Increasing Muslim representation: A tactical approach

By M. Zajam,

Buoyed by recent Lok Sabha election victory, Congress is working on plan to revive itself in States where it lost relevance in 90s. Good performance of Congress is attributed to the fact that Muslims voted in favor of Congress in large numbers. Congress isolation was over.

Muslims deserted Congress after demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992 especially in States where they had option in form of regional parties. We saw rise to Mulayam Singh Yadav and Lalu Prasad Yadav in early nineties.

Muslim support is critical for Congress revival in States like UP, Bihar and West Bengal.

In UP, parties like Congress, SP and BSP all are eyeing Muslim support to consolidate its position. If Muslim in UP choose to support Congress, it will be at the expense of SP and BSP. Similarly in Bihar, it will be expense of RJD, JD-U and LJP. In West Bengal, it will be CPI-M and Trinmool Congress loss.

Now the question is, should Muslim support Congress at the cost of small regional parties?

It seems both Congress and BJP are in favor of two parties system in the country. Statements of important leaders of both parties make this very clear. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had stated “Regional parties do not have any national vision and are an obstruction to the nation’s progress”. Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh had termed the regional parties as `fatal' to democracy. BJP leader Lal Krishna Advani had suggested voters that people should vote for the Congress and not regional parties if they did not want to elect BJP during 2004 election campaign in Haryana.

Sachar committee report brought out poor socio-economic condition of Muslims with facts and figure. It also unknowingly highlighted the fact that Congress was to blame for this poor condition as it was in power for considerable part of time. Congress has always used Muslim as mere voting machine to be used only election time and after election to be dumped in corner of a warehouse far away from eyesight.

Even at the time of election, Congress failed to live up to expectations when distributing tickets. In states where BJP and Congress are in picture, Muslims were out of picture. They were not given their due share when tickets were distributed. In these states Congress very well know that Muslims do not have option but to vote for them.

Let us compare Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh having almost same Muslim population. In AP Muslims were given all together 8 tickets by major parties but whereas in Gujarat, Muslims were consider fit for just one.

Tamil Nadu with Muslim population less than Maharashtra, Rajsthan, MP and Delhi lapped up 3 tickets from major parties and ended up winning two of them. Even Assam with 31% population Congress considered Muslim only for two seats. Contest was mainly Congress vs BJP + AGP in Assam and no one was expecting impressive show from AUDF.

Major bulk of tickets and winning seats came from UP and West Bengal, both states having multiplayer.

Small parties are more sympathetic and try to accommodate Muslims. In Orissa with only 2% Muslim population, BJD offered one seat to Muslim. In UP, BSP gave tickets to 10 Muslim candidates and forced other to follow suit.

More tickets will definitely brighten the chances of Muslims in election with some tactical voting. With Assembly election due this year in Maharashtra and Jharkhand, Muslim need to a hard look at their political future and act.

If we look at the issues which were raised during General Election Campaign, Muslim related issues did figure in UP and Bihar. In UP Kalyan Singh and Babri Masjid hog the limelight and Bihar it was Bhagalpur riot and Babri Masjid. Though they can not be considered as only real issues.

Congress is working hard to win back Muslim support for its revival. Now it is up to Muslim to decide whether they want to lend their support to Congress and make regional parties weak or work on Tamil Nadu model to increase representation. UP and West Bengal provided bulk of Muslim MPs in 15th Lok Sabha and we want to up the tally and not to dry it up.

To keep check on major national parties, we need regional parties. During UPA-1, under close eyes of Left and other regional allies it did good job and came back to power. Left and other regional parties in Common Minimum Programme included many welfare schemes for farmer and poor. They kept privitisation spree of Congress even under helm of Manhoman Singh under check. This helped India staying away from ill effect of economic meltdown, which was felt all over the world.

Some may argue that rise of regional parties promotes regionalism and few parties can arm twist to take away all the benefits. But it is also not true that Ministers tend to prefer home states and constituency when they launch new schemes and benefits.

Now it is up to Muslim to decide whether they want to take a walk right up to Congress door or learn from past and take every step tactfully. To all political parties message should be loud and clear that we will be tactically yours.