In the last six months, all major Indian political parties have attempted radical in-house experiments.
From the Left to Centre to the Right, India’s parties are devising new methods to deal with voter discontent and enable a generational transition. The next test will be UP (Shutterstock)
In Kerala, the ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist) denied tickets to legislators who had already served in the assembly for two consecutive terms. The party boldly made no exception — even for health minister KK Shailaja, despite pleas of civil society and women’s organisations.
For the CPI(M), a cadre-based party, experimenting with such innovations was somewhat easy, though it is debatable from the view of a parliamentary democracy. By its very nature, a parliamentary democracy requires popular leadership at the grassroots level and a candidate needs to constantly nurture a constituency. Why would a popularly elected leader, knowing that there is no chance of a nomination after a second term, bother about a constituency’s development?
But by implementing its decision, the CPI(M) — under the framework of party discipline — inducted new faces as its candidates and ousted settled popular leaders who would have been averse to change.
But this isn’t unique to the Left. The Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) under Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, has indeed been a pioneer in replacing candidates when fighting elections as the incumbent. But there have been a spate of other changes in the party in recent times — at the level of the leadership of a government.
In Assam, despite a successful five-year tenure and leading the party to victory home in the 2021 assembly elections, the incumbent chief minister (CM) Sarbananda Sonowal was not retained as the leader of the legislative party, and, instead, Himanta Biswa Sarma was chosen. One can credit Sarma’s appointment to his role in steering the BJP out of troubled waters in Assam where the party did not have a demographic advantage (the state has a 40% Muslim population) and tackling the disquiet over the controversial Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019. The fact that Sarma was central to the party’s expansion in the Northeast helped his case — but removing an incumbent CM is not easy for any party.
Later, in Karnataka, BS Yediyurappa met the same fate and the state legislature party had to gracefully accept the formula devised by the central leadership. However, this time around, the BJP leadership was careful in giving ample consideration to electoral arithmetic, and guarding its Lingayat voter base. It chose BS Bommai, a Lingayat replacement for the outgoing CM.
The BJP experiment reached its zenith in Gujarat, where a three-and-a-half-year-old cabinet was replaced entirely. A first-time legislator, Bhupendra Patel, with only some municipal leadership experience to his credit, was made CM and no other leader from the outgoing cabinet was picked for the job. This change of guard was so sudden and swift that even the incumbent CM Vijay Rupani had little inkling of what was coming his way. Commentators claimed this was intended as an antidote for certain anti-incumbency sentiments for a ruling party which enjoyed power uninterrupted since 1998. The BJP also conducted what is an inexplicable experiment in Uttarakhand — two CMs were replaced within a span of a few months, though, in this case, cabinet ministers were retained.
The impact of these decisions by the BJP’s central leadership remains to be seen.
In the summer, it was also rumoured that the BJP national leadership may consider some top-level change or readjustment in Uttar Pradesh. However, these rumours were unfounded, and CM Yogi Adityanath will lead the BJP in its 2022 hustings. However, there are some imponderables. Will the BJP replace a large set of legislators? And what will be its impact.
There was a third party, conducting its own experiment. In Punjab, the Congress replaced a tall leader, Captain Amarinder Singh, and after struggling with a set of choices, narrowed down on Charanjit Singh Channi, a Dalit leader, as CM. He has to now coexist uneasily with a set of other senior leaders, both in the government and in the party, all aspiring to be the next CM.
From the Left to Centre to the Right, India’s parties are devising new methods to deal with voter discontent and enable a generational transition. The next test will be UP.
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