INDIA CAN NEVER BE 'DYNASTY MUKT'

By Ruma Dubey

It is almost a given that the Congress might get its worst every tally in Lok Sabha elections of 2014. They might have to don the role of the Opposition and one wonders, how often they will end up disrupting the Parliament now that they are on the other side. More importantly, the big question – what happens to the Gandhi’s?

Well, they will go nowhere. They might lay low for some time but surely, with virtually all roads, all important structures named with a ‘Gandhi’ tag, with so many Trusts and power brokers, they will go nowhere. They were smart to have not named a PM candidate as in all likelihood, it was Rahul but he has proven what a bumbling ‘leader’ he really is though, the true cause for the defeat of Congress will not be Rahul, he helped the downfall but it was more the pathetic governance of five years, corruption and inflation. Priyanka’s rhetorics might have helped salvage some loss of seats but dynasty is most certainly here to stay.

To say that dynasty politics is over, at least for now is wrong as it is not just the Gandhi’s whose ‘family business’ is politics but there are many more. What about them?

Have a look at the other dynasties:

• Sachin Pilot who won on a sympathy wave after the death of his father Rajesh Pilot.
• The Lalu Yadav clan – wife Rabri, daughter Misha and sons Tej Pratap and Tejaswi Yadav and brother-in-law Sadhu Yadav.
• The Abdulla Family – first Sheikh Abdullah who was founder of the party, then son Farooq Abdulla took over and now Omar Abdullah.
• Munde and Mahajan Family – Late Pramod Mahajan’s sister, Pradnya is married to Gopinath Munde and now both Munde’s daughter, Pankaja and Mahajan’s daughter, Poonam are in the political fray.
• Jaswant Singh’s son, Manvendra Singh is a former Lok Sabha member and member of Rajasthan state assembly.
• The Sangma family – P.A. Sangma was earlier a Lok Sabha speaker and then was co-founder of NCP and then National People’s Party. His children – daughter Agatha, sons James and Conrad are all in politics.
• Of course the dynasty of Mulayam Singh is huge – first his three brothers – Shivpal, Ram Gopal and Dharmendra and his son, Akhilesh and daughter-in-law Dimple.
• YSR dynasty is no less – the son of late YS Rajasekhara, Jaganmohan Reddy is expected to lead this time around. YSR’s wife Vijayalakshmi and daughter Sharmila are also in politics.
• Former Prime Minister Deve Gowda has a legacy ready as his entire family too seems to be reaping the fruits – Son HD Revanna and Kumaraswamy, daugther-in-law Anitha.
• The NTR family’s presence is politics is also huge – starting with Rama Rao, his son-in-law Chandrababu, two sons – Harikrishna and Balakrishna, daughter Purandeshwari and her husband  DV Rao.
• The great leader Lal Bahadur Shastri’s family is spread across all political parties – of his three grand children – Sunil and Siddharth are in BJP and Anil is in Congress. Anil’s son and great grandson of Lal Bahadur, Adarsh is a member of AAP.
• Karunanidhi’s tentacles are also long and wide – sons Alagiri, Stalin, daughter Kanimozhi, and then great nephew Dayanidhi Maran.
• Scindia family – first was Vijaya Raje Scindia and her three children – late Madhavrao, Vasundhara and Yashodhara. We also now have the third Scindia generation – Jyotiraditya (son of Madhavrao) and Dushyant (son of Vasundhara).
• Then there are many more – Chautala’s, Thackeray’s, Singh Deo, Badals, Sharad Pawar, Soren, Hooda, Jogi, Bishnoi, Chandra Sekhar’s …. The list goes on.

So in that sense, would it be right for us to say that with the fall of the Gandhi’s, we will have a ‘dynasty mukt’ India? We might not have the biggest dynasty in power at the Center but the rest of the political world remains about family.

Politicians often argue – if it is OK for a doctor’s son to become a doctor why not a politician?  But the doctor’s son needs to study and get scrutinized by an external agency but what about these self appointed heirs?

We as Indians will never be free of dynasty politics – that’s the sad truth. In India, it remains all about family!