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Journalism of Courage
Among the more significant news photographs of recent times is the one showing Sushma Swaraj and Brinda Karat, both smiling and with good reason 8212; they and other women MPs across party lines fought and won a partial victory for the women8217;s bill. Such photographs should not be as rare as they are 8212; political leaders of parties with deep ideological divisions should be able to work together on specific issues. Political differences, however sharp, should not lead to personal antipathy because in a mature democracy there are always some national issues that require the political class to forge intelligent solutions. So it is one of the saddest developments in recent politics that parties have found it increasingly difficult to have quiet dialogue. More sad because it is not as if such dialogue is beyond the capacity of the leaders.
Economic reforms, let8217;s remember, is a political item only because of cross-party understanding on broad parameters. This understanding is not always advertised but it8217;s there. A similar quiet exchange could have happened on the nuclear deal. Indeed don8217;t underestimate the capacity of Indian politics to surprise; time permitting, some rough formula may yet emerge. But the fact is that nuclear politics could have been handled better, even given the stated positions of all the major political players. The reason it wasn8217;t is that the deal became a public issue when relations between political parties had already soured. Perhaps the Congress could have been a cleverer communicator. On the other hand, given the maximalist positions of the BJP and the Left, it is hard to see what else could have happened. But had relations been better it would be easy to see how much could have been achieved 8212; just look at Pranab Mukherjee8217;s energetic negotiations. Mukherjee and a Mukherjee equivalent from the BJP would have likely sorted out many issues.
