might also rally behind Narendra Modi to help him reach the magical 272 number. But the truth remains that, the BJP would have been better off had it not focused all its energy on trying to manufacture a quasi presidential election in world’s largest and most diverse democracy.

A tale of two brands

I am making specific references to the situation faced by Tata Motors today. And a sharp contrast is available in the form of Mahindra & Mahindra, to bring out some inherent contradictions.

Let me go back a few years when Indica was launched. A car with a fresh design, technology, no lineage and more importantly accurate positionig (that of a family car, remember the tag line “more car per car”). Maruti, at that point of time, already was an established competition. But there was something more/different Indica had to offer, and the rest is history.

But things have changed sufficiently since then. Every segment today will have at least 10-15 competing cars in India. The need to differentiate your products is further more today. I doubt if the very same Tata Motors does seem to comprehend this. I rather assume that some kind of uncertainty and insecurity has set in. If you check with any auto enthusiast, you will come to know that both Manza and the Vista are the next generation products from Tata Motors and are quite competitive vis-à-vis the other offerings in their respective segments. So what is ailing them in the market place is nothing but poor positioning and communication. The Vista was launched as Indica Vista and Manza as Indigo Manza, clearly indicating that Tata Motors wanted to play it safe with established brand like Indica and Indigo. So when you play safe, you can only play as much. Again, both these products were launched much before their respective segments got crowded, thus giving Tata Motors a clear advantage. But they lost the opportunity as they were scared of taking the big step initially. Eventually, only when the Plan A failed, Plan B did promote Vista and Manaza as brands with separate identity. But it was too late in the day, as initial association with economy brands like Indica and Indigo has significantly diluted the premium images of Vista and Manza respectively. Clearly there was some kind of fear and insecurity, and not business sense, driving this.

This blog would be incomplete without the mention of the great Indian dream, “the Nano”. The initial assumption that Nano will not require any promotion and every family on a 2-wheeler will automatically shift to Nano, was a psychosis of a different kind. The initial positioning of the Nano as an aspiration car for the lower middle class has given way to being a “cool to have a car with the GenY”. The new tag line, “ Celebrate Kickasssomeness” will have no appeal whatsoever to the previous segment of customers. In the absence of any logical connect between the two propositions, it is obvious that the Plan A has been shelved and Plan B has taken over. With an ambitious project like Nano, a bit more homework was desired.

A close look at their communications would reinforce the above theory. The new Manza advertisement features a Japanese spy in India, trying to understand the secret technology that drives the new Manza, and ending up with a complex. This is an age old concept of selling a technology product in India, playing on the collective complex of a technologically inferior nation. May be only a patriotic brand like the Tata can come up with such a proposition. I can’t help but remember the Voltas (a Tata group company) advertisement, “India ka AC, Korea ka nahin”. Looks like the problem is rooted deeper in the larger organization. While it may appear to be patriotic to most buyers, it is only reflective of a deep sense of insecurity on the part of the brand.

Even the Nano communications were no different to start with. The advertisement would show families on 2-wheelers aspiring Nano while getting wet in the rain, and contrast it with a family feeling lucky to have escaped the rain while inside their Nano. Another advertisement would show a couple in a Nano accusing the wind for stealing their romantic whispers. It really took them time to understand that they are better off celebrating youthfulness than exploiting lower middle class insecurities.

While the leading car manufacturer was gradually going down, their Indian peer Mahindra & Mahindra was rapidly climbing its way up. Now this is a company with no history; in fact the historical image of being a tractor manufacturer was rather a lag. With competencies narrowed in the Utility Vehicle segment and a setback in the car segment (broken partnership with Renault), M&M had its task cut out. They did the exactly opposite to Tata Motors, brilliant positioning and communication. They focused on a competency based strategy and came up with competitive products, across price points, in the utility vehicles category. Bolero, Scorpio and XUV are all leaders, and the likes of Xylo and Thar are no less. This was a company conscious of its limitations and decided to focus on its strengths. Hence, the clarity and confidence.

Again, a close look at the M&M communications would reinforce the above theory. The M&M communication clearly says “Live Young, Live Free”, backed by an excellent video capturing the Gen Y free spirit and youthfulness. Unlike Tata Motors, this proposition is not only more aligned to the targeted segment, but also reflective of the changing values of the contemporary society. M&M were quick to drop the stereo typical – style, technology, service, etc. as differentiators - and focus on the identity of the brand as the differentiator. Needless to say, there was risk involved in trying to ride on the pulse of the nation, rather than the stereotypical. But only a brand, as confident as the M&M, could have felt the pulse right. And as they say, the rest is history.

Raising Your Spiritual Quotient

The common belief is that Spiritualism is a journey to be taken consciously, and the path is very different from the various paths we trace in our routine lives. As ordinary humans, we are less conscious of and more instinctual about most of the things that we do. Common human vices such as anger, violence, jealousy, competition, etc., are all deeply instinctual. I don’t remember anyone consciously choosing to be angry or jealous. As we commonly say, that is in his nature, purely referring to instincts. The question I ask is that, if we are all gifted with all such vices, deeply rooted in our instincts, then why doesn’t it work the other way. Why can’t we have some spiritual instincts rooted in us as well, so that we as ordinary humans don’t struggle with what the Buddha has gone through. Or are those instincts already there, and we haven’t realized them yet. Knowing nature’s miraculous ability to strike balance, the second possibility is more likely.

I am inspired by certain scientific facts to explore the possibility of such spiritual instincts. A certain species of the Cobra snake deep in the forests of South America is laying eggs in the middle of the tropical rain season. Over the next few days the rains are only going to increase and affect the equilibrium of the entire ecosystem. However, it is no coincidence that the breeding season of the Cobra overlaps the heavy rain months of the South Americas. The cobra carefully selects a bed of leaves with high buoyancy and an elevated platform to lay eggs in order to de-risk the dangers of flooding. The hatching period of the eggs can go up to 100 days, and that is enough time for water level to rise in the forests. Moving further the Cobra feeds itself properly, for it doesn’t know when the next meal is going to come. The Cobra literally hatches and/or guards those eggs for almost the entire duration of 90 days. Not even for a single moment does it go off the eggs for that would put its eggs under threat. The Cobra, like any other snake, can very much go hunting but it chooses not to do so as the security of its eggs are of prime importance. But the biggest of all threats to the eggs is the Cobra itself. Can we imagine a snake hungry for 90 days. Does it really matter whose eggs it is sitting upon.

 Although snakes are also cannibalistic, I haven’t heard of any snake feeding on its own eggs. This Cobra being no different either goes hungry for almost 90 days. The eggs still need another 10 days to come to life. But mother Cobra really cannot overcome its most primitive instinct (hunger) any more. It realizes the fact that, there is no more a bigger threat to the eggs than her. All these days the killer instinct that she has been able to overcome, will now be directed towards the very eggs that she has been protecting. You might call it a spiritual coincidence or whatever, the Cobra does overcome its most primitive instinct, and abandons the very eggs it has been protecting for all these days. On the very 90^th day the Cobra sets on a journey to never to come back again.

Not all of the Cobra eggs mature into full grown snakes. Natural selection precedes and only a few of the eggs do see the light of the day. The Cobra could have done well to feed on only one of the eggs to be able to take care of the others, but it chose otherwise. I have no option but to term this very instinct of the Cobra as spiritual. But for any spiritual instinct, it is unimaginable for a creature like snake to overcome its most primitive instinct of hunger. Darwin might approach this as the process of “natural selection”, wherein this species would have extinct had they not shown this particular behavior, I would argue that all species would have extinct had nature not packed us with similar spiritual instincts.

What amazes me is that, if a creature like snake with its mere cognitive capabilities is capable of demonstrating such spiritual highs, imagine the spiritual potential that higher order cognitive organisms are loaded with.  Assuming that human being are the ones with the highest cognitive capabilities, the vastness of this spiritual potential is only for us to discover. There are three parallels that are obvious:

a.       We are all programmed with numerous such spiritual instincts, irrespective of the fact that we are not conscious of most of them.

b.      Spiritual instincts are capable of and meant to counter all negative instincts and maintain the equilibrium within us and thereby in our ecosystem.

c.       If the Cobra can be conscious of such an instinct, then it is imperative and very much possible for us  to do the same.

A tale of two cities

This blog, to start with, is dedicated to one of the greatest ever Oriya composer and singer, Akshya Mohanty. Khoka Bhai, as he is popularly known, had a unique local flavor to almost all his songs. Not merely in the form of music, but also in the form of lyrics. His songs had this unique story telling capabilities, depicting places, events, festivities, people, families, values, society, and above all idiosyncrasies. All the above items featured in his songs extensively, as if each song is inspired from and brings into life one of these characters. I really cannot stop myself from drawing a parallel to R.K.Narayan and his Malgudi Days, for Khoka Bhai does the more difficult of task of giving life to his non-fictional city and characters through the medium of songs.

I always wanted to write a blog on one of Khoka Bhai songs, but it was never so compelling until I came across this particular one, “Raja Jhia Sange, Kari Thili Bhaba hai, Bhubaneswara ra hata re” ( Fell in love with the rich man’s daughter at the market place of Bhubaneswar). My Oriya friends would relate to it much betterJ, and certainly no marks to them for guessing the two cities in play. Cuttack has been the oldest city of the Orissa, and the commercial and administrative capital for nearly two centuries in the pre-independence era. It was only in 1964, that Bhubaneswar came into being the administrative capital, and the educated elites were the first to migrate from Cuttack to Bhubaneswar. Ever since, Bhubaneswar without the burden of heritage has continued to attract such educated pro-western elites not only from Cuttack, but from all over Orissa. Cuttack, at the same time, has owned up the burden of its heritage and continued to give away from its huge repository of rich Oriya culture. A statistical validation of this comes from the fact that, while Cuttack managed to produce numerous geniuses in the field of Oriya art and literature, Bhubaneswar has only made strides in its quest for westernization during the same period. Thus, was formed the classical Marxian hierarchy of classes, with Bhubaneswar playing the role of big bourgeois city and Cuttack the insignificant proletariat.

Numerous Khoka Bhai songs have revolved around Cuttack and its people, but this one particularly brings into fore the prevalent Marxian hierarchy and according to me makes the best possible satire, then and now. What makes it more beautiful, is that it takes the help of a mini love story to bring out the intricate inter-city class dynamics.

So the protagonist (like many of my friends from Cuttack) makes these trips to the Bhubaneswar (market places, temples, etc…..especially places highly frequented by young females and with a high probability of finding a female partner) and one fine day does come across his dream girl in the market place. And thus began the very transient affair with the rich man’s daughter. The transient nature of the affair is evident from the fact that it started in Bhubaneswar and lasted only till Telengapentha (located exactly midway of Bhubaneswar and Cuttack). Of course the love story graduated beyond the market place and moved to parks and temples. It even travelled beyond the city limits of Bhubaneswar, but unfortunately could never get close to Cuttack. The protagonist claims to be dumped midway by the young lady; midway is only a metaphor for the distance covered in love was hardly anything.

To begin with, the lady’s valuation of the man was nothing less than a gem. Subsequently, rationalization prevailed and SWOT analysis revealed that the man from Cuttack was nothing less than a Casanova. According to the theory, the Casanova takes the ultimate responsibility for the failure of any relationship. And it was no different for this man either, for he was accused of not being worthy of love. As per the lady, Casanova is a certain medical condition of the lower class, and it runs in the veins of all the youths of Cuttack. And our hero being from Cuttack, and no other fault of his, shares this medical condition which does not make him eligible for being in love with a “Rajdhani girl”.

Not an unusual situation for men though (being dumped and at the same time being accused of it), but what really complicates the situation for this gentleman is the underlying class dynamics of the two societies. Borrowing from a colloquial concept of ‘’political economy of love”, the city based political behavior is not surprising. Neither the initial assessment of the lady is incorrect, nor is the final judgment correct. They are nothing but merely love instincts superimposed on the real class structure.   Many years later, I myself grew up in the city of Bhubaneswar and would witness such politico-economical love behaviors in plenty in schools, colleges and workplaces.  Akshya Mohanty was clearly a man ahead of his times in his music and thought, and his songs would, still nevertheless cut across the entire Oriya civilization.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Du6lBqlM12k&noredirect=1

The Arousal Syndrome

“In society today, people are looking for more and finding better ways by which they can get aroused. In the good old days, man’s brain levels and hormonal levels were considered to be at a even keel throughout. He would have very little to do except work in fields and go home. In modern societies the constant stimulation we receive from the world draws us to any kind of arousal that is available to us.” Hey, hold on, this isn’t an article about the changing pattern of arousal stimuli over centuries, nor is it about finding more and better ways of arousal in our environment. This is about a certain event and its audience, who together supposedly put India on the global map. And the above lines are from a piece in Times of India, wherein a certain man of medicine ( a doctor in Mumbai) is trying to possibly explain the psychological reasons responsible for a huge turnout in the maiden F1 Grand Prix in the rape capital of India.

From a psychological view point, he says, the motor car is one of the few ways by which a human being can actually project his maleness through a machine. The everyday surges you can get by driving your motor bike or car aggressively, do makes you feel like a doer and imagining that you are in control. No doubt, the haves in India have found a new means to stay more in control through such fast moving and damn expensive machines. What is fresh in the mind is a certain Mohd. Azharuddin gifting his 19 year old son a 1000cc sports bike for Id-ul-fitr, and what followed was headlines for national news channels. There have been many such instances of aroused kids speeding their fast moving BMWs onto the pavement dwellers. Actually, these machines on Indian roads serve a dual purpose. Firstly, they do communicate the Marxian class consciousness of the haves to the have nots;  they control the powerful machine, the roads, the space and above all the fruits of production in this 9% GDP story. Secondly, as our doctor friend suggests that they take care of the modern day arousals (thus they know how to control their arousal as well).

Coming back to the primary issue of 95,000 people turning up for the grand event, making it a global success, how many were arousal led. According to this theory, arousal occurs whenever there is something new. The hormone of arousal is dopamine which is stimulated whenever there is any form of new arousal. Thus, Delhiites are looking for a dopamine rush when they come for such sports that are designed for a dopamine stimulation (as they say F1 has curves, both on and off the track). No doubt, exactly a year ago the same city hosted the largest sporting event in the form of Commonwealth Games, and quite obviously the games were not arousing enough. May be the F1 bosses who worked hard to sell the F1 dream (a mirage rather) to the Indian audience had a measure of this arousal syndrome of Delhiites, and that is why Delhi was chosen over other Indian cities.

For the tiny section of genuine F1 enthusiasts (not driven by the arousal and mostly non-Delhiite), who were easily outnumbered by the aroused species, it couldn’t get any bigger than this. But the aroused species is the one which made all the difference – both numerically and monetarily. It could afford to buy individual tickets to the race @ 8K – 12K (approximately 30K for a family of 4). And also came along dada, dadi, munna, munni, chachu, chichi and so on. Going by the sheer affordability of the tickets, this species is not common and the sport isn’t either. This species was also surprised to discover that  neither Vijay Mallya nor Karthikeyan were able to win the race, unlike the Indian cricket team which won the world cup in India a few months ago. The species was also happy about the fact that their staple diet was supplied at the venue at affordable prices (Chole Bature – Rs 250/-, Biryani – 450/-, etc.). They also concluded that, had the roads in Delhi been like the ones in the circuit, even they could clock 300 kmph in their Maruti variants. For once I was happy about cricket being a dumb sport vis-à-vis F1, and India being a one sport country. And thanks to the IPL, all our cricketing dopamine has been done away with.

Clearly this is an audience of excess and at another level it will make Incredible India more fascinating with all its wild contrasts and baffling contradictions. Here is a sport which is imported fully from the West, and here comes an audience fully home grown. Not surprisingly, the rape capital didn’t know exactly what to do with this new arousal, and rushed for a certain Lady Gaga show, for which the tickets were bought @ Rs 40,000/- per person.