New Delhi: The 2024 Lok Sabha election results were not so much about the numbers but about giving India a chance to “breathe” and for its institutions to start functioning again, says senior Congress leader Manish Tewari.
In an interaction with PTI editors at the news agency’s headquarters here, the former Union minister also asserted that the BJP may acknowledge it or not but the government’s recent “U-turns” on certain issues are reflective of the realities of coalition politics.
Tewari said he believes India requires a “second wave of democratic reforms” whereby structures which really underpin the democratic edifice of India need to be more participatory, inclusive and democratic.
The Congress Working Committee permanent invitee also exuded confidence that his party and its allies were headed for a victory in the upcoming assembly polls which would have a positive impact on national politics.
Asked about the scenario post Lok Sabha poll results, Tewari said, “You need to roll back to November-December of 2023 which was similar to the November-December of 2003. The BJP had then also won Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. That was the shining India moment for them.Then subsequently what played out in the 2004 elections is history which I need not repeat for the sake of recreation.”
“If you now fast forward to the November-December of 2023, the BJP won Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh and there was this euphoria, railroading that ‘abki baar 400 paar’. There was a perceptible narrative which was built up, the subtext of ‘abki baar 400 paar’ was the abrogation of the Constitution and its replacement by something which would be more in congruence with what was the thinking of the predecessors of the BJP going back to the time when the Constituent assembly was writing the Constitution,” the Lok Sabha MP from Chandigarh said.
Starting from there to where the joint opposition was able to come with the numbers in the Lok Sabha stacking at 236 to about 300 for the BJP along with its NDA allies, the best thing that has happened is that it has “allowed this country to breath and given institutions a chance to start functioning again”, Tewari said.
The atmosphere of “utter stiflement” whereby everybody had installed a sensor in their own head, at least that particular spectre, seems to be in the background now since June 2024, he said.
“I see a more media approach to the media. It is no longer behaving as an unabashed propagandist, at least certain sections of it. You also see the impact of the 2024 results on other institutions in terms of the fact that everybody seems to be wanting to return to the natural state of equilibrium which a democracy really should be,” the Congress leader said.
“And so under those circumstances, I don’t think the 2024 elections were so much about the numbers, it was about the fact that it gave India a chance to breathe again,” Tewari asserted.
On whether the demands of the now-defunct G23 group within the Congress that had called for organisational reforms had been met, Tewari, who was part of the group, said that to narrowly see an effort that was made in that point in time as some kind of a reform initiative which was only specific to the Congress would be misreading of that effort.
“What India requires is a second wave of democratic reforms whereby you require the opening up of those structures which really underpin the democratic edifice of India. They need to be more participatory, inclusive and democratic,” he said.
To narrowly try and see an effort that was made in that point in time as some kind of a reform initiative which was only specific or uniqueness to the Congress would be misreading of that effort, he said.
“It is essential to locate it in the larger context in which there was a certain collective thinking. The time has come for the second generation of democratic reforms which is the more intensive democratisation of the political parties which underpin the great Indian democratic experiment,” he said.
To that extent, Tewari said, the Congress is the only party today with a democratically elected president, where by a full democratic process played itself out, and there was the co option of people who had even fought that internal election and lost into the decision-making bodies of the party.
“I think the one thing which possibly was never understood or perhaps we were not able to convey was that the impulse and the trigger was much larger and was aimed at ensuring that we are proud of the fact that we are the largest democracy in the world, the proliferation of that democratic experiment, should be both vertical and horizontal,” he argued.
Asked if he felt marginalised by the party when he was member of the G23 group seeking widescale reforms in party, Tewari answered in the negative and said one suffers from a sense of alienation if his or her objective of coming into politics is limited to aspiring for a post which had not been the case for him.
On assembly polls in Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, Maharashtra and Jharkhand, Tewari said like the positive impact the 2024 Lok Sabha poll results had on India’s democratic structure, the results of assembly polls, which would be in favour of the Congress and its allies, would strengthen the democratic structures of the country.
On Modi 3.0’s initial weeks that saw rollback of the lateral entry in bureaucracy move, sending of Waqf (Amendment) Bill to Parliament’s joint committee, reworking of the broadcast bill and the Unified Pension Scheme being brought in, Tewari said there were many things on which this government was very adamant but now seems flexible.
“The main reason for this is a coalition government and that is a reality. They may acknowledge it or not acknowledge it but that is a reality which will be seen in every decision,” Tewari said.
The Union Budget was full of mention of Andhra Pradesh and Bihar as the government is standing on “two crutches”, he said in an apparent reference to TDP of Andhra and JD(U) of Bihar.
“The U-turns are reflective of the realities of coalition politics,” he said.
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