Indira Gandhi targeting RSS during Emergency & legitimising it, Rajiv giving up mandate in 1989, and Vajpayee, Advani advancing general elections – these errors changed the course of India’s politics.
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Thanks Shekhar Ji for such a nice article. I am an Associate Professor in Economics at the University of Leicester , UK.
If I may please, I would differ with you a bit on the 1989 analysis. The President did call RG to form the government first, but at that point RG had no other option but to decline. How would he get the additional numbers required? Congress dod not have any major pre poll alliance. At that scenario, even the leftwould have not supported the government. However, I do think RG should have formed the government after the fall of the VP government. With the CS faction out, with 197 he could have made CS the deputy PM and offered a few more important cabinet posts. Instead RG chose to repeat the Charan Singh type tale. Incidentally in a recent researcg paper we have shown by careful econometric analysis that this act did cost RG electorally in 1991.
Don’t see the connection between the so-called major blunders. The analysis is too hypothetical. It simply says had Rajiv Gandhi not sat out in 1989 politics of subsequent period would have played out differently. How? Rajiv’s government would not have lasted. He might have still felled by LTTE bullets.
Since the prism is political, sending the IPKF to Sri Lanka can be excluded. However, seeking to nullify the Shah Bano verdict and also opening the locks to the Babri Masjid was a mistake. For Mrs. Gandhi, playing footsie in Punjab, leading ultimately to Operation Blue Star.
Thanks Shekhar Ji for such a nice article. I am an Associate Professor in Economics at the University of Leicester , UK.
If I may please, I would differ with you a bit on the 1989 analysis. The President did call RG to form the government first, but at that point RG had no other option but to decline. How would he get the additional numbers required? Congress dod not have any major pre poll alliance. At that scenario, even the leftwould have not supported the government. However, I do think RG should have formed the government after the fall of the VP government. With the CS faction out, with 197 he could have made CS the deputy PM and offered a few more important cabinet posts. Instead RG chose to repeat the Charan Singh type tale. Incidentally in a recent researcg paper we have shown by careful econometric analysis that this act did cost RG electorally in 1991.
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Don’t see the connection between the so-called major blunders. The analysis is too hypothetical. It simply says had Rajiv Gandhi not sat out in 1989 politics of subsequent period would have played out differently. How? Rajiv’s government would not have lasted. He might have still felled by LTTE bullets.
Since the prism is political, sending the IPKF to Sri Lanka can be excluded. However, seeking to nullify the Shah Bano verdict and also opening the locks to the Babri Masjid was a mistake. For Mrs. Gandhi, playing footsie in Punjab, leading ultimately to Operation Blue Star.