Back to the future: Like UPA, Modi sarkar may be derailed by the C-word

“We have done no wrong… there is no need to be defensive,” Sonia Gandhi said to a group of Congress MPs who met her soon after the BJP forced adjournment of parliament, demanding the PM’s resignation over the CAG report. 23 August, 2012.

“We have not done anything wrong, there is no need to be defensive,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi to party MPs after the conversion row in parliament. 17 December, 2014.

Welcome to the theatre of Indian politics, where the characters keep changing but the drama and the dialogue remain same. And so is the end result: lots of noise, opportunistic politics and policy paralysis.

So, what has the country gained so far by booting out the UPA and voting in the BJP? In the UPA era, the government was held hostage by corruption. One national election later, the parliament is debating another C word — communalism.

Speaking to CNN-IBN in February this year, Arun Jaitley, who was then leader of the opposition in the Rajya Sabha had said, “You see some obstructionism can be a part, not frequent obstructionism. I personally don’t like the obstructionism. But parliament being used as a forum in more than one ways to expose the weaknesses of the government, I think, is a positive development, and to that extent I think this parliament has done well.” In the same interview, Jaitley had argued that “the responsibility of restoring sanity and peace in the House belongs to the ruling party and if the ruling party can’t put its own house in order…”

Today, the opposition led by the Congress can use the same logic to claim that by raising din over the communal agenda, the parliament has done well and the government has failed in its duty of running the House — a claim that has some foundation.

The parliament has just a few more days before the winter session ends. Only a miracle can save it from going down as a complete wash-out, a terrible pandemonium of nonsense and non-issues, with two important bills likely to get buried in the noise. The proposed reforms in the insurance sector — allowing 49 per cent FDI — and a bill to ensure that coal mines keep running in the next year will be delayed once again. There may be some movement on the goods and services tax (GST) bill that was cleared by the Cabinet on Wednesday, but nobody is sure if it will get past the Rajya Sabha.

These bills have been pending not for months or weeks, but since the first UPA government. In 2004, the then finance minister had proposed the increase in FDI, but the BJP led by Atal Behari Vajpayee had stalled the process. Back then the BJP was erecting roadbocks, now the boot is on the other foot.

There appeared to be some sort of consensus on the insurance sector reforms before the start of the session. But Sadhvi Jyoti, Sakshi Maharaj and the ghar wapsi campaign hijacked the PM’s agenda.

The PM has been extremely lucky so far. The party has done reasonably well in state assembly elections, and it may win a few more states over the next few months. There is also a lot of euphoria around his foreign trips. Simultaneously, oil prices have crashed and inflation is in control. But his purple patch may not last too long. Globally there seems to be increasing fear of recession, many expect the dollar to rise against other currencies in the next year; in India key indicators of growth—industrial production index—have shown decline and the Sensex is falling, suggesting that investors are losing faith.

The tide of good fortune is turning. Jokes about the PM have started circulating — that he also needs a ghar wapsi invitation being the latest.

But the PM also has his own handicaps: lack of majority in the Rajya Sabha, signs of impatience within the Hindutva brigade, his inability to gag the loonies within his camp and, most significantly, the government’s inability to push through pending bills and reforms. To complicate matters, he is either busy travelling out of India or addressing political rallies, leaving very little time for the actual task of running a government.

The Congress won’t mind any of this. Having suffered at the hands of the BJP’s strident opposition in the Parliament during its tenure, the Congress will try its best to ensure that the government fails to move forward its development agenda. It will get complete support from other parties, who are in no mood to cede an inch to Modi.

Soon, people will be talking not of achhe din but purane din, and of the bad old kind.