Strategic Paradigms by Ehsan Ahrari

One of the chief differences between India and China is that the latter has institutionalized the process of change in its top leadership, while India still suffers from a small-village mentality of relying on a “wise” leader from a clan.  In this instance, the focus is the Nehru clan, the family of Jawaharlal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India.  The Nehru family, directly or indirectly, has played a leading role in governing India throughout its existence as an independent nation, with only a few periods of interruption.  Sonia Gandhi – wife of one of India’s Prime Ministers, Rajiv Gandhi, who was son of Indira Gandhi, another Prime Minister, and the grandson of Jawaharlal Nehru – is the real power behind the current Congress Party-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA).  Since she is suffering from an undisclosed ailment, which is unofficially described as some type of cancer, the talk is once again on about the succession to premiership of Rahul Gandhi.  He is the son of Rajiv, grandson of Indira, and the great-grandson of Jawaharlal.  From all public descriptions, it seems Rahul has not inherited the political talents of his grandmother or his mother, who is described by the Indian press as a talented and a wise politician. That fact was established when, in Sonia’s absence in August 2011, the government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh acted like a “keystone cop” in its handling of the hunger strike of Anna Hazare. Hazare is another savvy politician, whose meteoric rise on the Indian political horizon has befuddled even the most veteran observers of that country’s political scenes.  In using hiscampaign to fight endemic corruption for which the Indian political system is notorious all over the world, Anna Hazare has been playing the Gandhian legacy like a  fiddle.  In the process, he is also building his own huge political following in India.

There is little doubt that India is about to face a regime change in the next election.  What is tragic is that there seems to be too much significance given to the leadership of young Rahul Gandhi, who is both brash and inexperienced.  For a country of the global significance of India, it has been showing a serious lack of a corps of sophisticated leaders who can continue the march toward becoming the second superpower of Asia in the coming decades.  One reason might be the dominance of Hindu mythology, which excessively emphasizes the role of heroes (or even superheroes) that can singlehandedly conquer mighty evil forces.  The Hindu books of mythology are full of narratives of such heroes.  Since religious legacies – even the mythical ones – color the frame of reference of ordinary people in all societies, India seems to be enthralled by the idea of “hero-leaders.”  Mohandas Gandhi was certainly one such hero, whose nonviolent ideology turned out to be more powerful than Samson’s “bone of an ass,” which he used to slay “a thousand men.”  

Jawaharlal Nehru created a similar legacy for himself.  As an astute student of history, a philosopher, and a shrewd politician, he had the makings of a leader that Hindu books of mythologies describe.  But Nehru was not a religious man.  In fact, as a declared secularist, he had little use for religion.  He emerged as one of the leaders of the nonaligned movement (NAM) of the 1950s and 1960s.  That movement played a major role in serving as the conscience of the world in underscoring the immorality of the Cold War.  But Nehru was no vacuous moralist.  He used morality only selectively, and ignored it when it served India’s national interests.  The best evidence of that was India’s strong friendship with the Soviet Union, the leader of the communist camp of the Cold War years.  Nehru played a powerful role in the enduring nature of that friendship.  While he regularly criticized the Cold War, he continued to show preference for the Soviet Union.  As such, India became a major recipient of Soviet civilian and defense technology at a preferential rate.  Nehru also remained a giant in India’s domestic arena.  No one could challenge his leadership.  That leadership became a prototype that no Indian Prime Minister could match.

Nehru’s daughter, Indira, also emerged as a giant of Indian politics.  However, unlike her father, she was quite ruthless and often wrong-headed in dealing with opposition.  She initiated a 21-month-long emergency rule (25 June to 21 March 1977), which is still regarded as a dark spot on India’s otherwise immaculate commitment to democracy.  She asserted a highly controversial policy (aka Indira doctrine) that assigned India to play a central role in resolving political conflicts of South Asia.  For the Indian political culture – which emphasizes more the Gandhian morality than the Kautilyan version of Machiavellianism – that was a gross aberration.  It was under Indira’s premiership that India succeeded in dismantling East Pakistan into Bangladesh.  Those who live by the sword also die by the sword.  Her mishandling of the Sikh movement’s demand for the creation of a separate Sikh state, Khalistan – and especially her decision to send troops inside the holiest of the Sikh shrines, the Darbar Sahib (Golden Temple) in June 1984 (Operation Blue Star) to arrest Sikh extremists and their leader, Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale – eventually led to her brutal assassination at the hands of her two disgruntled Sikh bodyguards.

Indira was quite clearheaded and resolute about India’s role as a great power during an era when that country was not at all qualified to be labeled as such. However, to the extent that she had no doubts about India’s future potential, she was indeed a visionary.  In that sense, she also possessed the eadership qualities of India’s mythical heroes.

Since Indira, India did not have leaders of mythical quality.  Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee was more of a Machiavellian than anything else, in his decision to bring India’s closeted nuclear weapons program into the open by conducting nuclear explosions in 1998.  From India’s strategic perspectives, that was indeed a brilliant move.  The United States – the self-styled policeman against nuclear weapons proliferation – was angry about India’s nuclear weapons test and imposed sanctions, but then got over that anger.  The decision of the administration of President Bill Clinton to conduct strategic dialogues with India in 1999-2000 eventually resulted in the remarkable evolution of the U.S.-India strategic partnership.

India’s emergence as one of the states possessing nuclear weapons should be viewed in conjunction with its economic reforms program that Dr. Manmohan Singh carried out in the early 1990s in his capacity as India’s Finance Minister.  Thus, Prime Minister Vajpayee and Dr. Manmohan Singh together emerged as two technocrats who made major contributions toward India’s emergence as one of the rising powers of Asia.  They hardly possessed characteristics of mythical heroes of the Hindu holy books.  Vajpayee was at times referred to as charismatic, but certainly not Singh.  In fact, Singh is not even a Hindu.

Still, the public quest for another hero-like leader continues.  That quest has a genuine base in India’s political culture.  People love to find heroes in different walks of life. When they find them, they continue to worship them unless they do something awful to dismantle their god-like aura.  The Indian mass media also plays a crucial role by incessantly keeping the notion of mythical heroes alive, as part of public discussion and debate.  Those discussions only become intense when a government in power gives them reasons to argue that its time has passed.  Unfortunately for Dr. Singh – who has the reputation of a brilliant technocrat – such a discussion is becoming voluble with the passage of time.

Given India’s incessant quest for heroes, Rahul Gandhi’s chances of emerging as Prime Minister appear quite bright.  However, not many are willing to take bets about his competence in that office, because he lacks experience.  Despite the visibility that he has been given as a scion of the Nehru-Gandhi clan, he has yet to impress observers with his shrewdness, maneuverability, or craftiness – traits that were part of the political profile of his great grandfather and grandmother.  His mother, Sonia, has also nurtured an aura of a great leader in the past few years.  However, to be fair, Rahul might shock his critics and prove himself when given a chance.  But if he fails, India will move on.  His failure would not be regarded as the failure of a hero.  Heroes never fail; that is the judgment from the holy books.  And India will move ahead in its quest for another hero.