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S Prasannarajan
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LOCOMOTIF
Politics
of Symbolism
What
is there in common between Joseph Lieberman and Bangaru Laxman? Actually
nothing; they are as different as an American and an Indian can be in
politics. Joe Lieberman, a widely respected Democratic Senator, is the
running mate of Vice President Al Gore. He has a mind of his own, and
that was in display during the Monica Agony of the Clinton presidency.
He didn't defend his boss on something he thought was indefensible. Bangaru
Laxman? He has been one of them in the parivar, not particularly visible,
not particularly audible. If there is anything exceptional about him,
we are not aware of it. Sorry.
Suddenly, Lieberman the Jew and Laxman the Dalit are brothers in the politics
of symbolism. Lieberman has become the first Jew to be nominated for a
national ticket. He is a practising Orthodox Jew. The possibility of a
Jew in the White House is really something---for, as one headline goes,
what if war breaks out on the Sabbath? Gore's audacity is commendable.
It was a double-edged selection. It is Gore's way of distancing himself
from Clinton, if not Clintonism. It is also a celebration of symbolism.
The so called Jewish lobby in America is famously familiar. Then, America
is not all about Saul Bellow and Woody Allen and Henry Kissinger. There
is Louis Farrakhan also, or, anti-Semitism. Hate politics is not always
white, it is black as well. So, even if Bush can't afford a Colin Powell,
Gore can afford a Lieberman.
And, back in our own Indraprastha, our own ' Hindu Nationalist Party'
can afford a dalit party president. Well, the fundamentally mischievous
in the parivar can ask: If the Indian Republic can have a symbolic scheduled
caste president, why can't the BJP have a low-caste party chief? True,
and I'm waiting for a Laxman visit to Paris to read a socially correct
Le Monde heading on the event. At the moment, we only have the symbolism
as authored by the BJP high command. Unlike the Lieberman ticket, there
is no courage here, there is only convenience.
Laxman, unlike Lieberman, is all symbol and no proven substance. It is
symbolism for the sake of it. The president of the party is the public
face of it. He is supposed to be the communicator as well as the mobiliser.
The leader who can achieve a perfect harmony between slogan and action.
He is supposed to be the first among the equals. Laxman is textbook example
of the Third Frontisation of the BJP: confusion is the mother of consensus.
Perhaps, it is the mandalisation of the BJP. If you can't have a consensus
on the available best, well, you settle for the harmless, non-threatening
average.
Or, is it further confirmation that the BJP, as far as its public image
is concerned, is a two-man party, that there is no space for another Leader
in the party? Or, is the party nervously self-conscious about its upper-caste
image? Identity, in normal political circumstances, should not be a cause
for anxiety. And symbolism, in smart politics, should activate the currently
passive. Sen. Joe Lieberman has done it for Al Gore. Bangaru Laxman is
unlikely to do it for the BJP.
(S Prasannarajan is Senior Editor, INDIA
TODAY. Write
to S Prasannarajan)
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