Opinion No turning back

Weather forecasting was very primitive till after the Second World War.

September 23, 2012 01:50 AM IST First published on: Sep 23, 2012 at 01:50 AM IST

Weather forecasting was very primitive till after the Second World War. Meteorologists in those days would predict the weather on a particular day by consulting what had happened on that day in the previous year,the idea being that it would be the same again. Then they began to model the weather mathematically and use computers. Even so,the best one can do is forecast very short-term weather or very long-term weather. Medium-run is the most unpredictable.

Indias political weather is very turbulent at present. This time last year,the government decided on FDI in retail and then withdrew it when Mamata Banerjee complained. This year,it seems the pattern may not repeat itself. What is important for the government is to be seen tackling the deficit. It is the diesel price increase which is crucial for this,not the FDI. If the government recalls the diesel price rise,it may as well say goodbye to 2014. With the deficit under some control,interest rates may go down and the rupee may appreciate. Both of these will reduce inflation as well as the hardship suffered by urban middle-classes.

Short-term squalls will continue because every party will want to grandstand and be seen with the aam aadmi. No one will face up to the stark fact that the aam aadmi suffers as much from subsidy as does the Black Label aadmi.

The government has little to fear if it sticks to its guns. There will be short-run turbulence but it is unlikely that there will be a no-confidence motion and if there is one,that it will be successful. One can predict that there will not be bundles of dirty thousand-rupee notes brought into the Lok Sabha as was the case with the Trust Vote last time around. But any Congress/secular coalition can be sure that there will never be a united Opposition against a secular government. BJP being against,will ensure that parties seeking the Muslim vote will never join it in a no-confidence vote if they want to take votes away from the Congress. That is the long-run predictability of Indian politics.

This means that whatever the TMC may say,it will find it hard to join BJP against the UPA. Mamata values the Muslim votes she has won in West Bengal. Muslim voters have forgiven her past membership in an NDA government. But SP and BSP will also desist from joining the BJP as will the Communists. They will move their own separate principled resolution but will make sure they are not seen to be responsible for bringing the government down.

It was different when in 1999 Sonia Gandhi won a confidence vote against NDA though that did not help her and the NDA came back. The arithmetic of no-confidence voting is biased in favour of the Congress by up to 80 to 100 votes,thanks to secularism. Parties within the secular fold may snipe at the Congress but that is because they all want to capture the Muslim vote bank. On the big issue,they are united against the BJP.

The BJP,in my view,is missing a trick or two here. They should have agitated for one week during the monsoon session and then let the PM come to Parliament and defend himself. As it was,they overplayed their card and the repetition of the 2G scam will not be available for Coalgate. It is also peculiar that FDI in retail and in aviation and a balanced budget are BJPs policy as much as they are of the PMs. The BJP could have given tacit support to UPA on this and let the Left parties pick up the populist cause. After all,when and if the BJP comes to power,it will have to be vigilant about the deficit just as much as the Congress needs to be.

In the end,money will change hands. Not in the sense of black money but a special status for Bihar here and some few thousand crores for West Bengal there,UP being treated leniently and you have a consensus. Even white money can do the trick sometimes.