The Trajectories of

the Indian State

Politics and Ideas
 Contents

Introduction 1

Modernity and Politics in India 15

O n the Enchantment of the State: Indian Thought on

the Role of the State in the Narrative of Modernity 40

Political Culture in Independent India:

An Anti-Romantic View

The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 100

O n the Crisis of Political Institutions in India 144

Indira Gandhi and Indian Politics 171

Crisis of the Nation-State in India 2 12

The Politics of Liberalization in India 234

Index 273
 Introduction

T his volume of my essays on Indian politics follows from those in

an earlier work, The Imaginary Institution ofIndia.' In the pre-
sent book I move my argument about the present history of the
Indian state into the period after Independence. The earlier work had
sought to understand how a state with India's present-day boundaries
came to be established in the collective imagination, how an idea that
was initially unconventional turned imaginatively vivid, and eventually,
through political action, came to be historically real. Behind the fear-
fully tangible institutions of the modern Indian state lies a long pro-
cess of the elusive and contingent movement of political imagination.
In the mid-nineteenth century, that imagination appeared to settle
o n regional linguistic cultures. But through a fascinating ideational
change it eventually produced a complex and layered conception of
political identity that subsumed, but did not cancel these regional
cultures into a larger, second-order 'idea of India'. As against the essays
in Imaginary Institution, the essays collected here deal with the more
structural question of how the system of institutions of the modern
Indian state was formed, and how these institutions actually functioned.
I hope that, behind the different and specific concerns of each essay
here, a single general argument can be sufficiently discerned. Taken to-
gether, the essays suggest that to understand the baffling complexity of
the present-day Indian state-the strategies of the elites who control
power and the tactics of the groups who are the targets of these stra-
tegies-it is essential to develop a longterm historical analytic. This
argument is linked to the one underlying Imaginary Institution:
namely, that the imaginative unity of India ;S still historically recent,

'Sudipra Kaviraj, The Imaginary Institution of India: Politics and Ideas

(Ranikhet: Permanent Black, and New York: Columbia University Press,
2010).
2 The Trajectories o f the Indian State Introduction 3
and historically contingent-which does not imply that it is not in- Bangs or Kalinga or Vidarbha-which go back to Indian antiquity.
tense or durable-so the real functioning of the institutions of the Arjuna, unsatisfied by the wars of Kurukshetra, went out on an im-
modern state cannot be studied without constant reference to this perial campaign of conquest and brought under Pandava control re-
genealogy. Instead of believing that we can understand without re- gional kingdoms which have a remarkable similarity to the states of the
course to history why what is happening now is happening the way it federal union. Such military unifications were transient, and, except
is, we must look closely at the structures of social power existing over for a temporary militarily enforced territorial unity, they did not con-
the long term-and even start the structural story of the state not at tain other durable features. In pre-modern times, therefore, these two
the time of Independence but much earlier. The essays here suggest impulses, working across this political field, contradicted and cancelled
that the beginning of the history of the contemporary Indian state lies each other. Modern statecraft has found a way of balancing these two
in the political events and processes of India's pre-colonial past, in political logics, and the contemporary Indian state shows the workings
a period that is at times designated 'early pre-colonial modernity'- of both these impulses in moderated form.
from the sixteenth century. It appears from recent research by intellectual and economic hist-
Two contradictory impulses appear to work in the history of this orians that some more durable trends appeared during the period
complex political 'field' called India. It is misleading to view this field preceding the British entry into India. Politically, the Mughal empire
as an unpr~blematicall~ single political unity, even less a single poli- was able to bring a substantial part of the subcontinent under its
tical system, because it lacks the intentional direction and institutional effective political control, and subject it to a more bureaucratically
coherence comparable to those of modern European nation-states. It systematic and uniform administrative system.The researches of intel-
is also misleading to treat it as a merely 'geographic' notion, as the lectual historians have shown that, partly because of Mughal tolerance
British claimed, because political impulses of various kinds constantly towards awide and diverse intellectualpublic sphere, intense intellectual
intersect in this territorial region. And institutional structures which . exchanges took place between scholars and literary figures, not merely
span this political field have, over the last century and a half, imparted between North and South India, but also between territories falling
to it an increasingly causally effective structure. within the Mughal dominions and outside. There is startling evidence
A primary impulse, at times overstressed in the academic literature, that renowned scholars of Sanskrit grammar or literary figures were
could be called the imperial impulse. Empires arise intermittently and not merely patronized by the court, but received official stipends from
seek to impose a relatively unified set of political institutions; but it is both their Mughal patrons and rulers outside the Mugha! empire. A
easy to overestimate the effectiveness of the imperial process, to regard vigorous public sphere of debate and interpretation seems to have
the effects of imperialism's work as irreversibly final, and to view the existed independent of the political boundaries and conflicts attendant
intervals between imperial periods as mere interludes of anarchy-or on them, which produced a busy circulation of ideas across distant
as a period of waiting till another empire arises to restore order and a regions. Finally,economic history has uncovered evidence of commercial
sense of India. This is an overstated picture because the intervals be- transactions on an unprecedented scale in the 'long eighteenth century',
tween empires arelong, and during the interruptions stable, recognizable which suggests greater monetization of the economy and exchanges
regional political formations rise and achieve impressive degrees of across vast areas of the subcontinent.
efficacy. Political unity, it must be recognized, is not a 'binary' fact- Yet the end of Mughal rule demonstrated the power of the second
in the sense that it either exists or does not: so, we can make judgements hndamental impulse of Indian political life: the reassertion of regional
about whether India is united oLnot. It is clearly a scalar fact: the judge- i
/ - kingdoms, when the grasp of the imperia12entre slackened, and a
ment must be about whether, territorially, India is at any historical transfer of both authority and resources back to smaller political en-
point more or less united than over the preceding period. tities which could depend on the cultural self-identification of peoples
A second impulse, which ~ u l l against
s the stability of empires, is the inhabiting flourishing vernacular cultures. Before the British admi-
durability and intensity of feeling around definable regions-like nistration created a stable unity of territories after the decline of the
G
4 The Trajectories oj'the Indian State
Mughal state, powerful regional states had emerged in the Maratha, not the misguided epistemic selflessness of some dedicated devotion
Mysore, and Punjab regions, indicating that the dual logic of political to the works of Weber and Marx or Foucault, but a painstaking re-
power in India was still powerfully active in the early eighteenth cen- connection with the vernacular facts of Indian political history. The
tury. Political construction by the British followed the common logic ofwestern theory is not unhelpful, but it can provide only
of imperial states. For relatively fluctuating periods of time, empires oblique illumination to the history of Indian social power.
united vast territories under a single centre of political control, but The essays of this book do not agree with the common periodizing
precisely the vastness of the dominions made it hard to aspire to im- of recent Indian political history. Politics after Indian Independence is
pose on them a relentlessly uniform system of rules and regulative usually periodized in terms of party governments. It is quite right, in
order. Following this imperial tradition, the British too experimented one sense, to suggest that the long term of uninterrupted Congress
with different styles of revenue system as their empire expanded from rule, from 1947 to the early 1990s, was a continuous stage, disrupted
the early control of Bengal to conquest of the North Indian kingdoms by Congress' reduction to a minority government in the momentous
and Southern territorial acquisitions, and the shift from zamindrtri, elections of 1991, after which, for nearly fifteen years central govern-
ryotwari, and mahalwarisystems. The actual processes ofcolonial gov- ments depended on explicit or implicit alliances. Several of these essays
ernance thus struck a balance between the two impulses in the long claim that a more attentive analysis of the functioning of political
term of Indian political history. These imposed central integrative structures would reveal a highly significant line of separation be-
techniques at times, and in the fields where they were needed, but tween the Nehru years and those that followed. At times, this is viewed
left alone a great degree of regional specificity of political idiom and misleadingly in entirely personal terms-by reference to the personal
governing style. Political structures in India therefore continued to qualities of statesmanship to be found in Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira
develop a complex pattern of rules and legislative orders, stretched Gandhi. In fact, it is a combination of several significant changes: of
across at least three planes-of 'locality, province and nation'-to ex- higher political literacy in the electorate, of the new uses of political
press in modernist language a flexible structure that persisted over the language, of structural changes in the economy, of the long-term re-
longuedurke. I suggest that the political structures truly comparable to flexive effects of policies-that is, the manner in which policies, when
the contemporary Indian state are not the European nation-states of pursued successfully over a long period of time, have effects that loop
the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, but the pre-modern empire- back and affect the structures of governance and social institutions.
states of Indian and Islamic history, with the implication that we Although none of the essays directly addresses the question of period-
can find greater analytical assistance from studying not the history of izations of political history, collectively they call for a more attentive
Europe in the modern period-on which the social science studies and minute characterization of historical change.
focus obsessively-but pre-modern Indian history.
Political analysts often work with the wrong genealogy: the nation-
state in India, after Independence, is not a structural descendant of Regionality, Commonality, and Unity
modern European states but of pre-modern Indian empires. I believe A surprising result of this historicization is a more complex under-
that the studied ahistoricity of our political science thinking-the standing of the constitution of the political field which we casually call
plausible but massively misleading convention of starting the story of 'India'. Obviously, this is a highly complex and layered terrain of
modern Indian politics in 1947, or even 1858+ncourages this mis- ,
facts which requires an appropriately complex methodological res-
construction. There is no epis~micallyserious way into present p o j i i ponse.Though it is quite true that, within the varying levels ofpolitical
tics except through the long past. The neglect ofvernaculars, and ofthe Power, regional kingdoms-equivalents ofour modern federdl states-
cosmopolitan languages of Sanskrit and Persian, has rendered this are among the most durable, they are amenable to historical change.
exceedingly difficult. A revival of the study of the Indian state requires In the contemporary world these ~oliticalregions are also subject to
6 The Trajectories of the Indian State Introduction 7
pressures from other forms ~fre~ionality-by which I mean aconsistent more than just common: they unite territorial regions into unitary
historical process through which regions of varying kinds are formed sprs for particular purposes. In some ways state processes and the
and stabilized. Territorial regions acquire common features by be- gd
of the capitalist economy have created such unities at a cer-
ing subjected to the same sets of laws and political practices, by being tainlevel of the Indian economy and polity. Thus, there is a stratum
drawn into identical processes of economic production, circulation, of~ndianspace which is united, which works as a single plane of acts
and exchange, and by being affected by the same cultural and religious andcausalities; but there are also other strata which are divided into
movements. All such processes produce determinate regionalities, ~ . g i ~ ~ a l i tof
i evarious
s kinds.
they bring individuals and groups together into webs of common ex- The united space, created primarily by the efficacy of the upper
perience and control.The expansion of Mughal rule in most of north- levels of the state structure and the modern capitalist economy, is not
ern and central India subjected varying territories to a similar pattern however simply an upper storey which does not affect the lower levels
of revenue administration and principles of political governance. The ofpolitical life. Politicians who are based in their respective states often
rise of a Vaishnava religious movement united the territories of Ben- wield power in distinctly more authoritarian ways in state politics
gal, Orissa, Mithila, and Manipur in a common artistic and cultural while demanding democratic rules of functioning when they operate
sensibility. Colonial economic processes created both clear divisions at the national level. This is not a matter of mere inconsistency and
between coastal urban centres and extensive internal hinterlands- hypocrisy: it is in a sense rational choice. As none of them can hope to
both connected and separated by the specific relations of economic dominate the national stage in the way they do the political stages of
production and exchange. their regions, their best option is to guard against an unusual curtailing
Region-forming processes of this kind are many in the modern of their powers because of the possible emergence of political authori-
period, and sometimes the economic and the cultural regionalities tarianism at the centre. T h e fact that these regions are parts of a
cross-cut political ones. In recent periods, economic and political ,- democratic Indian union is not a fact external to their political life, but
regionalities have often accumulated different territorial configurations. conditions and determines politics at state levels as well. To accom-
In spite of UP being a single state, it is clear that-not merely in some modate all such complexities into our conception ofthe political field,
socio-economic terms-it contained three different internal regions, we need to think of a stratified political space.
and this was used as an argument for the creation of the new state of
Uttaranchal (now renamed Uttarakhand) out of it: but eastern UP and
Caste, Class, and Consciousness
Bihar also have significant common features. At the same time it is also
quite clear that economic processes have created a common region These essays were written over quite a long stretch of time, and they
incorporating the western parts of UP, the state of Delhi, parts of contain significant methodological shifts. T h e early essays are mark-
Haryana, and parts of Punjab. Faster economic g o w t h in some states ed by a much stronger imprint of Marxist techniques of analysis-
of India, compared to much slower change in others, creates political though there can be disputes about what constitutes a decisively
pressures, particularly if both growing and lagging states are territorial- Marxist approaches to politics. Even the earlier pieces interpret
ly contiguous. Marxist theory to claim that economic structures are overdetermined
But Indian political space is also fragmented in other ways which by cultural and political causalities to produce specific historical out-
need to be incorporated into an accurate picture of its topography, At,: - comes. Pressures arising from economic strqtures underdetermine
times, regions may be quite diverse and geographically d 'sta ant, p tr' political acts and outcomes. The later essays, however, diverge from
demonstrate features or processes in common. T h e specific hierarchies conventional Marxist analyses in more significant ways.
of caste groups are quite different between varying regions, but show The Marxist analysis of politics faces an immediate dilemma in
properties of inequality in common. Some processes are, however, deciding between two alternative constructions of its method. It could
 8 The Trjectories of the Indian State Introduction 9
be ~ractisedas a technique ofresolute economic determinism, reducinp by using the category of class is often supplemented by techniques
.. . . .
political phenomena to underlying economically causal processes: ifD for analysing strategic action. The dominance of social groups is
Marxists accepted this version of political analysis, there was littlr seen primarily not in directly intentional but consequential terms-
really to analyse; all that was required was simply to relate political by comparing the varying efficacy of different classes in influencing
events to appropriate economic triggers. Clearly, Marxist theory also political outcomes. The subalternity of particular groups does not
contains a very different strand which recognizes the immense sizni- imply that these groups d o not act on the fi eld of political action, but
,. -
hcance, even the 'primacy', of the political-usually in the context v -
of &at their actions are less efficacious, which raises the question ofwhy
analyses of revolutionary action. But it is not impossible to generalize this is so. Some of the essays which focus on analysing the present
this condition, and view politics as a highly significant activity which historica~~y-suggesting a major 'rupture' between the Nehru and
not merely subjugates and holds down subaltern groups, but shapes Indira Gandhi years, for example-also suggest that, contrary to the
and gives form to the social world. Economic structures can be view- conventional analysis of radical commentators which viewed the
ed as a set of constraints on political initiatives which limit political bourgeoisie and landed magnates as the two primarily dominant clas-
acts-in the sense ofruling out some options, constraining others, and ses in Indian society, a more accurate picture should introduce two
imparting a direction to political choices consistent with the interests modifications. First, it should carefully register changes in the historical
of basic social groups. &aracter of rural agrarian elites that have altered their patterns of
A second element of Marxist theory is the injunction to ask ques- economic activity, and often their modes of political control, over
tions historically, i.e. instead ofanswering questions as they are, to give ruralsociety. Second, it is important to see the managerial-bureaucratic
them a radically historical character. This requires that while seeking elites as major participants in the structure and dynamics of political
to understand relations between the state and social groups, or dominance: they do not merely participate in enjoying the fruits of
between dominant and subaltern communities, it is necessary first to political dominance, but at significant decisional moments play a
historicize the question, i.e. to ask 'What is the history of the world major strategic and directive role among the dominant classes. This
about which we are asking such questions?' The impulse to historicize also implies a further splittingof the general notion ofsocial dominance
the study of Indian politics, seeking the precise nature and character - -
into socio-economic dominance, and dominance as directive capacity.
of social groups, the nature ofpolitical conflicts, the precisemechanisms A collection of essays, though their separate arguments are inter-
ofsocial oppression, are in these essays drawn from this methodological connected, obviously cannot offer a coherent analytical picture of the
impulse in Marxist historicism. This can lead to several ~roblems complexity, vastness, and historical depth of Indian politics. These
when approaching Indian politics. It makes the standard forms of essays try to work on two fronts of political analysis: some try to sketch
class analysis less relevant as we move from the relatively more in- a long-term historical narrative of the political; and some seek to ex-
dustrialized regions of India to less industrial ones, and from the plore the logic of the specific constitutive phenomena of political life.
present to the past. In both cases, conflicts in political life happen I belong to a generation whose understanding of Marxist theory was
~rimarilybetween agentive constellations of castes rather than classes transformed by the discovery of Gramsci and historicism on the one
specific to modern capitalist economies. In a sense, therefore, the con- hand, and of French structuralism on the other. The effect of this
sistent pursuit of the historicizing injunction within Marxist theorv ---- double impact was to find the fact that the most creative moments of
leads to a move away from class to caste as the basic category of p$iti- radical analysis emerged when theorists, after acknowledging that they
cal conflict. i lived in particular and not universal history, sought to theorize their
A rejection of the iBea that Marxism is 'a theorv of eve;vthinp' own historical world by devising concepts appropriate to the surprises
- 2 ------D
opens up the requirement to supplement its techniques by other that their history threw at them. To follow Gramsci was therefore not
theoretical and methodological apparatuses. In several essays, analysis t9' to apply Gramsci everywhere, because that, paradoxically, would
 The Trajectories of the Indian State
Introduction
be to perversely misconstrue the high significance of Gramsci's work.
Within the Marxist tradition, Gramsci was a theorist of difference, menphor which captures this aspect of the unprecedented character
giving particular attention to those aspects of Italian politics which state. A 'state of sovereignty', Foucault remarks, sets up
made it different from all others; and to follow him or to learn from a relation between the ruler and his subjects which resembles one
him should lead to a discovery of historical difference in other speci- b e e n the shepherd and his flock. His relation to the flock is ex-
fic contexts. Gramsci, for instance, turned his analysis different by rehal: if the sovereign loses his territory, or his dominion is reduced,
addressing the peculiarities of the 'Southern question' in Italy, or the it has an external relation to him. By contrast, the relation between the
peculiar character of peasant culture. Although I must plead guilry to the ruled in a 'state of governmentality-the exact difference
asimple transfer ofconceptsoccasionally, I interpret themethodological hewasso interested in capturing-was like that between the passengers
injunction of historicity to imply that Indian analysts of politics and the captain of the ship: the fates of the rulers and the ruled are
should try to work out convincing analytical devices for forces which inextricably connected, or at least intertwined in a new and quite
different way. It is important note that what Foucault is trying to
have shaped the history of our politics-such as language, caste, and
capture is not democracy, but a relation of reflexive power usually
religion-and meld them into a radical analysis of politics which
on the modern state.
captures the historical difference of the Indian lifeworld. Some of the
What I am trying to suggest might not be exactly the same as
essays here try to work out these smaller explanatory sketches, which
Foucault's idea, but it is significantly connected to it. The modern state
could be fitted in as subsets of the larger picture.
is a newkind of instrumentality in its internal sovereignty, reflected in
Studying the modern state is astonishingly hard in some ways; and
h e crucial semantic alteration of the meaning ofsovereignty under the
the theme that is repeated by most close observers of the modern state
European absolutist regimes. The state continued to perform its con-
is that it is something new and unprecedented. Possibly the problem
veniional-pre-modern-functions, such as defending the realm,
with the analysis of the state is one ofsemantic anachronism ofaspecial
fightingwith enemystates, being unsubordinated to external command,
kind. Long before the emergence of the mechanisms which we call
etc; but gradually the internal functions of the state began to multiply
the modern state, there were states composed of intricately connected
and predominate: the state became involved more with doing things
institutions of rule, and there were also culturally specific stable mean-
to its own society than to other states. Through taxation, finance, so-
ings to the term 'state' (or rather terms which we would translate in
cial engineering, the manifold tasks of the modern bureaucracy, the
English as the 'state') which referred to those institutional complexes.
state became an agencyprimarily concerned with the most fundamental
When the modern state arose historically in Europe, political ana-
arrangements of its own society. In another way of speaking, it be-
lysts and popular discourse simply continued to use the old term for
came the primary agency of reflexive social action: and this became
the new entity. In this case, the descriptive expectations folded into
its predominant function. Thus political groups try to lay hold of the
the older term 'state' continued to bear connotative effect, sliding the
state-not because they want to fight intruders or conquer territories,
descriptions towards the past, suggesting that institutions and
but because they intend urgently to do things to their own society.The
mechanisms existed which in fact did not.
history of both democratic and authoritarian states in modern times
At times, when trying to clarify what is involved in the rise of the
shows that the greatest transformations of the internal arrangements
modern state, theorists, not surprisingly, use metaphorical language-
of social power have been made by modern states: the immense
as Althusser says regarding Marx, this is quite common because there
-sformations wrought not merely by the Soviet state or the Nazi re-
is a new perception of reality, but not a language which is prepared 6; gime, but also the vast social engineering carried out by modern demo-
it. In such cases, authors ha; to force the old language to do the Gork
cratic welfare states.
of the new, forcing the old concept to describe a new reality. In trying
BY stressing the notion that the state was a mechanism which emer-
to explicate his difficult idea of 'governmentality' Foucault used a
SS but of society but is separated off from it, Marx was probably still
12 The Trajectories of the lr~diarrState 1I Ir~troduction 13
thinking within the older language of the state-as an entity that is I

paw
=,;. here exist real inequalities of power in a purely political sense,
drawn out of, yet separated from, society; answering the first picture I
byimpliation, giving credence to the extreme Marxist idea that liberal
in Foucault, not the second. By contrast, as modern states developed ~ m O c z is a a~ 'sham'. It is an unrealizable ideal, it is argued, and
nationalistic and then democratic institutions, this power, separated t.defon: the only reason for its persistence is ideological-to generate
off from society, was sought to be reconnected to the whole society by picture of liberal power, a powerfully plausible distortion of the
devising new languages of universality, inclusion, and collective in-
tentionality. Nationalism presented this power as not of the monarch, -,, power really operates in democratic societies.
,I now believe that this is one of the major centres of modern poli-
but of the country-of France or England. When a soldier fought in bought, in the sense that we should give more attention to
a military engagement the act, sometimes the sacrifice ofdeath, did not h i s part of the problem; and it is possible to avoid the choice be-
carry the meaning that he was prepared to give up his life for a high ween w o oversimple positions offered by versions of liberalism and
ruler who owned his country, and to whom he was bound by rules of M-sm (both of which are extreme), in the sense that they pick
fealty. It meant, in contrast, that he was willing to lay down his life for up a very significant feature of the real characteristics of the mod-
a large collectivity which was ennobled precisely by its inclusiveness: ern state, but generalize on that, ignoring other, equally significant
he was dying for the French nation of which he was an indispensable features.
part. Clearly, the rise of democratic institutions advances this pitture These essays are about a historically unprecedented activity called
of the power of the modern state stemming from its own people, who, politics, an activity, if taken in this definition, that is available only in
under democratic conditions, procedurally sanction these wars in modern times, within the historical confines of modernity. It is hardly
which soldiers fight. In a sense, therefore, the soldier is fighting in a war surprising that in many Indian languages this newness, the unprece-
that he has played a role in launching, or, in a more elevated and dented quality of this activity, is captured by the fluent use, inside fully
unrealistic sense, has declared himself. Notice that in all these things vernacular sentences, of what was originally an English word but is
there is a dual argument: an argument of inclusivity-all people are in- no more-a word which has decidedly lost its Englishness. People
cluded and involved in these political acts or processes, and in the case without any knowledge of English would today recognize the word,
of internal acts such as taxation (not war) there is a dominant quality and its precise meaning. This is not because they know the English
of reflexivity-of a society sanctioning and enacting these changes to language, but because they know what that word indicates in their
its own structure. world. Thinking about the state-which is what these essays do-is to
Liberal and Marxist theory appear to misconstrue the nature of this think about the historical advent of this activity. This is the indelible
reflexive relation ofpower in two different directions. The trouble with mark of modernity on history-the presence of the political in this
ordinary liberal political theory is that it takes this picture of inclusi- sense. The least closely parded secret of the modern world is that,
vity and reflexivity as true in an excessively straightfonvard sense. In dthough they do not make it as they please, men do make their own
the common, i.e. extreme, liberal picture, even the captain of the ship politid history. I mean this in a much more narrowly and deeply
is dispensed with: the passengers run the ship collectively through politid sense than Marx's famous remark. Over this particular field,
political equality; and this equality can only be seen as equality of op- politics, God has lost his sovereignty and the elites have lost their
portunity-as at every election, in a legal sense, every citizen gets an d u s i v e claim. In the modern world, all politicians, from devoted
exactly equal chance ofshaping the decision of the political c o m p u g r y constitutionalists to radical fundamentalists, share a belief in the
There are well-known difficulties in accepting this simple p~cwieas ~ h t i c i t yof the social world and feel the ir2sistible attraction of the
true. Seriousobservers ofliberal democraticsocietieswould immediately lctivity d l e d politics, the activity which, presupposing this plasti-
observe inequalities not merely in non-political spheres like the eco- city, means to shape the structures of that malleable social world to
nomy and their distortive effects on the putative equality of political heir collective preferences. What makes a social world irretrievably
14 The Trajectories of the Indian State
modern, in the political sense, is not the appearance or possibility of
some specific form of political power, democratic or totalitarian, but
the presence of this activity. Modern state power is so universally
sought because it is, when stripped of all pretences, the power to com-
mand the reflexive organization ofsociety: turning, paradoxically, the
power of a society towards itself to determine its nature and structure.
These essays tell the story of how this activity produced a new set of
. .' Modernity and Politics in India
I
governmental institutions in India, and how all social groups-elites,
middle classes, and subalterns-are responding to its demands.

I am indebted to a long line of people, from friends and colleagues who

helped me understand arguments by discussing or commenting on
them, to students who often forced me clarifjr my own ideas by livgly
debates in seminars. I would like to thank Sobhanlal Dattagupta,
T his essay is in two parts. The first part suggests that conventional
theoretical models about the structure of modernity and its
historical extension across the world are faulty; to understand
the historical unfolding of modernity, especially in the non-Western
world, these theories need some revision. The second part tries to
Diptiman Ghosh, Partha Chatterjee, Dipesh Chakrabarty, Muzaffar illustrate this point by analysing the role of 'the political' in India's
Alam, RajeevBhargava, Sunil Khilnani, Satish Saberwal, Rajni Kothari, modernity.
Ashis Nandy, D.L. Sheth, Bhikhu Parekh, and Pranab Bardhan for
discussing Indian politics with me over a long period of intellectual Theories of Modernity
friendship. I owe a deep debt to students and colleagues at the School
Most influential theories of modernity in Western social theory, like
of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, where
theonesdeveloped by Marx and Weber, contain two central ideas. The
most of these essays were written, for stimulation and engagement
first is that what we describe as modernity is a single, homogeneous
with my arguments. I thank my colleagues at SOAS and Columbia for
process and can be traced to a single causal principle. In the case of
intense and active engagement with ideas and arguments, and for pro-
viding me with a stimulating academic atmosphere.
Mux,it is the rise of capitalist commodity ~roduction;for Weber, a
more abstract ~ r i n c i ~of
l erationalization of the world. It is acknow-
ledged that modernity has various distinct aspects: the rise of a capital-
ist industrial economy, the g o w t h of modern state institutions and
resultant transformations in the nature ofsocial power, the emergence
ofdemocracy, the decline of the community and the rise ofstrong indi-
vidualistic social conduct, the decline of religion and the secularization
ofethics. Still, these are all parts of a historical structure animated
b ~ .single
a principle. This thesis comes in two versions. The first sees
these as subsets of what is a single process ocrationalization of the so-
cial world. A slightly different version would acknowledge that these
P m e are~ distinct and historically can emerge quite independently.

k t published in Daedalus, Winrer 2000, vol. 129, no. 1, pp. 137-62.

 The Trajectories of the Indian State Modernity and Po Litics in India
But it would still claim that these processes are functionally connected in nineteenth-century Bengal was the complete transformation of
to each other in such a way that the historical emergence of any one educational structures. The modern Bengali's conversion to Western
tends to create conditions for all the others. Social individuation, for educational idealswas so complete that traditionalsystems ofinstruction
instance, is a prior condition for the successful operation of a capitalist and the schools that imparted them disappeared within a very short
economy. All these processes of modernity either stand or fall together. time and were replaced by a modern educational system that, in its
A second idea usually accompanies this functionalist model of formal pedagogic doctrine, emphasized critical reasoning and extolled
modernity. It is widely believed that as modernity spreads from the the virtues of extreme scepticism in the face of authority. Yet actual
Western centres of economic and political power to other parts of pedagogic practice retained the traditional emphasis on memory.
the world, it tends to produce societies similar to those of the modern Soon, more careful observers felt that one system of unquestioned
West. A corollary of this belief is that when we come across societies authority had been replaced by another, and the reverence shown
different from Western models, this is because they are not sufficiently modern Western theories seemed particularly paradoxical.
modernized; they remain traditional. Modernity replicates Western The second reason lies in the plurality of the processes that
social forms in other parts of the world; wherever i t goes it produces constitute modernity by their historical combination. In modern so-
a uniform 'modernity'. Both these theses appear to me to need some cial theory, there are various intellectual strategies that try to reduce
revision. this diversity into a homogeneous process or outcome. Some of them
There are at least three different reasons why we should expect mod- offer a theory of intellectual origin claiming that an intellectual prin-
ernity not to be homogeneous, not to result in the same kind of social ciple like rationality expresses itself in and takes control of all spheres
process and reconstitution of institutions in all historical and cultural of modern life. So, the transformations in science, religion (seculariz-
contexts. ation), political disciplines, industrialization, and commodification
First, the coming of modernity is a massive alteration ofsocial prac- can all be seen as extensions of the single principle of rationality to
tices. Modern practices are not always historically unprecedented in these various spheres.Alternatively,some other theories suggest a func-
the sense that the society was entirely unfamiliar with that kind of tional connection among various spheres of modern social life, which
practice earlier. Most of the significant social practices transformed by often take a causally primacist form. Functionalist Marxism claims
modernity seem to fall into the spheres of political power (state), eco- that the causal primacy of capitalist relations ofproduction transforms
nomic production, education, science, even religion. It is true that other sectors of the economy, and subsequently other spheres of social
modernity often introduces a radical rupture in the way these social life like politics and culture, to produce eventually a capitalist social
affairs are conducted. In all cases, the modern way of doing things is formation. Alexis de Tocqueville's analysis of democracy appears to
not written on a 'clean slate'. Practices are worked by social indivi- make a comparable primacist claim about the causal powers of the
duals who come from appropriate types of practical contexts, and democratic principle. Historical accounts, however, show that the
these social actors have to undergo a process of coercive or elective will- actual history of modernity does not manifest such strong functional
ed transformation into a different way of doing things. What actually characteristics. O n the basis of historical evidence, it seems possible to
happens when such modernizing individuals learn new things can be make the opposite case. Not only is one process insufficient for the
suggestively likened to learning a language. Like the accents from our pmduction ofothers, but the precise sequence in which these processes
native languages that always stick to and embarrass our English, work-, . 1 occur and the precise manner in which they y e interconnected have
ing from within or underneah, pulling our speech in the d i r e c t i d a!trong bearing on the form that modernity takes. Thus, to consider
of a different speech, the background skills of earlier practices work O@Y the two most relevant to the Indian case-the temporal relation
inside and through the new ones to bend them into unfamiliar shapes. dqpitalism and democracy-the absence of democracy might have
To take a simple example, one of the most startling cultural changes -ed great spurts of capitalist growth in some East Asian societies,
t
but under Indian conditions, \%,hendemocracy is an established poli- cieties will blindly repcar the cxpcricnccs of the W r s t r h e inirial
tical pracrice, it s e r i o ~ s l ~ a f f e ctheacrual
ts srructureand historical path conditions oftheir modernity arc diilcrent, and rherefbre they c;allnor
of capitalist development. Similarly, if secular srate institutions are imitate the West.' I n other resperrs, these sucierics may nor wish ro
subjected to derermination by democratic decision-making processes, emulate &ewes[ since [he experience oTWesrern modernit). is diverse
the ourcome might be quire differenr from what an unworried theory and not uniformly artractivc:'
of secularization might expect. I now follow the story of political modernicy in India rhrough
Third, the hisror). of modernity is marked by a principle of reflexi- its three most significanr aspects: [he modern state, nationalism, and
vity in two forms.' Modern socieries are constantly engaged in democrat): My argu'nenr will be [hat all three inrroduce disrincrivelv
devising more effective and expanded forms of collective agency. T h e modern ideas and insritutions, but in each case rhese insriturions o r
growth of modern political 'disciplines', like a bureaucratic adminis- movements have evolved in ways [hat are different from recognized
rrarion, rhe [raining of rnodern armies. and scares of collective consci- Western equivalents.
ousness such as nationalism, all contribute to this obsessive search for
forrns of deliberate and well-directed collective action. T h e evolution Colonialism a n d the State
of modern democratic mechanisms provides these societies with a new The state is utterly central ro thc srory of modernity in India. Ir is not
technique of collective n,ill formation. W h e n all these processes cdrne
merely one of the institutions thar modernity brings wirh it, for all
together, it becomes possible to say char a governmenr acts on behalf institutions inasensc come through rhc sratennd itsselective l~iediation.
of [he society, if only ro rranslate irs collecrive inrentions into policy.
However, some peculiariries ofrhe entry ofcolonialism inro Indian so-
These processes are reflexive in two senses. First. many ofthese modern
ciety oughc to be noted bec,iuse thcv make this history quirc different
devices of collecrive will a n d agency are directed nor only towards from the principal narratives of srarc formation in the Wesr. Curiously,
'orhers'- i.e., orher stares in wars, or subjected rerritories in colonial British commercial enterprise initially enrered India wirhout a serious
empires-bur also, in crucial cases, towards the society itself. T h e y are confronration with the Mughal imperial authority. This happened
reflexive in [he second sense in thar these techniques require constant because ofthe peculiar way social power was organized under rhe caste
monitoring of their own effectiveness and are regularly reformed in system. Everyday casre pracricc disciplined social conduct wirhour fre-
response to perceived failures or in search of more effective solutions. quent direcr recourse co [he power of the stare; rather, the holders of
This implies that concern for the r a t i o n a l i ~ y o f s ~ s t e m s a ninstitutions
d political authority were themselves governed by [he rules of caste order
generares a constantly recursive consideration of options open to so- a n d barred by its regulations from exercising legislative power over
cieties and groups for ranging [heir own structures; societies, conse-
quently, learn from a n analysis of their own a n d others' experience.
If colonial empires a bignificanr parr of che ca~iralrequired for
Because o f t h e existence of this kind ofrecursive rationality at the heart
industrialization, rhis is a condition tiiar larc rnodcrnizing societies cannot
of modern institurional forms, it is unpractical to expecr that later so- replicate-although some recent scholal.ship has sought ro question the con-
nection benveen colonialism and the early accumularion of capital.
! ,4lrhough societies may have possessed these capacities in earlier priods,
3The experience ofWestern modrrnity .ippears arrracrive now if we adopr
they are greatly enhanced under modern conditions (see Beck, Giddens, and a resolutely short-sighrcd view and refuse to look beyond 1945. O n a longer
Lash 19951. and this transforms the nature of 'risk'. See Beck 1992. 1 chi& view, the rise of aggressive nationalism, miIitarism,fascism, death camps, and
however. that [his was always Bne of the major distinguishing charactefisrics the repeated failures of democracy were essenrial parts of the moderniry on
of modern societies and can be seen, as Michcl Foucault's later work s~iggesred, and, not surprisingly, Indian writers like Tagore and (;andhi had a deeply
in discipiines ofthe eighteenth century. See Foucault 197'); Foucault ambivalent and critical attitude towards its claims to providc a form of rhc
good life unquestionably sulxrior ro rradirional ones.
1974.
 I

20 The Trajectories of the Indian State , Modernity and Politics in India

the productive arrengements of society. Royal authority is explicitly ;,9ning traditional Indian social life. After British power was con-
entrusted with the responsibility of upholding caste arrangements, ,mlidated, it was forcefully used to create a replica of the kind of state
which includes punishing infringement and restoring society to its a\lthority that by this time dominated Europe. But here again we
normal form. But political authorities lacked the jurisdiction to alter observe significant differences. This was a process of state formation
individuals' caste membership or the ritual hierarchy between caste in the entirely literal sense of the term; i.e. the complex of institu-
groups. In traditional Indian social order, political power is often .tional mechanisms that we call the 'state' was in fact 'formed', literally
distributed between several layers of legitimate authority stretching brought into existence. This does not mean that earlier Indian society
from the village or locality at the micro level, through regional king- did not know social stratification or intricate organization of social
doms, to immense empires like the ones set up by the Mauryas or the power. It surely did. But this points to a central fact that is being de-
Mughals. Historically, in India's political history constant shifts of monstrated by trends towards globalization. The regulative functions
power occurred from one level to another. With the emergence ofem- that are now excl~sivel~invested in the modern state, to the extent that
-
pires, kingdoms were either overwhelmed or subsumed into their we cannot easily imagine any other institution performing them, need
control, only to re-emerge as real centres of authority once the em- not be concentrated in that manner under all circumstances.
pires, usually rather short-lived, began to decline. The relation between This condensation of functions was a phenomenon of modern
these levels of authority is better described as one of subsumption'or history-started by European absolutist states, carried forward at each
subsidiarity rather than sovereignty, as the powers of even the highest stage by techniques of 'disciplinary power' and the rise of nationalism,
centres of power were circumscribed in two ways: the caste system set democracy, and the welfare state. Although these processes are very
aside certain fundamentally. important
. parts of social conduct from its different and are caused and sustained by enormously different cir-
legitimate field, and its relations with lower levels were often arranged Nmstances, they led to a secular tendency towards a concentration of
in a way that was closer to modern federal arrangements than to the all sgulatory functions in the instruments of the state. But, in prin-
indivisibility implied by the Austinian definition of state sovereignty. ciple, these regulatory functions can exist without being concentrated
This explains the peculiarly stealthy entrance of British power in in a single institutional complex. Before modernity, such strange
India. The British finally dispensed with the titular authority of the distributions were possible, as the British title to the Dewani of Bengal
Mughal emperors only after the revolt of 1857. Control over the pro- showed: even such important state functions as the collection of reve-
vince of Bengal, which functioned as the indispensable platform for nue could be handed over to a commercial body run by a group of
British imperial expansion into other regions, was achieved without foreigners. Colonialism does not come to India as one state invading
formal assumption of 'sovereign' authority. Because traditional Indian or making demands on another. It presents itself and is taken seriously
society was not organized around the power of the state, the British asacorporation, the East India Company. But the East India Company
administration in Bengal could start as a revenue-raising body and hid to perform functions that were, in my sense, state functions-the
gradually extend its control over most other spheres o f s o c d life with- d e c t i o n of revenue, the introduction of statewide accountancy, and
out overcoming or controlling the explicitly political authority of the the production of statistics and cognitive registers like mapping,
Mughal empire. bough which the territory could be made familiar to its foreign ad-
In a paradoxical way, once they settled down in India, the British -trators.* After a lapse ofacentury, these state processes, introduced
introduced two rather different types of ideas and practices: the firp, giccemeal, at different times, combine to create in a real sense a 'colo-
the idea of state sovereignty; the second, which in part runs corurdy .#&dstate'. As a next step in our argument, & is necessary to compare
to the absolutist demands of sovereignty, the idea of 'spheres' of social ~ l o n i a state
l to the contemporary Western form.
+:I,,
life, only one ofwhich was in the narrow sense 'political'. Both of these
ideas were fundamentally different from the conceptual schema gov- '1 argued this in Kaviaj 1994.
20 The Zajectories oftJle Indian State Modernity and Politics in Indza 21
the productive arrhngements of society. Royal authority is explicitly erning traditional Indian social life. After British power was con-
entrusted with the responsibility of upholding caste arrangements, solidated, it was forcefully used to create a replica of the kind of state
which includes punishing infringement and restoring society to its au&ority that by this time dominated Europe. But here again we
normal form. But political authorities lacked the jurisdiction to alter observe significant differences. This was a process of state formation
individuals' caste membership or the ritual hierarchy between caste in the entirely literal sense of the term; i.e. the complex of institu-
groups. In traditional Indian social order, political power is often tional mechanisms that we call the 'state' was in fact 'formed', literally
distributed between several layers of legitimate authority stretching brought into existence. This does not mean that earlier Indian society
from the village or locality at the micro level, through regional king- did not know social stratification or intricate organization of social
doms, to immense empires like the ones set up by the Mauryas or the power. It surely did. But this points to a central fact that is being de-
Mughals. Historically, in India's political history constant shifts of monstrated by trends towards globalization. The regulative functions
power occurred from one level to another. With the emergence of em- that are now exclusively invested in the modern state, to the extent that
pires, kingdoms
- were either overwhelmed or subsumed into their wecannot easily imagine any other institution performing them, need
control, only to re-emerge as real centres of authority once the em- not be concentrated in that manner under all circumstances.
pires, usually rather short-lived, began to decline. The relation between This condensation of functions was a phenomenon of modern
these levels of authority is better described as one of subsumption'or history-started by European absolutist states, carried forward at each
subsidiarity rather than sovereignty, as the powers of even th; highest w e by techniques of 'disciplinary power' and the rise of nationalism,
centres of power were circumscribed in two ways: the caste system set democracy, and the welfare state. Although these processes are very
aside certain fundamentally important parts of social conduct from its different and are caused and sustained by enormously different cir-
legitimate field, and its relations with lower levels were often arranged cumstances, they led to a secular tendency towards a concentration of
in a way that was closer to modern federal arrangements- than to the all regulatory functions in the instruments of the state. But, in prin-
indivisibility implied by the Austinian definition of state sovereignty. ciple, these regulatory functions can exist without being concentrated
This explains the peculiarly stealthy entrance of British power in in a single institutional complex. Before modernity, such strange
India. The British finally dispensed with the titular authority of the distributions were possible, as the British title to the Dewani of Bengal
Mughal emperors only after the revolt of 1857. Control over the pro- showed: even such important state functions as the collection of reve-
vince of Bengal, which functioned as the indispensable platform for nue could be handed over to a commercial body run by a group of
British imperial expansion into other regions, was achieved without foreigners. Colonialism does not come to India as one state invading
formal assumption of 'sovereign' authority. Because traditional Indian or making demands on another. It presents itself and is taken seriously
society was not organized
- around the power of the state, the British asacorporation, the East India Company. But theEast India Company
administration in Bengal could start as a revenue-raising body and had to perform functions that were, in my sense, state functions-the
gradually extend its control over most other spheres of social life with- collection of revenue, the introduction of statewide accountancy, and
out overcoming or controlling the explicitly political authority of the '%heproduction of statistics and cognitive registers like mapping,
Mughal empire. .through which the territory could be made familiar to its foreign ad-
In a paradoxical way, once they settled down in India, the British ~nistrators.*Afier a lapse ofa century, these state processes, introduced
introduced two rather different types of ideas and practices: the firg, ~ k m e a lat, different times, combine to create in a real sense a 'colo-
the idea of state s o v e r e i p ~ t h second,
e which in part runs c o n u d y
to the absolutist demands of sovereignty, the idea of 'spheres' of social
life, only one ofwhich was in the narrow sense 'political'. Both of these +
*
>
state'. As a next step in our argument, t: is necessary to compare
colonid state to the contemporary Western form.

ideas were fundamentally different from the conceptual schema gov- '1 have argued this in Kaviraj 1994.
22 The Trajectories of the Indian State Modernity and Politics in India 23

The colonial state gradually instituted an enormous discursive :point was that administrative and governing rules, in order to be ef-
project-an attempt to grasp cognitively this alien society and bring .geaive, must be appropriate to social conditions. Colonial power was
it under intellectual control.This knowledge was crucial in making use ,thusinfluenced by a very complex, occasionally contradictory, set of
of the vast potentialities of this country in the economic and military ruling ideas: some showed the characteristic universalism of Enlighten-
fields. There is evidence of the introduction of disciplinary techniques ment thought; others considered this hasty and uninformed.' In these
in the bureaucracy, the military, and the colonial prison system. But drcmstances, the colonial structure of political power eventually
this tendency is cut through and counteracted by an opposite one. to be modelled upon the British state only in some respects; in
Cognitive Orientahsm, the development of a large body of cognitive- others it developed according to a substantially different logic. It was
ly disciplined material that documented what the nature of this land that the Permanent Settlement Act, for example, introduced
was like, often created a powerful intellectual tendency in the oppo- by Cornwallis in 1793, would encourage the growth of a class of
site direction. Orientalist knowledge might, inside the West, create progressive landowners and improve agriculture, a line of argument
prejudices against the Orient and make it appear inferior; but Edward drawn directly from Adam Smith. Yet this experiment was not
Said's suggestion that it tended to show the Orient systematically as an extended to other parts of India. This produced a social class entirely
object, passive and tractable, to be moulded by Western initiative is 1 4 to British rule, but the economic results were disappointing.
certainly partial and misleading.5 Appreciation of the 'differences' of Indian society often stopped the
O n the contrary, Orientalist knowledge about India quite often colonial authorities from getting too deeply involved in the 'internal'
bore the opposite implication for policy-making. The more systematic matters of the society they now controlled; the objectives ofcolonialism
knowledge was gathered about social conduct and forms of consci- were fulfilled by keeping control over the political sphere and allowing
ousness, the more edgy and anxious administrative opinion became the traditional structure of subsidiarity to continue.
, - In the comparative study of colonialism, one striking fact is the
about the amenability of this society to standard Western ruling prac-
tices. What is important is not the general point that Indian societywas different manner in which local religions responded to the colonial
radically different, but the more specific question of how this difference presence. European colonialism obviously invaded ideological
was read, what this difference was seen to consist of. By this time, structures of the societies they came to control. Certainly, British creat-
Western societies were significantly secularized; the central question of ofnew structures of knowledge based their work on the support of
political life was class conflict. In Indian society, by contrast, religion highlyskilled, and at times unbelievably arrogant, native informant^.^
provided the basis of primary and all-consuming group identities.
Still, colonialism triggered an immense intellectual assault on the
Western societieswere also regarded as broadly culturallyhomogeneous, d n u e of traditional societies. It undermined traditional knowledge
unified by single languages and common cultures; Indian society was lbout the world, not merely in natural science, but also about how
bewildering in its cultural and linguistic diversity. It was commonly
society was conceived, in particular how to determine which social
practiceswerejust or unjust. Yet the results ofthe European intellectual
argued that since Indian society was so fundamentally unlike Western
society, none of the presuppositions ofwestern state practices applied
bpact were extremely variable across colonial societies. In Latin
there; policies that could be justified on abstract rational gounds, or
b i t and subsequently in Africa, indigenous religious structures
I).

by reference to sociological arguments in the West, were unlikely to I ,

work in India. Surely, the expression of this sense of intractable dif- 'within colonial ruling groups, often there was bitter conflict between
ference was usually in theSorm of regarding Indian society w 6s Imlonaries
.J.,
and colonial officials.Oficials at times found the missionary
practices, including its art, as irrational and inferior; but the political nr- and enthusiasm for conversion troublesome. Missionaries accused
' w h u a t o n of turning their backs on both Christian and rationalist ideals.
Said 1978.
' hdy 1996.
24 The Trajectories of the Indian State Moderniv and Politics in India 25
collapsed and werq replaced by Christianity, although it is often argued Said's unguarded assertion that Orientalism reduced colonized societies
that there was subtle creolization of Christian beliefs with earlier to intellectual submission and silence.'
religious practices. In India, remarkably, despite very energetic Christ- In any case, there were many reasons why the introduction ofWest-
ian missionary activity, the two major religions stood their ground. ern state practices to the Indian colony could not lead to an exact dupli-
Hinduism and Islam remained largely undestroyed by colonialism, cation of Western state-formation processes. First, the conditions in
partly because English colonial rule was vastly different from the bru- which processes were introduced in India and in the West were quite
tal excesses of Spanish conquests in Latin America. different. Absolutism in Europe had introduced a form of internal
The presence of Christianity, however, caused enormous internal sovereignty dissolving all competing claims to political authority, the
transformations within Indian religious life. In Hinduism, it gave rise like of which Indian society had never seen. Second, the colonial state
to at leasr two different trends with far-reaching conseq~ences.~ First, itself refracted its initiatives through Orientalist conceptions of Indian
by drawing Hindu intellectuals into religious and doctrinal debates on society, which emphasized the fact that the environment was basically
rationalist terms with Protestant missionaries, it forced Hindu doctrinal different; therefore the colonial rulers withheld certain Western practices
justifications to change their character, leading to attempts to harmonize and modified others. Finally, even in those aspects of state practices
religion with a rationalist picture of the world. Consequently, it was under colonialism where Western patterns were introduced-in the
difficult to tell whether the fundamental concession to rationalism was judicial system, for instance-something like an accent-shift took
more significant than the defence of Hindu doctrines. Hindu society place, especially if the practices relied heavily on Indian personnel tak-
changed in fundamental ways. For instance, caste practices, clearly ing the functioning away from their European models.
essential to traditional Hinduism, were seen by Hindu reformers as
morally repugnant and doctrinally dispensable. Attacks on caste
practice, which initially came only from outside Hindu society-from T h e Peculiarity of Indian Nationalism
missionaries or from the small section of intellectual atheists-by the Interestingly, some of the intellectual and organizational techniques
turn of the century came from figures who were in various ways quite of modern disciplinary power were enthusiastically embraced by the
central to the Hindu discourse: Vivekananda, Gandhi, and Tagore. new Indian elites.'' Traditional elites regarded these techniques with
The most significant fact was that indigenous religion, on which the a sullen hostility. Yet the new elite created through modern education
entire intellectual life of society depended, did not decline, but rather started taking an interest in disciplinary techniques almost immediately.
restructured itself by using the European critique. The impact of There was an interest in instilling discipline into the human body
Western civilization-not its power structures, but its immense intel- through exercise, daily routine, and school curricula. Similarly, there
lectual presence-was tackled with a surprising degree of intellectual were efforts to bring more discipline into the family and the lives of
sophistication and confidence. Within thirty years of the introduction children through a science of domesticity. There was an urge to turn
ofthis utterly new civilization, Bengali society produced an intellectual everything into discourse. Western-educated intellectualism produ-
class that had acquired sufficient mastery not merely of the foreign ces a written world; it seems particularly important to write the social
language, but also of the entirely unprecedented conceptual language world down, to pin every practice down on paper, to give it a reliable
of rationalism, to engage in an uproarious discussion about what to image, a fixity required for subsequent reflection. Reflexivity on the
take and what to reject of the proposals of Western modernity. This, part of the society, its capacity for acting upon its own structures
incidentally, shows the iupplicability to Bengal and later to 1n&a of for greater and more effective use (sociolo~calreflexivity), seems to

I am most familiar with the modern history of Hinduism, but this does
not imply that such changes did not happen in other faiths.
26 The Trajectories of the Indian State Modernity and Politics i n India
depend on that social world being written down and being capable of emulation, and differentiation have significant points to contribute to
cognitive recall. its The first stirrings of nationalism are both emulative
A new ontology, based on the distinction between economy, polity, and oppositional. The modern elite naturally asked why India had
and society as three separate domains that had internally specific laws, become colonized. Eventually, the explanation of colonization is
appropriate to the intrinsic nature of each sphere, was introduced by traced to three complex causes. The first, the most significant but
the self-limiting impulses of the colonial state, justifying its claim that dsothe most elusive, was the evident superiority of Western science,
it could not be responsible for everything in that vast and complex so- the West's cognitive grasp of the world through science and rationalist
ciety. The state's proper domain was the sphere of the political. Slowly, thinking. This meant that they could undertake and accomplish
emergent nationalists came to appreciate the huge enticement of this socially necessary things with greater deliberation and efficiency, But
distinction, to claim and mark out a sphere from which they could ex- rationalist cognitive processes in themselves do not explain political
clude the colonial regime's authority by using its own arguments." mastery over the whole world. It is explained through - a set of institu-
The colonial administration applied this ontology of distinct spheres tional structures of collective action, mostly associated with the state
through their distinction between political and social activity, the and its subsidiary organizations-particularly, modern techniques of
latter indicating those aspects of social conduct that did not affect the political 'discipline'. However, quite distinct from the institutions
state and were therefore outside its legitimate province. Indians, on themselves, Indian writers obsessively emphasized, there was a collective
their part, viewed this distinction as an extension of a traditional con- spirit ofnationhood that animated Western political life. It is this spirit
ceptual dichotomy between an 'inside' and the 'outside',12 and claimed that helped the British to act with cohesion and come through the
that religious activity on social reform fell within the internal affairs worst military and political calamities, while Indians started bickering
of Hindu society. The practical consequences of the distinctions were at the slightest pretext and lacked, to use a common phrase, a 'pub-
convergent and, for a time, convenient to both sides. Orientalism- lic spirit'. Indians must, if they wish to flourish in the modern world
the idea that Indian society was irreducibly different from the modern in competition with modern European nations, develop these three
West, intractable to modirn incentives and pressures, indeed in some things in their society: the control ofmodern knowledge, the techniques
senses incapable of modernity-gradually established the intellectual ofcreating and working modern institutions, and a spirit of collective
preconditions of early nationalism by enabling Indians to claim a cohesion Ealled nationalism.
kind of social autonomy within political colonialism. Such ideas led
to a series of catachreses, slowly creating a sphere of subsidiary quasi-
sovereignty over society within a colonial order in which political The Paradoxical Politics of Reform
sovereignty was still firmly lodged in the British empire.13 The entrenchment of British rule gave rise to a strong associationism
But this only created the space in which nationalism was to emerge; among modernizing elites. In traditional arrangements of ~ o w e rde- ,
it did not determine the exact form that Indian nationalism would mands or requests by individuals were usually made to the royal
take, or, to put it more exactly, which one out of its several configurations authority, and their justice was decided on the basis of various criteria
would eventually emerge dominant. The nationalism that emerged of fairness and expediency. The British colonial authority, it became
shows that all the clashing hypotheses of imposition, dissemination, dear early on, acted on different principles. First, it carried with it

" Chatterjee 1993.

- i- an ideological affirmation of 'the rule of kw', although high offi-
cials of the Company often slipped conveniently closer to autocracy
l 2 Tagore's famous novel The Home and the World (in Bengali: Ghare Baire) when parliament was not looking. Yet the trials of senior officials like
played on this distinction. Clive or Hastings showed the significance of the procedural ideology.
" Chatterjee 1993. Second, it became clear that numbers were treated with a kind ofoccult
28 The Trajectories of the Indian State Modernity and Politics in India 29

respect by the coloniql administration, and demands or complaints hFes q e s of a complex evolution of self-identification. At the first
stlge, there is a spontaneous identification of people as Hindus or
were taken more seriously if they were made on behalf of communi-
ties rather than individuals. Modern educated elites thus constituted Mohammedans, as there are no other recognizable principles of col-
themselves into associational groups of a peculiar kind. Educated lective identity. Soon ic becomes clear that these traditional collective
members of caste communities sought to convert them into unified identities are being asserted in the context of a fundamentally different
pressure groups ofwhich they could claim to be the natural leaders and modern form of governance, and this generates an incongruous rela-
representatives. Thus, British rule brought in a logic of associationism tion between the universality of the institutions and the particularism
that at first sight appears close to the creation ofa kind ofcolonial 'civil communities. A third stage is marked by a widespread dissatis-
society'. faction against this state of affairs and the conscious creation of a
Closer examination reveals that these groups lacked one important nationalist ideology that posits a stark dichotomy between nationalism
feature ofmodern associationism: membership orentrywas segmentary, and 'commundism'.
not universal. Only Kayasthas, for instance, could become members
of the Kayastha sabhas; only Brahmos could benefit from opportuni- The Process of Imagining the Nation
ties given to the Brahmo Samaj. This associationism was therefore a
peculiar but not historically incomprehensible mixture of universal
Tonationalist Indians, the combination ofinstrumentality and emotion
in the modern nation-state had always appeared to be the secret of
and particularistic principles. It was not possible to welcome all men
British power, and it was essential to understand and replicate it. Yet
into them, but once the criterion of membership was specified these
therewas a major ~ r o b l e mwith the nationalist imaginairewhen trans-
groups were expected to embrace every possible member. Clearly, this
~ o s e to
d Indian conditions. With the emergence ofmodern vernacular
curiously mixed logic of collective behaviour was to have enormous
, languages therewas a growth ofregional patriotism. Under colonialism,
consequences for modern politics. From the colonial period, repre-
because of the uniking structure of the British colonial adminiscra-
sentativegovernment, either the restricted colonial variety or democratic
tion, sentiments ofpatriotism took a strange turn. Alongside regional
rule after Independence, would have to cope with two types of group
patriotism, a pattern of bilingual communication evolved, producing
dynamics: groups based on interests and those based on identities.
a political diglossia of vernaculars and English, by means of which
This also put a rather strange spin on traditional liberal principles like
elites from all regional cultures could form a political coalition within
equality of treatment by the state. To take only the most contentious
the Indian National Congress. Initially, a nationalist imaginaire was
example, it was possible to argue that equality of treatment before the
produced by a modern elite thinly spread over the urban space across
colonial state could imply the state's disregard for individuals' religious
British India. By the first decade of the twentieth century, however, the
affiliation, i.e. being blind to their being Hindu or Muslim. Alternatively,
m c t i o n of nationalism was pulling large masses of petit bourgeois
and plausibly, as some early advocates ofMuslim power argued, it must
mean treating the two communities as equal communities, and thus
and peasant elements into its fold who were primarily monolingual
giving them equal importance irrespective of the numerical weight of
a d whose cognitive political horizons never extended much beyond
I1
I
their region and its relatively local excitements. The great surprise of
their membership. British administrators eventually adopted policies I
swayed by both types of considerations, as the community-equality \ story of 1ndian nationalism is how its internal ideological struggle
wt in favour of a most complex and non-Western construction.
argument could also be translated into one for the protection of minor-
r' - I -.
rities. Early reforms by British administrators inclined towards a s d u - JII
tion that accepted a part of the second argument and offered Muslims
*
wc 1 Nationalism: Replication or Improvisation?
and others separate electorates, flouting liberal tenets of universalism
nationalism needed a form of identity and ideology that was
and leading to accusations of 'divide and rule'. Ld On inclusivist and universal unifying principles, instead of the
Nationalism is about fashioning self-representations. There are t,
30 The Trajectories of the Indian State Modernig and I'olitics in lndia 31
segmentation of traditional society. Two types of scepticism were ofthis was that Hindi of a particularly Sanskritized variety should be
expressed against the pbssibi~ityof an Indian nationalism. European given precedence over other vernaculars as India's national language.
observers emphasized the fact that nothing seemed to hold India's Remarkably, most ofthe leading intellectualsofIndian nationalism-
immense social diversity together except the external frame of colonial Gan&i, Tagore, and Nehru-rejected this argument of replication.
power. The history of European nationalism, which modern Indians what offered passionately against it could be regarded as an argu-
read avidly, seemed to suggestsome preconditions for the establishment ment of 'improvisation', but in two substantially different forms.
of successful nation-states: particularly, homogeneous cultures based Gm&i and Tagore advanced an idea more consistent with the first
on single languages and predominant religious communities. Hence, m e mentioned in my introductory section, asserting that the proper
those who thought modernity had a single, uniform logic did not ex- functioning of modern institutions depended on their chiming with
pect India would be able to solve this problem of finding a sufficiently traditional social understandings: only that could make modern insti-
single basis for its putative political community. One of the major tutions intelligible. Also, in their view, modernity's irrational bias to-
internal debates within Indian nationalism took place over a long time wards pointless novelty was to be mistrusted: institutions and social
on precisely this question of India's unmanageable diversity and the conduct ought to be changed only if rational argument showed they
difficulty it constituted for a modern nation-state. needed to be, not for the sake of change or in emulation of the West.
In the twentieth century, Indian nationalists developed two powerhl Tagore defiantly declared that it was the principle of autonomy of
but entirely opposed arguments to counteract this sceptical objection. judgement that constituted modernity, not mere imitation of Europ-
It was inevitable that there would be an increasingly strong impression ean practice. Autonomy of judgement about sociopolitical institutions
that successful emulation of the Western model of the nation-state might lead to the considered decision that some forms of traditional
must try to replicate all the conditions of the European experience as institutions suited Indian social life better than importing Western
closely as possible. In India, this idea could have only two implications. forms. If such practices were retained out of choice, it would be the
The first idea, unattractive and unacceptable to nationalists, was that result of a modern decision.
India as a whole could not form a nation-state; only its various lingu- Nehru offered an argument based on modern principles of the re-
istic regions could. A 'replication' argument asserted instead that flexive constitution ofsociety. For Nehru, the imposition ofa homogen-
despite India's cultural and religious diversity, ifit wanted to be a mod- izing Western model of the nation-state was likely to fuel apprehensions
ern nation-stare it must start to acknowledge the primacy of a single ofassirnilation among religious and regional minorities; the imposition
culture based on a majority religion and language. As Independence of a homogenizing form of Indian nationalism was therefore likely to
drew near, this argument took clearer shape, partly encouraged by the disrupt a nation-state instead of cementing its cultural basis. In his
suggestion from the early 1940s that Muslims needed a separate state political writings, Nehru absorbed a typical Tagorean idea that it
of Pakistan. Not unusually, the demand for a minority state for Mus- was a mistake, following colonial thinking, to consider India's diver-
lims, by implication, seemed to turn the rump of India into a Hindu sity a disadvantage: a diverse economy was less prone to scarcities,
state with a distinctive culture, although the claim of linguistic major- bred-downs, and foreign pressures; a diverse culture offered greater
ity for Hindi was distinctly less plausible. Hindi was still forming into imaginative and intellectual resources. Despite their differences, the
astandardized language and was fraught with internal rivalries between Gmdhi- agor re and Nehru arguments converged to offer a power-
regions and the central conflict between a bazaar Hindustani in which. ful refutation of the replication thesis that called for a homogeneous
the people of North India actually communicated and a highlyprCi- Indian nationalism. .
ficial Sanskritized Hindi that Hindu chauvinists sought to fashion out The practical consequences of this ideological disputation were
of political enthusiasm. In this view, an Indian nation-state could be Despite the creation of Pakistan, which raised fears of a
securely based on a single culture of Hinduism, and the usual corollary quick balkanization, Indian nationalism retained its complex form
over the. singul:~~- . I I I C ~ hoinoge11i7i1l~ o n e . l r retained its cont;cicnce in e d to a dcmocl-atic-clcctori~l ratification. ' 1 . 1 1 ~' s t r , ~ n ~ e n c s os 'f Indian
( h e idca that i d c n t i ~a n~d p , ~ t r i o t i s n\~v e x necessarily a complcx a n d delnocracy is d u e , in m y \,ic\v, ro tlle different sequcncc o f historical
~ n ~ ~ l t i l a af'hir
~ c r ~a nd d t11;tt ( h e r e \ \ a s 110 \va>,of being a n Indian with- c.\.t,nts i n India.
o u t first being ;1*1;1nlil o r h'larntha o r Bengali. I n d i a n nationalism wxs At the time o f I ~ i d e p e n d e n c e political
, insritutior~swere chosen
tl~ereforea second-order identir!., b u t n o t s o m e t h i n g insubstantial, with explicit care, even including t h e rationalistic. .~utonornistidea
fraudulcnr, o r artificidl. T h u s , three processes were involved in t h e that a people 'choose' a n d 'gi\,e to the~nselves'their ~ o n s t i t u r i o n . ' ~
making o f m o d e r n politic.al India: a reasoned attention to t h e historical T h i s involved a neglect o f that other, m o r e plausible idca tIi,lr m o s t
p r c c o ~ ~ d i t i o nosu t o f which modernity has to be created, rhe specific people lived u n d e r political regimes o u t o f habirual a n d historicdl
s c q u c t ~ c eo f processes, a n d in particular t h e idea t h a t moderniza- compulsions.The idea o f a deliberative a d o p t i o n o f s t r u c t ~ ~ roflegiri-
cs
tion w . ~ sn o t a blind imitation o f Wesrern history o r institutions b u t marc power was given a theatrical realizarion in t h e proceedings o f t h e
a self-conscio~~s process of rctlcxive construction ofsociety that should Constiruent Assembly. I n individuals like ~ m b c d k a r I ~ - t h e a u t h o r o f
r a t i o ~ i a l assess
l~ principles from all sources a n d improvise institutions m a n y o f the technical s o l ~ ~ r i o nins India's consrirution-and Nehru,
suitable (01. particular societies. t h e c o n s t i t u e n r Assembly liada rare combination ofpolitical experience,
intellectual skills, a n d openness to international conlparisons t o pro-
vide at times startlingly innovative solurions to problems o f political
D e m o c r a c y a n d India's M o d e r n i t y construction. But it seems in retrospecr that N e h r u a n d Ambedkar
were w r o n g todisregard tr.1dition entirely taking rhe typical Enlighten-
After Independence, the central question o f Indian politics \\,as the
construction not o f n a t i ~ n ~ l l i ~b ur nt o f rleniocrnc\: T h e idea o f social m e n t view oftreatins those ideas .lnd practices as'erroneous'.They also
wrongly believed that ro rescue pcoplc- from tradi tion-[heir inrellcctclal
consisrs o f t w o pnrallel movements. O n o n e sidc is rhe sociological f x t a n d practical hahirus-all that was needed was simply to prcscnr a
modern option; inhcrcnt rarionaliry w o u l d d o t h c rest.
of [he plasticiry o f soci.11 orders, b a e d o n the increasingly wicicspre~d
idea that t h e r e l a t i o n within which people ;Ire ol,liged ro live o u t their
I have argued elsewhere that this is based o n t l ~ ec o m m o n b u t
- -

lives can hc radically altered by collective reflexive action. T h i s socio- mistaken belief t h a t rraditions cndrlred for l o n g historical spans
logical tendenc): which explains the f'req~lenc>.of revolutions a n d simple obstinacy in t h e fact. of' historical challenge, a n d , c o n h o ~ ~ t e d
with rhe light o f reason, they w o ~ i l dd i ~ a p p c a r . ~ I . tignored
~is a n equally
large-scale Jacohinism in m o d c r n politics,l'+runsparalli.1 to norrnativc
principles of' a u t o n o m y extended f'rom individr~alsto political corn- plausible view that traditions were complex mechanisnis t h ~ survived t
munities, the moral justification of democratic rule. for l o n g periods preciselj. because they could change i ~ ~ s i d i o u s l y .111 '-
D e m o c r a c y is obviously thc incontrovertihlj~m o d e r n feature o f
1 n d i ~ ' spolitical life. I n at leasr three different aspects, t h e evolution o f l5 Prcarnblc ro [he (-:onsrirurion of 11idi.1.
democracy in India has s h o w n the general tendency o f modernity I 6 B . ~ Arnhrdkar,
. onr of rhc mosr inrcrchring figurcs ot' rhc nationCdi$r
towards differentiation, T h e s e aspects are ( 1 ) [he lack ofsocial movement in its lasr phase, came from a n unrouchahle caste. was \XTcstcrn-
individuation a n d t h e resi~lranttendency towards democracy being educated, became a Fromincnr I,~w?t.r, and evenruallp played a prc-cmincnt
more focused o n political equality o f groups rather than individuals; role in the drafring of lndia's consriturion.
( 2 ) a n assertion of electoral power b y rural groups because o f t h e "Christianity survived for r\vo ~ n i l l e n n iprcciscly
~ hccau<e i t changcd irs
form and contenr quire radic'lllv: from earl! Chris~ia~iity to its '~Joprionby
cpccific secluence of'economic modernization; a n d ( 3 ) the incre.l;ing
Rome; [he adapratioii ~ i t c rthe dibcovcry c)f Grccli cl'lssical ~cxrs,c\t,ecially
conflicts o f secular state principles as the idea o f secularism is subjecr-
*ristotle; Protcsranrihni; ,uid a d , ~ ~ r a r i oro~ i,I rarionalist cultr~rcin niodcrll
"mes. My suggesric,n is, in rhc c ~ h cof tr,ldirioris. that r h i r i < rhc rulc. nor tllc
exception.
34 The Trajectories of the Indian State Modernity and Politics in India 35
another view, traditions, when faced with the challenge ofentirely new d b m n t i e t h century, long after the corrosive effectsofindividualism
structures like industrialism or electoral democracy, might seek to
adapt to these, altering both the internal operation of traditional
d ~ rnunity
m loyalties had done their work. Democratic politics had
rntend quite often in the
. classical
- cases of European
. .democracy
.
structures like caste or religious community and the elective institu- && the collective demands of various classes, particularly the early
tions themselves. Actual political experience in India followed the p a h i a t , but the logic of numbers on which democracy operates did
more complex trajectories of the second type rather than the clear-cut with a reassertion of communal groups. The logic of
,gt

-
oppositions of the first. Thus, instead of dying obediently with the d e r n structures of electoral democracy does not automatically erase
introduction of elective mechanisms, caste groups simply adapted to d t i o n a l forms ofconduct, but manages to subsume them, or subor-
new demands, turning caste itself into the basis of a search for major- dinate them to its own operations-changing them and changing its
ities. Initially, the constitution ~ r o d u c e dan enormous innovation by character in the process. In fact, this is accompanied by a sur-
affording the former untouchable castes a legal status as Scheduled prising fact. Precisely because the new elites who emerge into political
Castes and making them beneficiaries of some legal advantages of power are quite often without the education that the colonial elite
reverse discrimination. Upper-caste groups, which were in control of enjoyed, their understanding ofthe precedents of European modernity
the modern professions and understood the electoral sig~lificanceof is tenuous, if not entirely absent. As they try to improvise and act
social solidarity, were unified by their modern loyalties and clearer per- reflexivelyon these institutions, their character is likely to change even
ception of common interest. By the 1970s the 'intermediate castes'- further in uncharted and unexpected ways. They do not have the im-
those in between these two strata-recognized that by carrying on the posing script of European history before them when they are making
traditional segmentary logic of the caste system they were proving their own. As a consequence, in trying to understand the current
incapable of exercising suitable leverage on the electoral system. Their aomplexities and future prospects of Indian democracy looking to-
response was to weld their parallel-status caste groups into vast elect- , wards European precedents is not enough.18 Instead, it is necessary to
oral coalitions across the whole of North India-altering the nature of understand the historical logic internal to this process.
elective democracy and its operative logic unrecognizably. ,. Such changes forcing the structure and tendencies of modern
During Nehru's time Indian democratic politics resembled politics institutions in an unprecedented direction have not occurred only in
as it was practised in the West, where the fundamental political identi- pdiitics. Briefly, I will point to two other fields with similar trends.
fications were on either class or ideological lines (which were internally Recent work on political economy has suggested that the trajectory of
connected). But, contrary to all historical scripts, as democratic aware- agrarian power in the context of Indian democracy is vastly different
ness spread to the lower strata ofsociety and formerly excluded groups from the 'classic' European cases. In European modernity, by the time
began to voice their expectations, the outcomes began to grow democratic votingwas established, the process of industrialization had
'strange'. Since thesegroups interpreted their disadvantage and indignity shrunk the agricultural sector into a secondary force. This resulted in
in caste terms, social antagonism and competition for state benefits significant political effects in the West. First, since the rural inte-
expressed themselves increasingly in the form of intense caste rivalries. weren numerically and strategicallyweak,their impact on democratic
The dominance of caste politics in India is thus a direct result of mod- ~ollticswas not dominant. The industrial proletariat and the
ern politics, not a throwback to traditional behaviour. It appears ibafusional middle classes wielded much greater electoral power and
strangely disorienting, as this kind of caste action is impossible to
classify as either traditiondor modern, leading to dark murmuIikgi '''. "This doer nor ar all mean falling over i&o indigenism. Indigenous
about the inexplicability of Indian history. L b . d i ~ o n sin India were urrerly unfamiliar wirh democracy and cannor offer
However, it is neither inexplicable nor indeed very surprising to PCloductive conceprual rools wirhour much crearive elaborarion. Some parrs
accept that modernity is historically diversifying. Democratic insti- t M W a t c r n theory, evidcnr in aurhors like Alexis deTocqueville, remain parri-
tutions arrived in Western societies in their full form only at the start ' b l y rclevanr in u n d e r ~ r a n d i n[he
~ complexiries of Indian democracy.
36 The Trajectories of the Indian State Modernig and Politics in India 37
consequently had the capacity to dominate the political agenda. In to reassure them that the constitution would protect their cultural
purely economic terms, this difference in size made it possible for identiV.This conjunctural requirement to reassure Muslim minorities
European economies to subsidize theagrariansector, since this involved forced the framers of the constitution to improvise and to institute
a resource transfer from a dominant sector to a smaller one. In India, rights that individuals could enjoy only by virtue of their membership
by contrast, electoral democracy has arrived at a time when the agri- in communities.
cultural sector is statistically, and in terms of its voting weight, enorm- In recent years, some liberal political theorists have sought to make
ous. Therefore, agrarian interests have the capacity to force state room for cultural rights ofcommunities within general liberal principles,
policies to concede their demands. Yet in purely economic terms the but in the late 1940s this was a considerable innovation. I wish to make
vastness ofthe agricultural sector makes it difficult for the state to force historical-sociological case that the assertion of the distinctive-
other sectors oftheeconomy to subsidize the rural sector." Democratic ly modern right to form political institutions led the framers of the
politics thus creates a huge contradiction in state policy towards the Indian constitution to produce a legal system that diverged significantly
economy: sectoral constraints make it impossible for the state, or from standard Western liberal-individualist precedents. The primary
whichever party is in office, to ignore demands for agricultural sub- reason for this again seems to be the differential historical sequence. In
sidy; yet the size of the agricultural sector in comparison to others the West, institutions of the secular state were devised by a collective
makes them increasingly difficult to sustain. Trying to learn from process ofsocial thinking and institutional experimentation in response
actual policies followed by Western democracies in these respects is to the religious wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and
unlikely to produce serious results, since the structure of the problem these arrangements for religious tolerance were unquestionably establ-
is historically unprecedented and requires new kinds of solutions. ished long before democratic government arose in the twentieth cen-
A second case can be found in the politics of secularism. It has been tury. In addition, by this time, the secularization of social conduct had
plausibly argued that secular institutions in India have experienced in- ,-
made the question of religion and politics a rather minor affair for
creasing difficulty because they function in a society that is not secular- most Western states. In India, a secular state and democratic politics
i ~ e d . ~State
' secularism, it is argued, was an ideal intelligible only to were introduced at the same time through a single constitutional
the modernist elite, and it was because of the complete dominance of sett1ement.h in democraticpolities, eventually all significant questions
Congress modernists during constitution-making that secular principles of social life are either directly or by default ratified by the democratic
were introduced without challenge.21Yet on this point too, careful reflexive process; the question ofthe secular state and its precise charac-
observation shows interesting historical complexities. Undoubtedly, ter thus becomes inevitably subjected to democratic processes. This
modernist authors of the constitution like Nehru and Ambedkar opens up the intriguing possibility of a potential conflict between
wished to establish institutional forms closely modelled on Western principles ~Tsecularismand a strongly majoritarian interpretation of
liberal democracies. But since they were practical politicians, they democratic politics.
decided to acknowledge two types of constraints arising out of initial
circumstances, tempering their extreme c o n s t r u ~ t i v i s mThe
. ~ ~ cons-
traints emerged from the immense uncertainty faced by Muslims Conclusion
who decided to remain in India after the Partition riots and the need If we reject both a ~ u r e l yintellectualist teleological construction of
modernity and a purely functionalist modekand consider it-more
l9 Varshney 1994. i realistically, in my view-as internally plural, this logic of plurality
20 Madan 1991. should be seen as intrinsic to the structure of modern civilization
2' See Bhargava 1998 for detailed arguments on various sides. nchcr than as an exception to the historical rule. I would like to suggest
22 Eisenstadt 1996. that this ispreciselywhat we find in the h i s t o r y o f ~ u r o ~ e modernity:
an
in t h e expanding panorama o f m o d e r n r r a ~ ~ s f o r n i a r i o ntlie s. elen~ents Foucaulr, M. 1974. r/lr,(l~d<,i- n / ' l h i u q ~ 1.ondon:
. Ilivih~oil<.
-- , 1979. L)lsciplii~ra ~ I'liiirih.
~ d H.irmoncls~vvr.th:T'cngl,in Rook>.
of i n d ~ ~ s t r i a l i z a t i o e'tiztix,rtioil,
n, individuarion, a n d secularization are
Kaviraj, S. 1094. L)ilemln;ls of L)emocraric L)cvt.lopiilcnt in India. 11) i.cftwicll
in\ral-iably present as constituent processes leading to a m o d e r n sociecy.
1 994 ( I fide i r f i n ).
Bur [heir mu[ual articulation a n d c o m b i n e d effecrs, a n d , consequenrly, . ]')')G. Rcligion a n d Idcllrity in Indi.~.E~/)riic.izird Kncinf ~St:tlc/lirJ,
rhc s t r u i r u r e of social life the? produce through their combination, vol. 20, no. 7 , pp. 325-q-i.
is vasrly different between European societies. As European societies Lefnuich, Adrian. Ed. 1994. L)r,mor.l.ui.),,/)/tiL ) P I ' P ~ O / , Y ICambridge:
/P~I~. 1'oliry
c o m e u ~ ~ d [he e r deepening influence o f rhese pressures, the political Press.
life o f England-France, o f Germany-Ital>: a n d o f Russia-Easrern Madan, T.N. Ed. 199 1 . Soc.iolog~,oj'KL,figion. I)ilhi: Oxforct Univcr\iry
Europe gets transformed, bur in significantly different ways. W h a t Said, E. 1978. Oric,~itnflsii~. L.ondon: Kou tiedge.
creares t h e ~riislcadingsense o f similarity a b o u t political forms is a Varshney, Ashutosh. 10'14. L)~vriorr/r<vi~ii~dt/~e (Io~~r~ti.)~~idc:
Ne\vYork: Car~ll>ridStl
strange amnesia a b o u t imperial conflicts a n d [vars. At [he t u r n o f t h e University P~.css.
century, a comparison o f European nations w o u l d have presented a
vast spectacle ofvariation in t h e in\.cntion o f m o d e r n life, from spheres
o f culrurc like painting and poerry to sphercs o f political experience.
Indeed. s o m e o f the great conflicts o f m o d e r n times h a p p e n e d pre-
cisely hecause m o d e r n politics gave risc ro d e n ~ o c r a t i ca n d totalitarian
fornis oforganizing rhccapacities o f t h c state. nnd these opposing poli-
rical forms c a m e to a direct confronrarion. I t is difficult t o accept that
liberal democracy c a m e to G e r m a n y l)v s o m e k i n d o f delayed s p o n -
taneous conlbustion in 1945 caused by underlying functional causes
r a t h r r t h a n by t h e simpler external fact o f t h e war. T h u s , t h e logic o f
m o d e r n i t y shows a diversibing a n d pluralizing tendency in E u r o p e
itself. H o w can its extension t o differe~itcultures a n d historical cir-
cumstances p r o d u c e obediently uniform historical results?

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)i~ ,I, I 5.~ ,
 On the Enchantment of the State 41
this idea. It also seeks to explain why, despite the global dominance of
ideas of liberalization, and a reduction of the state's interference in
social and economic life, this enchantment is still undiminished in
India.
I lookat the movement ofthe idea of the state in the broadest sense,
O n the Enchantment of the State: and my study includes very different forms of 'thinkink-from the
highly self-conscious thinking of theorists to the far more practical,
Indian Thought on the Role of sketchy, but powerful conceptions that animate ordinary actions in the
the State in the Narrative political world-the ideas carried in the minds of ordinary politicians,
voters, bureaucrats, dissenters. Although - these ideas d o not possess the
of Modernity form of political theory, they cannot be neglected by political theory.
In fact, the task ofpolitical theory must be to make sense ofthese ideas,
and give them more consistent and definite shape so that they become
thinkable in a theoretical fashion. In understanding the ver; different

0 ne of the fundamental ideational changes brought by modernity

into Indian intellectual culture was the transformation of the
idea of the state. From an institution that was traditionally
seen as a necessarily limited and distinctly unpleasant part of the basic
furniture of any society, the idea of the state has been transformed into
trajectories of the imaginary of thestate in India and Europe, it is useful
to look contextually at these ideas. I think the Slunnerian injunction
about a strict contextualist reading of ideas holds not merely when we
are studying the theoretical work of individual theorists and the mean-
a central moral force, producing an immense enchantment in India's ings of their atomic statements, but also when we are trying to pursue
intellectual life. Indeed, in the Indian context, as distinct from the a much more elusive beast: what a ragged and complex collectivity
European one, it has been the primary source of modernity. This essay ' like 'political Indians' (with all the necessary ambiguity of that phrase)
seeks to present an absurdly short history of the curious adventures of 'think' of an entity called the state. The boundaries and content of the
idea of the state are likely to vary between intellectuals and common
This essay was originally presented at a seminar on the state at Columbia
people, and also between literate and illiterate actors in the political
University, organised by the Centre for the Study ofPoliticalThought (CSI'T) world, between elites and underprivileged populations. All this can be
in April 2005. It was first published in the European Journal o f Socio- gathered together into something like a 'political imaginary' or a state
logy, 2005, vol. 46, pp. 263-96. I am grateful to David Armitage and David imaginary. So, this essay is not only about thinking in the form ofpoli-
Johnston who organized the conference and to those who contributed to rhc tical theory in its ordinarily recognizable form, but also about think-
discussion. ing in many other unorthodox shapes and forms, ordinary people's
' In thc European context, Marxist historians would view the role of eco- powerful but inchoate expectations, moral understandings, and 'habits
nomic transformations towards capitalism as a primary process, bearing a causal of the heart'.2
influence on changes in the state. Others may disagree with the Marxibt
ascription of a causal role exclusively to the economy, but it is generally ack-
nowledged that the story of European modcrniry is driven hy economic as round. That does not mean, however, that once the structures of a capitalist
well as political forces. I wish to suggest that in India the primarycausal impulsr; economy are established in various parts of the productive system, they do nor
cowards modernity came mainlTfrom the state and political transformations exert important and independent causal influence.
around its control. Significant economic changes were conditional on changes Charles Taylor (2004) has used the concept of an imaginary, following
in the structure of political power. In other words, it is the changes in the the earlier discussions in Castoriadis 1987. 'Habits of the heart' of course is
structure of the ?tare that explain changes in the economy, not the other way TocqueviIIe's wonderfully evocative and capacious phrase.
42 The Trajectories of the I;udzan State On the Enchantment of the State
The first part in what follows below offers an elementarydistinction, defeat in the political imagination is partly artificial. While there is
necessary for my argument, between pre-modern and modern con- no doubt that the state-centred view gradually 'won', these theories
ceptions of the 'state'.j It gives two separate examples of pre-modern offered dense, intricate, considerably detailed, and subtle ideas on
conceptions: an image of the state from Hindu antiquity, and an &inking about the modern state, and many of these 'elements' are in
Islamic-Aristotelian one associatedwith the Mughal empire. I t suggests, constant circulation. They provide, in a certain sense, the underlying
against common understanding fundamental similarities between the repertoire-of concepts and arguments-by which Indians have
two. It then describes how the peculiarity of British rule-particularly thought about the state for nearly two centuries. This story should also
its long and staggered inception-introduced the modern idea of the illustrate a separate and more general argument in which I am inte-
state, how Indians responded to it, and began to conceive it as central rested: the need for bending middle-level principles of so~ial/~olitical
to the social organization of modernity. It then shows how through theory away from their familiar architecture historically centred on
almost a century (from the 1860s to the 1950s) two broad strands of Western history; bending the whole enterprise of theory-with its
thinking about the nature of modern power struggled for imaginative major methodological principles, theoretical hypotheses, large taxo-
dominance.* One produced a serious, searching critique of the Europ- nomies, central concepts, and minute patterns of detailed analytical
ean version of the modern state and warned against its unmodified inquiry-away towards other historical formations (not culture^),^ in
installation in India on the !grounds that, in its view, would impede a fundamental diversification of political theoryi
a realization of the good life.5 The other strand, which eventually
triumphed, advocated acomprehensive reliance on the modern state-
based precisely on the European model-for the remaking of Indian
society according to just and democratic principles, and viewed that Two Conceptions of the State
precisely as the particular form of the 'good life' which modernity had First, although we generally tend to speak about the re-modern and
rendered possible. For reasons ofspace, I shall disregard finer differences the modern state, this way of speaking has a major conceptual short-
and inflections of emphasis. Instead I shall focus on four influential coming: it implicitly contains an unavoidable suggestion that we are
thinkers who presented fundamental ideas that have gone into the
talking about two historically different versions of the same object,
making of Indian intellectual discourse on the fascinating fate of the
though this ~reciselyis to be seen as aproblem. In fact we are talking
modern state. It must be noted that any judgement about victory and about two very different types of organization of political authority.
However, for other theoretical reasons it is plausible to house them
I readily acknowledge the frailties of the notion of a 'pre-modern' state,
insidea capacious general category. If the state designates any coherent,
because there was more than one form of the state before the coming of
distinct organization of power such that it identifies a group of people
modernity. The use of this distinction does not deny the diversiry of historical
forms, but is strictly limited to this kind of discussion where the contrast is and an institutional structure that lays down the rules which members
important-not the internal variations within the 'traditional' side of the ofasociety must follow, it can perform the conceptual function ofthat
contrast.
This is of course a considerable oversimplification: there were major dif- This is an important difference: I do not wish to offer a culturally relativist
ferences of principles and inflection amongst theorists who belonged to these position. However, I think what is true and compelling in cultural relativist

tellectual narrative.
-
two strands. But these are disregarded here in the interests of a broader in-c
d
arguments is derived from the historical peculiaqties of cultural formations.
Cultural differences are central to understanding politics, but they are produced
I have chosen Bhudev Mukhopadhyay (1827-94) and M.K. Gandhi historicaly, they are not essential differences which defy standard forms of
( 1 869-1948) as the two examples of this strand-a point of departure and a historical explanation.
point of arrival, to echo Partha Chatterjee's terms. See Chatterjee 1989. I have developed this argument elsewhere: see Kaviraj 2005.
 c'jtegory. It wonlcl I,c c l c ~ rhowcvcr thar this d c f i n i t i o ~ iis Reflective discussiori.; o n the. n.lrure of ~-o!,,ll 1)ower \\,<~-c,g c . ~ l ~ . r . . ~ ~
r n ~ ~ cwider
h rhan rhc d e t ; n i ~ i o ~\vc l l ) , horn M A X
l c o n \ ~ e ~ ~ r i o n n draw by a perpetual inrcrwr.lving o f two kinds o f thiriking. Orlc srr~lnci
Wcbcr bc~callsei r omirs rwo c r ~ ~ c i Wcbcl-ian al features: ir makes n o contained in t / ~ ~ o i . ~ t i r t ~ l t c ~ x t j - the
l i k ehlirr2ilsiwi~tiandt h e Aitl~i~>.iri/i'i.~--
rclcrcncc to tllc a~ionymit!,or i ~ r i p c r s o ~ ~ , ~ l i t y opowers f t h c of the st~ltc; setting o u t high p r i n ~ i p l ~asn, d rhc orhcr s ~ l g ~ e s t cby d tliz ilni-ii~tir~r,
n o r does it dc11l;rnd rll,lr rhe stnre shoulcl excrcise a monopoly o n the complications offerecl to chow principles by the epic xnd p ~ ~ r a nnar- ic
1,fgltlrnare
.' usea o i ~ i o l e n c e . ~ ' l 'W'eberi~n
l~c idea is in a n y case undeniably ratives.'' T h e Mtrvtzrsi?r)~ti, in its srvcnth arlcl eighth chapt.ers, provide,
loc,~lin histol-ical terms, as t h c fcudal order in Europe w o u l d n o t fit his detailed dogmatics ahouc t h e n o r m s s u r r o u n d i n g t h e power o f t h e
Inore str;ngent detinirion. Wcber's d e f i n i t i o ~o~f the statc, which t o r m s ruler. Although M a n u conceives o f onlj. a single royal form o t zt;irc
SLICII .\ ce~\tl.al,self-evident basis o f m o d e r n social science, is i n Gact power, and does n o t refer to [he republicnn traditions o f H i n d u a n d
the d c f i l l i ~ i oo ~t a~ m o d e r n European c o n c c p t i o ~ol f the state. T o try t o Buddhist 'intiquit!: his disputation o n rhc c11,lrncrer o f stare powel-
u~~clersr,uld the precise nature o f political authol-itl i r o~ l h e r contexts advancessomesubtlc.suggestions. In slokn3 ofctitlptcr 7.M a n u l,egins
ot'lirnrandsp,lc-c thus i n v o l ~ e s s u s ~ c ~ r d i n ~ r ~e ~t lsrrss a t ' t l idefinition.
at with a demonstration o f t h e necessiry o f politicnl authorit>, which
rrsernblcs a n elementar!, Hol)bcsi:i~n p i c - r ~ ~ r'Sincc c: in .I condition of
march!., ordin,(ry lnunlan beings 'Ire terrificd b\. rhc po\zcrfi~l,fils t h e
preservationlsccuri ty ofall people. t h e Cr-ratol-has crc.,ltcd I;ingship." '
H e represclrt5 <()cia1order: c\.erl t11011ghthe king is :L child, he- stnolrld
b e treated 1ike.l sod. 11n.1ti \ . 3 j ,111 ;~gcritd i f k l - e ~ lfronl r or.dina~-!.ln~~nl,~n
Ancicnr H i n d u f ~ l ~ i l o s o l -t~roducccl
rh~~ two styles o f ~rcflccriono n t h r beings.'4'I'he ccntr-a1 rno\,e i l l ,\l:(n~~'s tllcor!. o f I;ingllip i j nlncie. ill
riaturc o f royal power.'" Sonnc rheorctical treatises conraincd dct.liled my view, in this jkoli.(/:
dogriiatic c o m p e n d i a of t h e pririiiples g o v e r ~ l i n groyal conduct. '
In rhc i11rcrc.r oi[lic. kins I i;)r rhcgood o f r l ~ c l t i n(;od
~ . f;r\r c~c..lrL.tiN',iiid'~
[an at~srmcrco~ice~>ricr~i ot"oi-dcr'] in hi\ o\+,n imay,r. For rhL. pre.wr\.lrion
W\c.l,c,r 1078 [ I 0251; for an excellsnr accoulit of how this idea developed
of all t)cinp. ~iL/iliii~snlrt~, ch;lt~rc.r7,~ I o k ~I 4i j
Iiisrorically. see Sliinner 1988.
" 0 1 1 eotrhe rnosr celcbrarcd rcxrs ofsocinl rulrs i r ) [he Hindu rradirion is

r l x compcndiu~niMizri~rsit~rti, arrriburcd ro a Icgcr1clnry \,~gt.hZanu. I r pro\ ides

ihc nio\r dcr,~ilc.ddcscriprion of rules ro be ob\rr\.ed i l l rlie H i r ~ t l ~Iifc-~~cIc, l social lift. which dc(~i1ccl[lie rules ~ I i , l r sliollld goici.11 rhc conci~~cr of I~orli
wirh r \ \ o c l l , ~ p ~7c' rand ~ 8 dealing wirh ri2j/1-rIii~1.in'r-rhc I - L I ~ ~ro\ he ol)scrvcd ordinary members of a principalir!. 2nd of tlir rulcr; second, rhc l.i~.~/~t~s,.lz~ti
I)!. I-ulcr-\.Scc Ilonigcr ;lnd Siiii~h1991. the treatise composed ;lccording ro legend b! Ch,~naC;!.I, rhc sli~-c,\\d co~~n\cllor
"' 'I'hcrc can he 1cgirini;rrc.qu~.,~iori, .iIlo~lrthe \ v ~ y sb!, which \vc c;ln really to rhe firs[ hlauryan emperor (:I~'~ndragnpr.~ \rho dcf;.,~rciiAlcxanticr'\ \tlcc.c\\or
I I I ~ ~ C I - \ ~Iio\+.ordiri,r~-!
~ I I I ~ I~icii;rli\1hi11L , l b o ~ ,111cl
~ r pmcric.~llyoricnrrhcnisclvcs Se~eucusand csrablished a Hindu cn~pirc.Thc.cri~pirc\\;I\ inhcrirccl ,lnd nior,~lly
~o+-va~-d\ (lie sr'lrc.. (:lc,~l-l!..rlic ~ - c . . l c i i ol~rli~~orcric.~I
~l~ rcxrs i \ 0 1 1 ~~3rriclllar\\;I! transformed bv Asoltn, Cliandraguprn's grmdsun, \+rhocon\,crred to I3~lcidhi\m.
of c , i p [ ~ ~ r ioril!, l i ~ O I , C p i l ~ i c u l ' l r1 0 1 111 of rliilikr~i~: ~ppr(~1cI1 c.crr,rinl\ Third, rhe almojr enrircl!. srlt-sra~idingdisquisirion on royd l,o\\cr siven I>y
privilcgc\ .I highly inrcllccru,~l.. ~ r ~~liu.; d br,lhminical. form o f r l ~ i n k i n klon,~. the great elder jrarctman Rhi\lirna on his bed of 'irrows, before hi\ Jc;~rli.ro
ordinary Illclian\ ~hirik, ~ h o ~rhc l r hrarr caiinor be \imply deduced fro111 try- the new king at'rrr [he gl-car barrle in [he lare cdnro of the :Lffihnhh/ilirrlr.
t ~ r , l l :irg~~li~e~lr.\, csl>c.cicill!.troni rhc Iirghl! c\oreric Sankrir canoli. S C L C ) I I ~ ~ ] ~ . , l 2 In the Hindu rradiriol~,\cIiol,~rswcrc cxliorred ru l-cdd rhc 11ico1-cric;ll
rlir S.i~~sI\r-ir c;ilion it\clt-i\ irircrn<~E, drve~\c.\+ irh 5o111e ci1ffcrence5ofeliil)tic~i\l texts along with the epic. narrnti\.el because [hev conrnincd exel-cite.; on .lpl>li-
I>c~\it~cri ~ii~rjor ~ < I I I ~ I ~ ~ ~cxts.
~'II carion of the pri~icipic,.
' ' I hr~,cof LIIC I I I ~ \ [ I ~ I I I I ~ LofI \ ~ h c \ c\ \ c ~ - I:I-\I,
c ~ [lit ( \ \ o ch;rprcr\ cIe:di~lg I' Manusmrd, ch, 7,siokir .3, I)trriigcl- .lnd Sniirh 1091.
1 4 hfanusmrti, i h . 7, siokil 8 , ihid.
\ \ i t 1 1 1.0\.1/ \ I O \ \ ~ , I i l l :\/iiiiiiiiiii i i , 111~. yrc.,rt Joyrii.rr~~ ciigc.\~trtrnlc of k l i r i c l ~ r
46 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 47
This 'law' (or order) which combines the attributes of both a divine upper castes of the varna order of antiquity. The order of the ancient
and a natural conception, is central to Manu's theory of kingship. By v x n s is based, as is well known, on a division between the great goods
distinguishing between 'the law' (danda) and a fallible human agent ofhuman life: pure social prestige associated with knowledge: political
(the king), Manu is able to construct a theoretical structure in which power vested in royal authority; and wealth produced by commerce.
the king does not enjoy unconditionally absolute power over the lives ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ethe s tsocial
i n ~order
l ~ of
, the varnas separates these great goods
of his subjects. It is absolute in the sense that there is no other human of human life radically by making them the legitimate province of
authority which can contest it, but it is not absolute in a more funda- the life activity of specific and separate castes (varnas). By radically
mental sense as there exists a moral framework to which it is, in turn, separating them, the varna structure also brings into play a subtle but
subordinate. The king's power is simply the translation into the human persistent logic of coalitional interdependence between these groups,
scale of 'the law', the logic of a divinely given natural and social order. making them interdependent on each others' assets. T h e dominance
The Manusmrti makes it entirely clear thac the locus of sovereignty of a complex caste-based social order can be achieved, this theory
is in the danda, not in the person of the king or his adventitious in- clearly implies, not by the exclusive use of any of these assets-of pres-
tentions: tige, power, or wealth-but by their combination: only a combination
of these assets and their social possessors could be sufficient for social
I n essence, it is the law [danda]that is the king, the person with authority, dominance. Yet, curiously, even these upper castes live according to
the person who keeps the order of the realm, and provides leadership to it. general rules ofhierarchy, and the Brahmins retained their ritual super-
(Manusmrti,chapter 7, sloka 17) iority over the two other upper castes (the Kshatriyas and thevaishyas)
primarily because they are regarded as the human representatives of
Entirely consistent with this theory is the corollary that if a king this overarching transcendental order.I7 In a certain sense, of course,
goes against the rules of this abstract and super-personal order, he is awell-orderedsociety is ruled by abstract principles, but these principles
'destroyed by the order itself' (dand~naivanihanyate).15This h n d a is need constant reinterpretation in the face of historical change and
truly 'the source of immense power' (sumahattejah),and is impossible complexity of circumstance; the Brahmins are the repositories of this
to control and use by those 'rulers who have not learnt to govern their essential form of social knowledge.
own selves' (d~rdharasakrtatmabhih).'~ The fundamental distinction This might serve to explain certain peculiar rhetorical characteristics
between the king as the human agent and the law as the superhuman ofthe Manusmrti. Traditionally, nationalists illegitimately assimilated
abstract order leads to a theory of restrained rulership and a concep- Indian forms ofwriting to European ones, often suggesting that texts
tion of fairness of treatment towards different types of subjects. Early like the Manusmrti, Artbasastra, and the Santiparva ofthe Mahabharata
Hindu reflections on the state produced a theory which, while recog- were similar to European literature in relation to advice given to prin-
nizing the requirement of unrestricted royal authority, sought to ces. Closer attention to the technical rhetorics of address, the manner
impose restrictions upon it by positing an order that was morally trans- ofwriting, and even the use of the grammatical forms of the imperat-
cendent-an order to which it was both subject and in complex ways ive reveals a significant difference. The Manusmrti is written in an
eventually responsible. imperative mood, a mood of command; it is not friendly, avuncular
Two aspects ofthis brahminical theory are significant for a longterm
historical understanding of conceptions of the state. The first is simply l7 Louis Dumont's celebrated but contested reading of the caste system,
an implication that follows from the last observation. A central fea-; Homo Hierarchicus,makes this point by insisting thac there is a deep connection
*
ture of Hindu society is the curlous, complex interrelation among the between social hierarchy, or more strictly the claim to social precedence, and
a logic of 'encompassing'. The gneral order chat the Brahmins represent is
0" this view higher than the political order that the ruler sustains. because its
l5 Manusmrti, ch. 7, sloka 27, ibid.
'"or the relevant passages, see ibid.: 129-31. abstract moral principles encompass the rules of mundane political authority.
46 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 47

This 'law' (or order) which combines the attributes of both a divine upper castes of the varna order of antiquity. The order of the ancient
and a natural conception, is central to Manu's theory of kingship. By varnas is based, as is well known, on a division between the great goods
distinguishing between 'the law' (danda) and a fallible human agent of human life: pure social prestige associated with knowledge; political
(the king), Manu is able to construct a theoretical structure in which power vested in royal authority; and wealth produced by commerce.
the king does not enjoy unconditionally absolute power over the lives Interestingly, the social order of the varnas separates these great goods
of his subjects. It is absolute in the sense that there is no other human of human life radically by making them the legitimate province of
authority which can contest it, but it is not absolute in a more funda- the life activity of specific and separate castes (varnas). By radically
mental sense as there exists a moral framework to which it is, in turn, separating them, the varna structure also brings into play a subtle but
subordinate. The king's power is simply the translation into the human persistent logic of coalitional interdependence between these groups,
scale of 'the law', the logic of a divinely given natural and social order. making them interdependent on each others' assets. The dominance
The Manusmrti makes it entirely clear that the locus of sovereignty of a complex caste-based social order can be achieved, this theory
is in the danda, not in the person of the king or his adventitious in- clearly implies, not by the exclusive use of any of these assets-of pres-
tentions: tige, power, or wealth-but by their combination: only a combination
of these assets and their social possessors could be sufficient for social
In essence, it is the law [danda] that is the king, the person with authority, dominance. Yet, curiously, even these upper castes live according to
the person who keeps the order ofthe realm, and provides leadership to it. !general rules ofhierarchy, and the Brahmins retained their ritual super-
(Manusmrti, chapter 7 ,sloka 17) iority over the two other upper castes (the Kshatriyas and the Vaishyas)
primarily because they are regarded as the human representatives of
Entirely consistent with this theory is the corollary that if a king this overarching transcendental order." In a certain sense, of course,
goes against the rules of this abstract and super-personal order, he is awell-orderedsociety is ruled by abstract principles, but these principles
,
'destroyed by the order itself' (dandenaiva nihanyate).15This danda is need constant reinterpretation in the face of historical change and
truly 'the source of immense power' (sumahattejah), and is impossible complexity of circumstance; the Brahmins are the repositories of this
to control and use by those 'rulers who have not learnt to govern their essential form of social kmwledge.
own selves' (durdhara~akrtamabhih).'~ The fundamental distinction This might serve to explain certain peculiar rhetorical characteristics
between the king as the human agent and the law as the superhuman of the Manusmrti. Traditionally, nationalists illegitimately assimilated
abstract order leads to a theory of restrained rulership and a concep- Indian forms of writing to European ones, often suggesting that texts
tion of fairness of treatment towards different types of subjects. Early like the Manusmrti, Artbasastra, and the Santiparvaofthe Mahabharata
Hindu reflections on the state produced a theory which, while recog- were similar to European literature in relation to advice given to prin-
nizing the requirement of unrestricted royal authority, sought to ces. Closer attention to the technical rhetorics of address, the manner
impose restrictions upon it by positing an order that was morally trans- of writing, and even the use of the grammatical forms of the imperat-
cendent-an order to which it was both subject and in complex ways ive reveals a significant difference. The Manusmrti is written in an
eventually responsible. imperative mood, a mood of command; it is not friendly, avuncular
Two aspects of this brahminical theory are significant for a longterm
historical understanding of conceptions of the state. The first is simply " Louis Dumont's celebrated but contested reading of the caste system,
an implication that follows from the last observation. A central fea- ; Homo Hierarchicus, makes this ~ o i nby
t insisting thatthere is a deep connection
ture of Hindu society is the curlbus, complex interrelation among the between social hierarchy, or more strictly the claim to social precedence, and
a logic of 'encompassing'. The general order that the Brahmins represent is
l5 Manusmrti, ch. 7 ,sloka 27, ibid. On this view higher than the political order that the ruler sustains, because its
abstract moral principles encompass the rules of mundane political authority.
'"or the relevant passages, see ibid.: 129-31
48 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State
advice from a wise, intelligent, widely experienced counsellor. There
The (slamic State in India
is correspondingly very little use of concrete historical examples,
as these are not items of advice but rules created by a transcendent As religious systems, Islam and Hinduism contained antithetical
authority-accessible, because of their cognitive specialization, only principles in many respects, for example in relation to idolatry and the
to the thin stratum of the Brahmin intelligentsia-to be followed, nature of God. However, in terms of the relation between the power
without hesitation or defiance, by wielders of political authority. The of political rulers and what I have called the 'social constitution', they
Smrti is written in the grand, unanswerable tone of a divine decree obeyed surprisingly similar rules. Islam was a religion of the book, un-
simply recorded by its human amenuensis. The central idea of this like Hinduism, and its social constitution, it could be argued, was far
form of political theory is that social order is not subordinate to the more explicitly laid down in the Koran and Hadith in contrast to
king's legislative function; rather, he is subordinate to the social order. the messy diversity of sectarian texts within Hindu society. Yet, in res-
Another central idea in the Manusmrti, entirely consistent with this ponse to the significant question of whether the temporary possessor
line of reasoning, is the relation between the political ruler and the of political power could alter the fundamental tenets of the social
social practices of the caste order. The ruler's power is executive or ad- constitution, Islam suggested a remarkably similar answer. A plausible
ministrative; it cannot make fundamental rules of social conduct or functionalist suggestion could be that in traditional agrarian socie-
change them. The rules of the caste order as a system of social relations ties political power was so fragile and volatile that the necessary social
are thus impervious to the constant fluctuations of royal power. The stability could not be maintained if legislative power of a serious kind
constant ebb and flow of power from dynasties or lungdoms or indivi- was given to the political ruler. To impart stability to norms of so-
dual rulers constitutes astratum ofevents that occur at the insignificant
- cial life and save them from arbitrary rule, most religions
- in agrarian
-
surface of deep social life, affecting the lives of a very small number of societies probably followed a similar logic of ascribing the power of
individuals who are born, by their caste fate, to endure the imperma- , the legislative constitution ofsociety to divine authority, with a crucial
nence and aggravations of a life of political power. Narrative traditions mediating role played by religious intellectuals-the very similar func-
of.the Hindu epics-the Ramayana and the Mahabharata-merely tion performed by Brahmins in Hinduism and the ulema in Islam.
accentuate this sense of the excessive and exorbitant mortality ofpoli- After the eleventh century, most of the territory of northern India was
tical power, of the extraordinarily volatile existence of rulership, and politically subordinated to Islamic dynasties; yet, strangely, this stable
emphasize the extraordinary gifts required of individuals who have Islamic empire made little effort at systematic conversion of the Hindu
the miraculous moral skills for making such lives fulfilling. The two society over which it exercised uncontested political dominion. Recent
primary features of the brahminical theory of rulership therefore res- historical scholarship has provided some intellectual clarification for
trained the power of the state by subjecting it to a transcendent divine this extraordinary behaviiur on the part of Islamic empires in South
order, and divesting the state of all legislative authority over society. Asia (Alam 2004). The Mughals, the most powerful of the Islamic
This seems to me to explain an unusual feature of Indian history: the dynasties in South Asia, followed a theory of rule drawn from a tradi-
general absence of political rebellions against political rulers similar tion of Persianate Islam which developed under entirely exceptional
to the slave or peasant rebellions of ancient or medieval Europe. By ~ircumstancesin the Khorasan region. Unlike the rest of the Islamic
contrast, the major upheavals of Indian social history were directed world, in Khorasan a highly developed Islamic society had to sub-
against this supposedly transcendent order and its primary intellectual mit to the conquest of non-Islamic rulers. Using a reading ofAristotle,
custodians and mediators: the brahminical intelligentsia. Indian soci~tyr Islamic intellectuals claimed that the respo'nsibility of the ruler, ir-
saw a succession of social reform movements directed against the respective of his own personal faith, was to provide the conditions
classical brahminical social order, starting with Buddhism and Jainism that would allow his subjects to flourish. The task of the ruler was
in ancient times, down to bhakti movements in the middle period nor just to ensure that his subjects were able 'to live', but 'to live in a
which responded to the political and religious challenge of Islam. way fit for human beings'. Living as human beings-not just zoe but
r,
50 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 51
bias-required conditions in which subjects could use their intellectual institutional forms from modern Europe (Pollock 2003,2006). Accord-
and spiritual capacities. O n the basis of this interesting derivation ing to a new strand of historiography, there was a demonstrable im-
from Aristotle, they were able to assert that the task of the non-Islamic pulse of indigenous modernity from the sixteenth century onwards
ruler was to preserve the religious practice of his Islamic subiects. By which was defeated and channelled in different directions by the triumph
a generous application of this principle to its own non-Muslim sub- of British power in the mid-eighteenth century.
jects, the Mughal dynasty extended a ruleof tolerance to the surround- British colonial power entered India in a peculiar fashion. This has
ing Hindu society. From our angle, what is significant is that Islamic made it difficult to ,recover it with historical accuracy, because the
political rulers implicitly accepted limitations o n political authority immensely powerful narratives of British imperial histories and Indian
in relation to the social constitution, which were parallel to those of nationalism both tend to occlude its complex and unusual character.
Hindu rulers. In terms of the historical long term, the entry of Islam Both imperial histories and nationalist narratives saw it as a cataclysmic
into Indian society triggered highly significant changes in many other struggle between two societies-their normative principles and their
fields of social life, but not in the structure of its political order. collective institutions-though the actual historical process was far
T h e Islamic state saw itself as limited and socially distant as the more limited, uneven, and messy. T h e establishment of colonial domi-
Hindu state. Crucially, because ofthis, neither the Hindu nor the Isla- nation was not a result of a comprehensive conflict between these rwo
mic state employed a conception ofwhat domination entailed that was societies, though its eventual consequences were certainly far-reaching.
strictly similar to modern European notions of sovereignty. In terms British power did not enter Indian society as a conquering colonial
of their external relations with other lungdoms or empires, these states power: in fact secrecy,stealth, and imperceptibility were the conditions
were certainly 'sovereign' over their territories; but we cannot simply of its conquest. T h e British were eventually able to conquer India pre-
assume that in their internal relation with their subjects these states cisely because they did not conquer it all at once, and the entire process
exercised the familiar rights of sovereignty. It is essential to understand did not look, at least initially, like a conventional imperial conquest.
the difference between actual weakness ofa state and its marginality in Similarly, nationalist torment about the loss ofsovereignty to a distant
principle. The relative autonomy of the social constitution from the and alien power was also based on a m i s d e ~ c r i ~ t i oT
nh. e British did
state did not arise because the state was weak, and would have invaded not conquer an India which existed before their conquest; rather, they
social rules if it could muster the necessary strength. Rather, it accepted conquered a series of independent kingdoms that became political
a marginality that was a consequence of its own normative principles. India during, and in part as a response to, their dominion. Schematical-
T h e marginality of the pre-modern state was a social fact precisely be- ly, all states before the coming of colonial modernity in India answered
cause it followed from a moral principle which guided the relation the description of a state of subsumptionlsubsidiarity: they dominated
between rulers and subjects. society as agroup of rulers distinct from the society below them, untied
to their subjects by any strong common emotive or institutional bond;
11: States of Sovereignty: Colonialism and the correspondingly, their ability to affect society's basic structure of the
Early Modern State organization of everyday life was seriously restricted.'*
T h e idea of the modern state in the West was first of all the object
In recent years the history of India from the sixteenth century has of a long tradition of theoretical reflection. In contrast, in India, there
become a field of astonishingly fertile contestation, with strikingly
revisionist suggestions on b ~ historical
h and conceptual questions.
l8
-.
This might appear similar to the distinction in Foucault's work between
Historians working on vernacular textual sources have suggested an a state of sovereignty and of governmentality; but that distinction was quite
autochthonous process of 'early modernity' which was partly accelerat- specific to a prticular period of European history, and should not be casually
ed and partly negated by the arrival of colonialism, which introduced imported into the Indian case.
52 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 53
was a disconnection between the earlier theory and the nature of the unprecedented powers of the modern state: its intellectual culture,
the modern state." In Europe, the rise of the modern state occurred therefore, did not feel an urgent need to either define and understand
within an intellectual context of major theoretical interventions (by the powers of the modern state, or to produce a strong argument that
Hobbes and Locke, for instance) which emphasized both the necessity urged that people treat this new institution with caution.
of the modern state and expressed suspicion of its overexpansion into In fact, the study of the peculiar process by which the colonial state
areas of 'civil society'." Western political theorists drew upon a long emerged illustrates an important theoretical fact: the various functions
tradition from Greekand Roman antiquity ofreflecting philosophically which are systematically bundled together in the modern state were
on questions of the state, the nature of political obligation, the idea not institutionally conjoined in earlier times in a necessarily singular
of the respublica, and the more recent traditions of Italian republi- structure. British power entered into Indian society almost unnoticed,
can political thought. By contrast, when the modern state arrived in when the East India Company became one of the major players in a
India, despite the considerable sophistication of its intellectual life, situation of political uncertainty and flux. As the Company established
Indian society could not draw upon an existing body of conceptual its hold over specific levels of the economy and administration ofvari-
and theoretical resources to make sense of, describe, and evaluate the ous regions of India, it introduced, in segments, and as its requirements
new institutional and practical forms of political power. demanded, various military and administrative functions to its indes-
From the point ofview of comparative history, the rise of the insti- cribable collection of diverse activities. Its power was initially based,
tutions of modern European states was also marked by the emergence on the one hand, on a legal permission to trade granted by the Mughal
of strands of thought and behaviour deeply mistrustful of this authority which was already normatively fading and politically
monstrously powerful new institution of the absolutist state which, for ineffective, and on the other by its military capacity to protect its own
the first time, entirely subdued all other centres ofcompetingauthority. territorial and commercial establishments. As its territory expanded,
As one particular line of political theory associated with Bodin and and as it obtained further permission to collect revenue on behalf of
Hobbes pressed for a prudential and moral recognition of its authority, the empire, it had to bring in accounting practices, which then led to
there were parallel intellectual lines of reasoning which suggested that greater cultural contact with the native population and cautious
restraints should be placed on its potentially destructive powers-for cultural moves to introduce the natives to modern education. Eventual-
instance, Locke and Montesquieu in vastly different but equally in- ly, over a period of about seventy years, these new ruling practices
fluential ways (Taylor 1990). Additionally, in the emerging capitalist came together to form what became the recognizable figure of a colo-
social form, powerful social classes like the emerging bourgeoisie deeply nial state.
mistrusted the absolutist state and its potentially predatory instincts. As it established itselfon Indian soil, the colonial authority continued
Guizot's elegant thesis that European modernity was made possible to display the distinctive outward insignia of a state of subsumption.
because in its long history none of the three principles-royal, aristo- First, initially, the functions it partly inherited and partly usurped were
cratic, and popular-was ever completely destroyed, and each balanc- indeed those of a subsumption state. Second, in its early stages, the
ed the other, in a sense reflected this historical reality.2' Crucially, Company was anxious not to produce an exaggerated image of its
Indian society had never seen a state form which remotely resembled own control-for fear of triggering a rebellion. Third, those who ran
the Company administration and those who exercised increasingly
substantial supervision over its expanding ope<ations, on behalf of the
'51 For the state of traditional political theory immediately before the arrival
of the modern colonial state-in-the compendia of the dharmasastras in the' British government, followed what they considered Roman precedents,
seventeenth century, see Pollock 2006. before the British empire found its own true principles and a suitable
Lo The second line of reasoning is distinctive of Locke's theory. rhetoric to accompany them. Finally, there was a strong current of
2' Guizot 1997. opinion in English political thinking, represented by Burke, that was
54 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 55
deeply mistrustful of its actions in India and feared that its lawless Early colonial policy proceeded from an acknowledgement of the
conduct in the colony would slowly invade the rules of metropolitan aliennessof British power and showed excessiveanxiety over interference
governance. in the social habits of its Indian subjects. British missionaries often
Eventually, when British power was consolidated, the state that pursued energetic campaigns for conversion from Hindu society,
emerged was something ofan intermediate form, a hybrid between an and chided the government for not performing its Christian duty of
empire state of the older type and a sovereign state in the European spreading rationalism and enlightened beliefs by interventionist
pattern. Some of its features came to demonstrate distinct marks ofthe legislation. Officials, on their side, responded coolly to such proposals
relation of sovereignty that binds subjects to their sovereign state ofexpeditious moral improvement, and regarded them as meddlesome
authority; however, its colonial character prevented it from develop- distractions from calculations of colonial policy. By the middle of the
ing other aspects of a state of sovereignty or its evolution into what nineteenth century, such claims of sovereignty were beginning to be
Foucault has called 'governmentality'. The relation of sovereignty embedded in early modern Indian culture, and the large-scale rebellion
characteristically marked the relation between the state and its nation. of 1857-8 in northern India, which the British called the Sepoy
As modern research in nationalism has demonstrated, it was the state ~ u t i ncan ~ ,be~seen
~ as a desperate attempt at rejection of this new
that established fixed territories, introduced new cultural practices, definition of an alien but sovereign state by appealing to a more con-
and 'produced' their nations-contrary to the earlier view that it was ventional language of power. The rebellion failed ideologically as well
pre-existent nations which demanded and eventually obtained their as politically. Except for a small revivalist Muslim elite in northern
states2*TheItalian and German cases, where something like the con- India which believed in the vague possibility of a return to Mughal
ventional narrative was credible, were in fact the exceptions and not power, it had ambivalent support from ordinary people. The majority
the rule. of the peasantry were too alienated from the world of political power
It was soon evident that the British empire was fundamentally ,. to respond widely to contests against the legitimacy of foreign rule.
different from its Mughal predecessor. The nature of its power, the The modernist elites based in Calcutta saw their own economic pros-
purposes for which it was used, and its long-term historical consequences pects as being too deeply entangled with British rule to welcome such
were all immeasurably different from earlier empire states. British a ruinous retreat into the past.
colonial rule, because of its unprecedented supremacy in military tech- After the rebellion of the mid-nineteenth century, and in part as its
nology, gave a new kind of fixity to political territoriality. Except for consequence, the character of colonial rule changed in major ways.
the outlying regions in the north-west, most of the subcontinent came First, the metropolitan government assumed direct responsibility of
under a stable, single, uniform administrative authority. Territorial the Indian empire, abandoning the earlier policy of ambivalent ex-
fixity was followed by slowly expanding moral claims of sovereign ploitation of the colonial c ~ n n e c t i o n When
. ~ ~ the Company ruled
power. In European discourse, British rule over India was often justi- India, British official policy was a mixture of quiet enjoyment of the
fied by a dubious 'right of conquest'. However, within India it was financial benefits ofcompany rule and a casual denial of responsibility
ideologically anchored more effectively in a typically utilitarian line of
reasoning.That theory maintained that the legitimacy ofagovernment 23 The large-scale mutiny of British Indian troops started from camps
should be judged consequentially:not by some vague and indetermin- in Bengal and spread to the major cities of northern India. It was eventually
able right of natives to rule, but by the historical results of a form of put down by the British with the help of those ~ a r t qthe
f army that remained
governance. By this criteriomit was possible, if not plausible, to wd- Id to colonial authorities. Interestingly, the emerging modern elites sided
vide an effective justification of colonial rule. e~&elywith the British, though much later nationalists reinterpreted the events
~ o n i s r i c a l l as
y the first war of independence.
24 For excellent accounts of the nature of British power and the ambiguities
22 Despite their considerable difference on other points, the two arguments
by Gellner (1 983) and Anderson (1983) converge on this one.
I ~ffolonialrule, see Bayly 1989 and Washbrook 1999.
rz i
56 The Trajectories of the Indian State O n the Enchantment of the State 57
if things went wrong. With the direct assumption of empire by the for interference without consultation and went against the fundamental
home government, the British establishment had to be more directly notions ofself-rule. A third strand of Hindu opinion was more coher-
involved in the affairs of the colony, and it had to take far more seri- ently conservative: it opposed the jurisdiction of the state to initiate
ously progressive demands that emerging liberal rules of governance reform and rejected normative criticisms of sati as a social practice.2"
should be applied to the government of India. Secondly, colonial The second strand of argument was the most interesting, in a sense,
authorities had a clearer perception of the political need for Indian and also contained an ambiguity. It was not clear at that stage if the
collaboration, bringing a group of modernist Indians into the busi- objection to the use of the state as a reforming power against society
ness of colonial administration in subordinate roles, so that they could was based on the fact that it was a foreign power, or because it was
work to provide an ideological relay into Indian society, performing a the state. In other words, the basis of the objection was ambiguous:
quasi-hegemonic connection with at least the ambitious, modernist whether it was the state's claim to interfere into social rules that was
segment of the Indian upper class.25It is fair to say that, in the early unacceptable, or the fact that the state was in the hands of an alien
period of British rule, even before direct governance by the crown, the power. The distinction was fundamental. The first argument would
Indian upper classes saw the expanding claims of sovereignty of the merge into a Gandhian scepticism about the state in general; the
British state as a way of intensifying their own control over Indian second would eventually evolve into the Nehruvian reliance on the
society. The case of the abolition of sati is an excellent example. Social nationalist state. In later periods, these would increasingly diverge into
reformers like Ram Mohan Roy despaired of persuading conservative two separate strands of political reflection-one rejecting the foreign-
Hindu society to support a rejection of sati on rationalistic grounds, ness of the intervention; the other, more radical one, objecting to the
and gradually shifted their strategy to persuade the reluctant colonial power of the modern state to intervene in the rules of society. All these
administration to interfere in stamping out barbaric practices from strands would for the time being use the idea of swarajlswarajya-self-
Hindu society. , rule or autonomy-but in significantly different, ohen contradictory
The sati episode illustrated the emergence of attitudes that were directions. I shall try to illustrate this by reference to three intellectual
to characterize Indian political discourse for a long time. T h e contro- positions in the evolving discourse about the nature and role of the
versy split Indian intellectuals and public opinion into three ideological modern state.
camps. The first supported the abolition unconditionally and argued Intellectual reflection on the peculiarities of imperial control brought
that since Hindu society was unwilling to abolish the practice, the only the question of the state gradually to the centre of the political field of
rational solution to the problem was to bring in the power of the colo- vision. Something like a shift of horizon in a Gadamerian sense began
nial state. Rationalist reform was historically necessary, even though to occur from the mid-nineteenth century onwards. In the nineteenth
the cost was colonial intervention into Indian social practices. Some century, the central puzzle for Indian intellectuals in their recent hist-
Hindu reformers agreed that sati was morally abhorrent but insisted ory was the question of subjugation: how such a small number of alien
that it must be eradicated by Hindu society itself-through a process rulers, from such a distant base, could control a country ofsuch immense
of self-correction. To allow the colonial state to rectify the undoubted size and diversity. By the early twentieth century, this was transformed
barbarisms ofindigenous societywas to give it an illegitimate jurisdiction into the question of independence: a consideration of how this power
could be effectively contested and ultimately removed. The answer to
25 There is a long and interesting discussion about whether the Gramscian
concept of hegemony, in s~me'appropriatel~ modified form, can be appli:d 26 In the Bengali controversies about the abolition ofsati, and more generally

to colonial India. For some direct interventions in that discussion, see the the role of the state in initiating social reform, Ram Mohan Roy articulat-
work of Shula Marks and Dagmar Engels (1994); for a dissenting view by a ed the first position, Bankimchandra Chatropadhyay the second, and Hindu
distinguished historian, see the work of Ranajit Guha (1997). CO"Be~ativesthe third.
58 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 59
the first question went through several stages, and Indian intellectuals asserted that Indian and European societies were providentially joined
eventually provided increasingly complex and 'political' answers to by history, but the simple power of colonialism could not erase the
this central puzzle of modern Indian history. Initially, lndians were fundamental fact that the two societies were organized around de-
inclined to blame the victory of the British simply on an unusually monstrably different principles-in the normative and organizational
long run of military misfortunes. But British military victories were sense. Indian society, by which he primarily meant the Hindu social
too numerous, and too consistent to be explained away as a statistical order based on caste, was characterized by an 'interior organization'
quirk. A second version ofthe explanation focused on military techno- (antah-sasane sasita): this form of social ordering was interior, and
logy and organization; but Indian rulers like Tipu Sultan of Mysore anterior to the external authority of the state.28Its normative princi-
eventually succumbed to British power even though they employed ples derived from a collectively accepted and intelligible normative
European military organization and technology. When these two ex- order of dharma,29and it ran according to those 'internal' principles,
planations appeared implausible, Indian discussions moved towards a in other words, disqualifying the claims of 'internal sovereignty' of
more sociological form of analysis, suggesting that the obvious the modern state. Modern European societies alienated this power
invincibility ofBritish power arose not from material things likesuperior ofsocial organization to a statewhich then assumedlegitimate external
technology or simple organization oftheir armed forces, but something authority to provide societies and communities embedded in them
deeper, more comprehensive, and subtle-which Indian intellectuals with their normative and practical order. External interference into the
slowly identified as 'a national spirit'. By this they usually meant the settled habits of Hindu society-its ~ittlichkeit~~-wastherefore per-
historically peculiar device of the modern nation-state, which produced ceived as normatively unjustified, and for this reason likely to be in-
a new constitutive relationship between a people and their state. Early effectual ifattempted by pure force (Mukhopadhyay 1981 [1892]);for
Indian nationalist thinking is replete with references to the virtues of interpretations, see Raychaudhuri 1989, Kaviraj 1995). Bhudev was
discipline and what Foucault has termed 'governmentality'. For that
was what the British possessed, and the Indians lacked. T h e discourse
primarily in English. Authors who chose vernaculars as rheir exclusive vehicle
of Indian nationalism was thus born with a strangely contradictory
often have extremely interesting ideas: at times, they can afford to be more
relation with European nation-states: clearly, the only way of prising explicit in the political implications oftheir arguments. Bhudev Mukhopadhyay
open the colonial grip of the British nation-state o n its Indian empire is undoubtedly one of rhe most insightful 'theoretical' thinkers in nineteenth-
was to generate a sense of nationalism, and the eventual creation of an century Bengal, buc there is no serious translation of his major works into
Indian nation-state. English.
28 T h e idea that Indian society was ordered internally-not by the stace-
111: Thinking about the State becomes a major argument in much social reflection associated with Indian
nationalism, and is echoed, with appropriate inflections ofemphasis, by thinkers
A Discourse of Disillusionment: (ike Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore. For Gandhi's version, see HindSwaraj
Bhudev Mukhopadhyay in Gandhi 1997. For Tagore, see his political essays in Thakur 2003, in particular
the essay 'Bhararvarshe Itihaser Dhara' (The Course of Indian History).
A major strand of theoretical reflection emerged in the 1860s in the The meaning of the term dharma is notoriously difficult to capture in
work of several Bengali authors, among whom Bhudev Mukhopa- [ranslation, but the closest equivalent in the context of chis discussion is 'right-
dhyayls essays on sociology (Mukhopadhyay 1892 [ I 9811) were the encompassing both the sense of what is right, and what the rights are, the
most incisive and consistent.% Bhudev wrote a powerful treatise whizh Proper ways of acting, that is, by different social agents.
30 I am not suggesting a direct reference to Hegel, though Bhudev was ex-
27 A major problem in studying modern Indian intellectual history is that tremely well acquainted with contemporary European theory and commented
academic attention is invariably given disproportionally to authors who wrote On Hegel in a separate part of his work: Mukhopadhyay 1981 118921.
t
60 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment ofthe State 61
led to a comprehensive moral rejection of the modern West-
among the early thinkers who offered, from an explicitly Hindu point
ern social form. Bhudev's succinct assessment of the historical con-
of view, a comprehensive sociology of modern European civilization,
sequences of expanding modernity over the world was interesting
and built an unappealing Hobbesian picture of modern European
societywould eventually undermine its own bonds of basic sociality by
society.31Societies in modern Europe were based on a new kind of
encouraging individuals to treat all others instrumentally (to borrow
fundamental acquisitiveness and expansion of individuality which
G n t i a n language) and make both collective and individual life unful-
had three negative effects when judged from a rationalistic humanist
filling. States based on these forms of competitive sociality would
perspective. It destroyed the unconditional affection which traditionally
reproduce similar relations of hostility and competition towards other
held families together and introduced forces that were bound to turn
states, which would lead to interminable wars among nation-states.
this basic social unit into an increasingly contractual institution. It
The European mastery ofmodern military technology made such wars
turned the world of work, the field of interaction between poduct-
more destructive than ever before. In an intriguing critique of emerg-
ive persons, into a field of unceasing conflict: a war of all against all.
ing international law in the nineteenth century, Bhudev suggested that
For Bhudev, Hobbes's solution, however, was delusive: the creation of
modern European societies periodically sought to impose such
a sovereign would not reduce or eliminate incessant conflict; it simply
quasi-legal restraints on their own states because the history ofEurop-
gave it a more civilized disguise. Modern European societies did not
ean modernitywas an incomprehensi blestory ofbuilding and destruc-
have real moral cement because of the apotheosis of competition.
tion. Modern European societies constructed an unprecedentedly
'Civil society', or its economicversion in the modern market, appeared
opulent civilization in periods ofpeace but were unable to control state
to him tocreateacondition ofutter instabilityoffortunes and insidiously
conflicts that swiftly annihilated what was achieved. But Europeans
persuaded modern Europeans to accept that as a natural and desirable
wereshowing signs oftiring ofthe repeated mutual destruction oftheir
condition induced by a false theory of 'human nature'. Finally, Europ-
, own economic prosperity. Attempts at the creation of modern inter-
ean colonialism was simply the application of this logic of conflict to
national law to restrain wars were primarily aimed at avoiding future
the level ofworld society. From altering the norms and institutions of
wars within the European continent. If that version of international
their own societies, European societies now had the collective power
lawsucceeded, it would reduce military destructionwithin the territory
to extend them to all others; to impose these norms artificially on all
of the European continent. However, as the militaristic and aggressive
their dominions and pretend that this forced universality confirmed
nationalist nature of these states could not be changed, this would
their 'natural' character. Modern societies did not emerge in other
simply mean the transference of devastating wars from the European
cultures through spontaneous combustion but by the forcible reforms
centre to the peripheral world of the colonies. It would be the rest of
of European colonial rule.
the world that would have to pay the price for European propensity
Modern states were unprecedented devices by which the entire
towards aggression. Interestingly, although Bhudev was sharply critical
social universe in the colonies was restructured by European imperialism
of modern European statecraft, he showed deep admiration for two
into a form ofsociety that was excessively materialistic, individualistic,
achievements of European modernity: political economy-the Europ-
and competitive, and which eventually made any real conception of
science of improving the wealth of nations; and the growth of
'community' un~ustainable.~~ In Bhudev's critique-which wasechoed
modern science. Apart from these two spheres, Indian society had
and elaborated by a long line of subsequent nationalist writers-this
nothing to learn from Europe.
-
For a discussion, see Kaviraj 1995.
3'
m
t
\
,, Dapite their power and complexity, Bhudev's reflections on the
modern s a t e remained fatally incomplete on several counts. First, his
32Bhudev was writing in a period when Bengali fascination with French %Wt, though insightful and critically incisive on the centrality of
theories, particularly Rousseau, was at its peak. Some of his arguments may , state in European modernity, recorded this simply as a brute hist-
have come from a reading of Rousseau as much as from Hindu philosophical
orical fact, without any suggesrions for straregic opposirion. He had
reflection. C I
I
62 The Trajectoories of the Indian State O n the Enchantment of the State 63
no answer to its power, except for refined disapproval.33 Without a contractual; capitalist economies destroyed all sense of community by
counter-strategy, his response to colonialism was simply a technique rendering human relations competitive and aggressive; modern states
ofwhat Bhabha has termed 'sly civility'--accepting British rule as pro- were primarily effective engines of comprehensive wars against other
videntially given while waiting for some future fundamental change in states; and the search for self-interest by states drove modern Europ-
the field of political power.34 What is notable about Bhudev's early ean nations into a denial of self-determination-which they valued
modern critique of Western modernity is its pervading sense that the for themselves-for others, thereby justifying modern imperialism.
modern West was a new kind of historical force that would not merely The very universality of the proposals of European modernity forced
transform Western societies but that also carried a universalist proposal reflective individuals of other societies, who wished to live thought-
for moral and institutional change in all civilizations:that the civilization fully in history, to adopt a partly relativistic vision of an increasingly
of the modern West was 'universalistic' in a different way from the interdependent world that did not allow the traditional separateness
hopeful, putative universalism ofproselytizing religions like Christianity ofcultures.'~heintellectual and political power ofEuropean modernity
and Islam. Central to his thought was also a deep reflective convic- irreversibly ended the era of isolated civilizations.Evaluative isolationism
tion that 'the form oflife' that Western modernity proposed to the rest was rendered impossible in a world dominated by European empires.
of the world could be shown through rationalistic argument to be The work of social theory-conceiving in their most general abstract
morally indefensible and causally dangerous. Although the ideology of form the principles on which one's society runs, and making comparative
Western modernity assumed that it had philosophical implements to judgements about different societies-was an inevitable task for mod-
secure other cultures' dialogic conversion to its superior principles, it ern intellectuals. Bhudev was convinced that Hindu society had to be
had acquired the political power necessary for a monologic imposition subiected to scrutiny by abstract rational principles, but confident that
of transformation according to its own preferred rules. Colonialism it could win such an argument with modern European social philoso-
was not a rational conversation over principles, but an unequal ex- phy. Implicit in his thinking was the idea of the unavoidable centrality
change of power between societies. The trouble with modern Western ofsocial philosophy to the human condition in modernity. To defend
civilization was that it talked about the dialogic persuasion of norms, Hindu society against Western cultural imperialism required social
but actually relied more on the coercion of unanswerable power- theory as much as the modernist argument of assimilation into a single
which must remind us of contemporary parallels.35 homogeneous modern culture ruled from a Western imperial centre.
After close inspection, he rejected the Western proposals of mod- I give more room to an elaboration of Bhudev Mukhopadhyay's
ernity on four fundamental grounds: capitalist modernity depleted thought for several parochial reasons. First, in recent historiography of
the emotional bonds within the family by making them illegitimately Indian intellectual modernity, vernacular reflection has been relatively
neglected in favour of authors who wrote in English. Yet, the ideas of
33 Indeed, the disappointing conclusion of all his sophisticated analysis was
English writers were often derived from strands of reasoning which
netvratik~ha-a wistful 'waiting for leadership'. Bhudev's (1892) conclusion were already powerfully articulated in the odd secrecy of vernacular
was ironically called kartauya-nirnaya-deciding what is to be done. discourse. In some ways, vernacular critical thought was in fact more
j4 His essays begin with a fascinating report o f a conversation with an Irish original and more intransigent towards Western reasoning than what
official of the British bureaucracy, who, after some youthful flirtation with appeared in English.36 Secondly, a discussion of Bhudev shows that
Irish nationalism, joined the service of the empire, and subsumed his Irish
identity into British national&. But Bhudev claimed that this subsump~ion \

was inauthentic, and under conversational provocation 'the fire' ofhis Irhhness 36No serious study has been done on the question of the 'self-translation'
of Gadhi's autobiography, My Experirncnts with Truth, a central text which
flared up again. See Mukhopadhyay 1892: Introduction.
35 It is odd how isomorphic the present situation in Iraq is to the one Bhudev
~ ~ m p o s ine Gujarati
d and translated into English. The English version of
utterly overshadowed the Gujarati original; but some interprerers
described.
64 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 65
Gandhi's startling interventions on the question of modernity and the modernity assumed a different kind of dignity and coherence. The
state had a long indigenous pan-Indian history. major predicament of modern European culture (Gandhi disagreed
with its description as a 'modern ci~ilisation'~') arose from its reversal
of the ideal of restraint, which was a central normative ideal common
IV: The Discourse of Disillusion-Gandhi
to all pre-modern civilizations. For Gandhi the primary principle of
Gandhi's unusually intransigent rejection of modernity's material, human life was restraint, what he would call swarzj-using a theme of
technical, and political attractions made this critical political vision dominant reflection in Indic religions on the government of the self,
internationally known-though originally it simply attracted amused especially sensual desires.38In his thought there was a distinction and
derision from Western sources (Pare1 1997). Gandhi's elaboration of inverse relation between internal and external government. If the
this position (Parekh 1986, Brown 1989) however introduced some individual could govern, restrain, control his self, especially his mater-
crucial disjunctions with Bhudev. Gandhi revoked the two concessions ial desires, he would find contentment and require less external con-
even a historical conservative like Bhudev had made to European trol. The extent of intrusion of the state in the lives of individuals and
modernity--on the crucial questions ofscience and political economy. local communities was directly proportional to their failure to exercise
By doing this he would add a new dimension to the critique. Gandhi self-restraint. If we observe closely, we will find a direct elaboration of
asserted that the central feature of modern Western society was the the Bhudev argument that traditional Indian society was ruledfiom
substitution ofthe traditional principles of moral restraint-in the de- inside, ordered by the operation of internal restraint-only this is now
sires of the individual and in the economic acquisitiveness of society- elaborated by Gandhi into a much more comprehensive and multi-
uis-d-uis the human exploitation of nature by technology. He deployed level doctrine explainingadversitiescommon to modern life. European
the resonant Hindu-Buddhist idea of himsa-violence in a complex, modernity has turned human ideals upside down. Its ideology reinter-
vastly capacious sense-which could extend from jealousy , preted a fulfilling human life as not one in which desires are restrained
against others, to meat-eating, the ill-treatment of animals, aggressive and 'stilled' (a very Indic concept running powerfully through both
behaviour in market society, modern wars which extended the full the Gita and the teachings of the Buddha, the Dhammapada), and
capacity of modern science and technology towards a rationalist pro- through which he can live in solidarity and compassion with others;
ject of destruction against other states and peoples. By outlining the rather, it has turned the abandonment of restraint itself into the ideal
ramifications of this concept Gandhi believed he could bring the entire of human life. Thus, to produce social order it is forced increasingly
architecture of European modernity into a single intelligible theoreti- to depend exclusively on the external powers of the state. As individual
cal grid, and in a manner that would be entirely persuasive to religious- acquisitiveness is encouraged and crosses all traditional restraint, the
minded Indians. He simply appealed innovatively to a concept deeply ordering powers ofthe state have to expand to impose legal prohibitions:
embedded in reformist traditions of Indic religion-in Buddhism,
Jainism, and all versions ofthevaishnava sects. In Gandhi's hands, and
37 When asked by a journalist what he thought of 'Western civilisation',
partly in the works of his friend Rabindranath Tagore, this critique of
Gandhi said 'it would be a good idea'.
38 It must be emphasized that in Gandhi's thought the junction of the two
believe a close textual scrutiny would reveal serious and significant differences morphemes sva and rajproduces a compound with two distinct, but crucially
of emphasis and inflection between the two texts. Exactly parallel to this, interrelated connotations. Swaraj undoubtedly m<ans rule by the self, taking
Tagore wrote in far more compfex ways about nationalism-both Indiamarid this in the direction of political autonomy. However, it crucially means rule
European-in his copious Bengali essays on this theme, than in the simplified over the self as well: for Gandhi, willed acceptance of punishment or suffering
presentation in his English text, Nationalism. Little serious work, however, has is an indispensable instrument for making foreign rule ethically unworkable,
been done on this crucial problem of self-translation. and this brings independence through non-violent non-cooperation.
66 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 67
for Gandhi therefore there was a clear explanatory solution to the social elites. Finally, it was clear to the political and intellectual elites
paradoxical simultaneity of the expansion of liberal ideals of individual that whatever the undesirable associations of the modern state, the
freedom and the inevitable expansion of the powers of the state. It international order was irreversibly an order of states and no national
was a failure of liberal theory not to see the deep connection between group couldexist viablywithout employing this transactively mandatory
these two parallel developments in Western modernity. The more the form of political organization. Historical conservatism therefore
atomistic individual is encouraged by the modern social imaginary to offered a powerful critique and an ineliminable utopia, which bothered,
invade others' interests, the more the state would be called upon troubled, and inconvenienced the irresistible march of the idea of the
to restrain and mediate between them. Finally, the enslavement of the modern state, but eventually could not resist it.
individual to hislher own desires leads necessarily to the enslavement
of societies to their states and ruling mechanisms of an external ins-
V: The Enchantment of the State:
titutional order. This historically conservative theory of the state
The Modernist Political Imaginary
therefore had two defining characteristics: it accepted as ideal the
conventional belief in an order which was divinely given, but rationally No other thinkers in the Indian nationalist tradition could match
intelligible to ordinary human beings, which reduced the function of Gandhi and Tagore in intellectual significance.Yet, paradoxically, the
the state to the merest preservation of that order. Its conception was political imagination of independent India-both of the elite and of
also of a 'minimal' state, but minimal in aradically different sense from subaltern groups-turned decisively in an opposite direction. Their
laissez faire liberalism. This vision questioned the need of the modern ideas were accorded a hollow reverence, while actual political reasoning
state altogether: what it sought was not a minimal version of the mod- fell deeper into an abiding enchantment by the state. Gandhi brought
ern state, but the state minimized in a pre-modern way. independence to India, but it was Nehru-an entirely unrepentant
But Gandhi's theory of 'the government of the self and government . modernist-who obtained the historical opportunity to decide what
of society' failed to answer several questions. His writings implicitly to do with that independence, and how the powers of this newly ac-
acknowledged an idea central toTocqueville's analysis of the European quired sovereigntyshould be used. In any case, there was a contradiction
state. The powers of the modern state were so vast and intrusive that at the heart ofthe Gandhian political project. After all, the Independence
individual defiance to this state was ineffectual. The only form of movement was about the capture of the state, and it was anomalous to
resistance to the power of the modern state was another typically mod- suggest that the state that was captured with such effort should then
ern form of collective agency: the political mass movement. This be reduced to insignificance. Sociologically, the crucial reason for the
was already a fundamental concession to political modernity. Besides, state's triumph in the Indian political imaginary was the manner in
Gandhi's thinking had no simple answer to the question of how to which it captured the imagination ofboth elites and the masses. Even-
practically evict the power of the state from Indian society once British tually, even the conservative elites who initially held back from the
colonialism was removed. His historical conservatism eventually seduction of the state succumbed to it, partly because of the strange
failed due to three reasons. First, the modern form of the state was at- paradox of modern political rationality-for even those who wish to
tractive to modern elites because they saw in it an immense expedient restrict the inroads of the state in society's affairs have to use the state
for the expansion of their own power over society; modern elites were to legislate that prohibition." Our comparisons are usually utterly
not satisfied with segmentary forms of domination: only the media- one-sided-always measuring modern India against the history of
tion of the modern state couldprovide it. Subaltern groups in Indbn modern Europe. IfIndia is comparedwith other societies ofthe South,
society, especially the lower castes and untouchables and, in a different
but parallel movement, worlung class parties, also saw in the modern i 39 From that point of view, it is entirely misleading to liken the limitation
state the only instrumentality which could provide them with some of the state that conservatives desired with the capitalist limitation on state
reasonable chance of emancipation from traditional subordination to interference proposed by neo-liberals.
p,

tL
68 The Tmjectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 69
probably the most striking thing we observe is the depth that the This modernist elite, which assumed power through somewhat
modern idea of the state and its institutional practices have gained in fortuitous circumstances, had an entirely Jacobin conception of the
the political imaginary of ordinary Indian people. ~ t a t e . ~ ~ T h e y uastrongdistinction
sed between the state and the society
The most consistent and eloquent presentation of the modern it governed precisely to view the state as an instrumentality, rather than
statist vision of the future came of course from Jawaharlal Nehru, who as an organic gowth that should reflect society's cultural habits. 43The
consistently represented a different theoretical view inside the national state was conceived in really revolutionary terms-its task was precisely
m ~ v e m e n t . ~Nehru
' considered Gandhi's vision of the quiet, idyllic to drag into a modern age a largely reluctant, conservative society by
Indian village community historically romantic and practically un- directly attacking its unjust and reactionary practices. In his pedagogic
workable. In contrast to Gandhi, he had a vivid and thoroughly mod- version of nationalism, Nehru conceived of the state as a vast, bureau-
ernist political imagination based on the conception of an elective self, cratic instrument of collectively-willed, elite-directed social change,
of an economically atomistic individual who would go out in a life of drawing the sanction for this proposal of radical social transformation
work. His work would be carried out within an open economy in from philosophical readings of history rather than instant support of
which individuals could choose their occupation and emerge from the his people (although during his tenure as prime minister he enjoyed
crippling continuity of hereditary occupations, and a democratic state entirely secure elective majorities). The state's role was particularly cri-
which would confer on its citizens the right to act in a participatory tical in two major areas of reform. First, India's economic backward-
public sphere. In his vision, this state must also accept responsibility ness was attributed to imperialist exploitation, but more strictly to
for the reduction of extreme social and economic inequality, and work the neglect of industrial development under colonial rule. In Nehru's
actively for income redistribution. Emancipation from European con- clever mixtureofMarxist and Fabian political ideals, political sovereignty
trol was essential, because colonialism blocked the realization of true was never secure without serious industrial development, particularly
modernity.41For Gandhi, independence meant the historical oppor- the growth of heavy industries. Continuing dependence o n former
tunity to move out of the forcible imposition of European modernity colonial powers for complex technology and capital goods seemed to
on India; for Nehru, modernity was a universally desirable condition, Nehru to threaten the real core of ~overeignty.~~
but imperialism created a two-speed world in which serious modernity Accordingly, after Independence the Indian state began to expand
in the colonies was either partially realized or perpetually deferred. its economic role frenetically-with serious long-term historical conse-
Colonies required independence precisely because they wanted to q ~ e n c e s . ~ ~ T rNehru
u e , inherited the frameworkofthe British colonial
break out of the systemic imperialist provision of inferior versions of
modern life. Gandhi remained indispensable for Indian nationalism 42 I am using the term Jacobin not in the sense in which it is used in the
during the anti-colonial movement; after freedom, his political imagi- context of French ~oliticalhistory, but to refer to a much broader idea that
nation went into abeyance with apeculiar rapidity. After Independence through the adoption of a new constitution, enforced by the state, modern
the nation-state ignored Gandhi's politics in exchange for a ritual cele- people could achieve something like a 'refoundation' of society, a fundamental
bration of his life and death. overhauling of the basic principles of social co-operarion.
43 To refer to rhe distinction in chapter 1 of J.S. Mill's Consideration of
Representative Government,which exercised a strong influence on the language
40 Nehru himself has offered a frank assessment of his heo ore tical differences of state-making in modern India.
with Gandhi in his Autobiography (1936). 44 For a more detailed exposition ofNehru's arguments on political economy,
4' Nehru did not write a sysFematic treatise on the questions of the srtate see Kaviraj 1 994.
and the economy, but his ideas on these issues were presented with great ex- 45*Thoughthere can be finer periodizations of this process; and the serious
pressive force in a series of essays and speeches in the 1 9 3 0 ~1940s,
, and 1950s. expansion of the state began after 1955, with the start of the Second Five Year
See Nehru 1962. Plan in the next year.
70 The Trajectories of the Indian State O n the Enchantment oj'the State 71
state; but in the next two decades this state changed its character in distributive justice-the state supervised the rapid growth ofa modern
several fundamental respects. First, from a state concerned primarily middle class which, paradoxically, benefited from the expansion of
with political order and tax collection, it turned into avast bureaucratic both the market and the state. This might have accentuated internal
machine striving to affect the functioning of the entire productive inequality, but the absolute size ofthis middle class created asubstantial
economyin twoways. Nehru'sgovernment legislated ahuge framework enclave of contentment with the state's performance. By allowing the
of protective laws that would shield Indian industry from foreign market economy to develop, albeit slowly, and by creating a rapidly
competition, but it also exacted a heavy price by imposing an intricate expanding state sector of the economy which required the expansion
network of rules of bureaucratic approval.46 By using the reformist of a supervising bureaucracy, this state earned the gratitude ofthe new
imaginary of the state, Nehru's government easily established a firm middle classes-the aspiring and confident entrants into this modern
directive control over Indian industries-which was to turn destructive mixed economy. At the same time, the Nehruvian state retained at least
in later decades. Secondly, the Nehruvian state was not content with an ideological commitment to social reform and distributive justice,
merely directing industrial investments of the private sector by public though slow and insubstantial economic growth threw the state in-
economic policy; it decided that the Indian bourgeoisie lacked the creasingly upon the resources ofthe modern elites and slowed the pros-
capital required for establishing large-scale industries and purchasing pect of any serious income redistribution.
advanced technology Starting from slightly experimental moves in the Interestingly, the Nehruvian state also appealed powerfully to the
early years, from the 1956 Second Five Year Plan it rapidly constructed subaltern political imagination. Through the design ofthe new consti-
a large public sector of directly state-run industries. Commonly, ob- tution, it undertook an immense project of social reform, using the
servers emphasize the continuity between the colonial and the Nehru- state as the primary instrument for tearing down the millennia1 in-
vian state; but their discontinuities are at least equally significant. The dignities of the caste system. This caught the imagination of the lower
political history of Asia and Africa is full of examples of states which orders of Indian society in a different but equally potent fashion.
simply inherited colonial bureaucracies, with a tired political imagi- All previous states had accepted defeat in the face of the historical
nation, which could not achieve any significant imaginative integration persistence of the caste order, although the colonial state had begun to
with their peoples. As they moved away from contact with popular provide for limited political representation to the lowest castes. By
aspirations, these states degenerated into personalor military tyrannies, adopting areformist constitutional system, the Nehruvian state declared
or simply crumbled. The Indian state was an exception to this general the 'sovereignty' of the state in decidingsocial principles and legislated
dismal fate. After Independence, the Indian nationalist state the basic rules of the caste system invalid-an unprecedented move
a new, powerful imagination for itselfwhich reconnected it to popular unachieved either by any previous state or by the sporadic efforts of
aspirations, and which allowed the Indian state to continue its suc- religious reformers. By the constirutional abolition of untouchability,
cessful career despite disapproval from both camps in the Cold War. and a system of reservation in three sectors-electoral representation,
There were two crucial factors in this unusual success of a state which government employment, and educational institutions-the inde-
managed to install democracy without conditions of economic pros- pendent state made the first fundamental attack against the normative
perity. The first was the manner in which it captured the imagination legitimacy and institutional power of the caste system. T h e consti-
of the emergent modern elites. Despite its stark and obvious failures tutional initiative on caste eventually yielded two consequences. It is
in various fields-the removal of poverty, the provision of primary now generally accepted that there was a large gap between legal rhetoric
education, achieving respecyable rates of long-term economic growth, and social conduct. The actual ameliorative results of the reservation
policies were very slow, affected a small segment of the lowest castes,
and were consequently seen as largely symbolic-conferring on the
4 V o r an excellent recent discussion of India's political economy, see Chibber
lowest sections of Indian society a ritualistic formal citizenship which
2003. Two earlier studies provide much interesting analysis of Nehru's econo-
mic straregies: Frankel 1978, and Rudolph and Rudolph 1987.
the state could not actually translate into effective redistribution of
t
 The Trajectories of the Indian State O n the Enchantment of the State 73
dignity, not to speak of incomes. But this small segment of the up- unmistakably more vernacular, caste-oriented, and non-Western. The
wardly mobile elite from low castes secured for their communities a movement of democracy in India has become historically peculiar: it
symbolic dignity, a staged equality with other bearers of power in state has become more Indian while it has become more democratic.
institutions. It is remarkable that, despite the formal openness of the From the point of view of comparative political theory, the Indian
competitive market, this did not lower-caste or untouch- case illustrates an interesting point. In modern Indian political life the
able millionaires or business magnates.47Despite all the failings of the central conflict was about two views of the state, represented broadly
state. it produced a real stratum of bureaucrats from the by Gandhi and Nehru. One of them demanded a limitation of the
lowest castes and, eventually, the elective apparatuses of the state also state's powers; the other an unambiguous expansion. Yet, this was not
produced a stratum of important politicians who sat on the central a re-enactment of the European conflict between liberal and socialist
cabinet and ruled large states as chief ministers-one ofthem eventually theory. The limitation that Gandhi wanted was very different from
occupied the post ofpresident ofthe republic. Despite the undoubtedly liberal theory. What Nehruvianism eventually came to represent was
nominal character of this elevation, the process changed the normative also quite distinct from socialism: because the state had little suc-
template of Hindu society. Paradoxically, the slowness of this process cess in its redistributive agenda. Yet it was not a failed socialist state,
and its largely ritualistic character also produced among vast masses of as it is often represented: it succeeded in something else. The correct
the lower castes an indignant sense of urgency in demanding their characterization for this would be a pure 'statism', without a strong
rights. This has expressed itselfin a strange transformation of the basic redistributive expectation. It was literally a poor people's version of the
language of Indian politics-its intriguing turn since the 1970s to- welfare state, which had too little revenue to provide them with normal
wards the vernacular. Electoral politics in India now mainly occurs everyday welfare but came to their rescue via the desperate mitigation
in the vernacular-both in a literal and a symbolic sense. Since the of crises.
late 1970s, ~arliamentary~oliticshas gone through an amazing trans- It has been suggested that 'the Congress system' (Kothari 1970)-
formation-in its personnel and language. During the Nehru period, or what I have more grandly called the Nehruvian state-was based
politics was almost entirely an arena for upper-middle-class politicians upon a consensus. This is misleading if consensus implies different
who were wedded to ideologies like liberalism and socialism, disputing political groups reaching agreement on the same principles. It is more
their claims in chaste English in India's numerous legislative chambers. accurate to say that in the Nehruvian state there was a historic con-
By the late 1970s. they were substantially replaced by politicians from vergence of radically different expectations. The upper classes saw it as
lower social strata, with less or more vernacular education, whose poli- an instrument ofeconon~icgrowth-naturally, primarily for themselves,
tical imaginations and practical preoccupations were startlingly and in the immediate future. Lower strata in Indian society were drawn
different. Western ideologies like liberalism and socialism disappeared to it by the promise of social dignity, an end of he caste system, and
from the language ofpolitical contestation, which acquired a new kind a distant dream ofeconomic redistribution. The two dreams, and their
of intensity and was entirely concerned with the question of dignity divergent justifications, were equally real for the relevant groups to
and resentment against the unacceptable sluggishness of caste eman- repose their faith in the modern nation-state.
cipation." Thus, while politics from the 1970s became undoubted- But, in a certain sense, a distinction between the Congress govern-
ly more participatory, and in that sense democratic, it also became ment and 'the Nehruvian state' is crucial for understanding what is
now happening in Indian politics. 'The C~ngresssystem' fell into
47 A point argued most recFntly in Damodaran 2008. d decay by the 1970s, and Congress' fortunes were revived briefly by
48 This does not mean that the basic principles of liberal and socialist poli- Indira Gandhi through a quite different kind of political system.4"
tics-liberty, equality, justice-lost their significance. Rather they were trans-
lated increasingly into terms that were central to the Indian social system. 4 ' ~ h iis~a contentious issue in rhe interpretation of recent Indian hisrory.
74 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Enchantment of the State 75
By the 1980s, even the restructured system had failed Congress, and is widely regarded as elitist, indifferent, and always carrying a faint
Congress's conception of a pluralist Indian nation was being seriously stench of corruption. It is not the army and the police, the coercive
challenged by an aggressive Hindu nationalism. A subtle and interest- apparatuses, which are dreaded and hated by large parts of the popu-
ing shift has taken place in the imaginative universe of Indian politics lation for being violent and venal. In standard academic discourse, the
through these political changes. All forms of collective belonging- state comprises the army, the bureaucracy, and the government; in
the Hindu community, the secular Indian nation, pluralist Indic Indian popular imagination, it is made strangely distinct from all these
civilization-have come under increasing sceptical criticism. In some institutions. This has made it difficult to read the precise locus ofihis
parts of India's territorial boundaries there are movements of radical ~ o p u l a rconception of the state-it is not to be found in the places
separation from the conventional idea of the Indian union. Since the where we are accustomed to search for it. Yet its distinctive presence as
early 1990s successive Indian governments run by various politi- a powerful regulatory idea is unmistakable. It is implicitly invoked in
cal parties have implemented an expanding programme of economic every demand for justice, equality, dignity, and assistance-because all
liberalization which necessarily wants to shrink the powers and the such demands can be made only in its name; and it is the state's res-
spheres of operation of the state. ponsibility to meet all these expectations. Ordinary Indians see the
operation of this state in many tangible events which could not have
happened without it. The poor, for whom this state should have been
VI: Reading the State the most difficult to discern, see its presence in the way the right to
All these confusing and conflicting aspirations and the inevitable dis- property is put in abeyance when they squat on government land, or
appointments that historical experience has brought along have im- encroach on private property (Chatterjee 2004: ch. I). They see it as
paired the legitimacy of:he state, and done something strange to the the obvious provider of relief after natural calamities such as the earth-
exact location of its image in the political imagination. T h e sense of the quake in Gujarat or the tsunami in South India. They see it as the pro-
state that has survived, despite unexpected historical twists in politics vider of education and as their recourse during extreme distress. What
and the widening effects ofeconomic liberalization, can be clarified by is significant in a narrative of the state is that disadvantaged groups,
a series of negations in popular discourse.50 It is seen as distinct from who often volubly declare their disillusionment with the Indian
governments at the central or the state level, run by the Congress or nation-its offer of common citizenship-and are bitterly resentful of
the BJP, which are generally seen as corrupt, inefficient, and, in cases all incumbent or potential governments, still need something like a
like Gujarat, murderous. It is distinct from the bureaucracy, which strangely disembodied idea of the state to articulate their grievances in
the modern social world.
So the idea of the state has gone through an astonishing trans-
formation. It has cut itselfloose from its attachment to conceptions of
Some scholarssee the state under IndiraGandhi as a continuationofthe Nehru- the nation but has attained a strange apotheosis as the only reposit-
vian state. I believe the differences between Nehru's rule and Indira Gandhi's ory, though elusively present, of people's moral aspirations. All other
were highly significant. normal repositories ofpublic and collective life-governments, bureau-
50 This last section moves away from 'political thought' in the formal
cracies, communities, the nation-have lost some of their legitimacy
sense. Ways of viewing the political world had major theoretical exponents
like Jawaharlal Nehru, or the d&t leader B.R.Ambedkar in the years after in a rising tide of undirected and uncontroHable social aspiration,
Independence. Since the 1970s it is hard to identi@such large-scale positi;ns except for adistant, second-order, spectral, and moral idea of the mod-
in the world of politics in general. The picture presented in this section is a ern state. Its attributes are strangely familiar: it is capable of knowing
composite one drawn primarily from parliamentary discussions, debates in everything, doing everything, removing all obstacles, p~nishin~wrongs,
the political public sphere, and the results of surveys of popular attitudes. showing mercy, averting evil; it is expected to be nearly omniscient and
 O n the Enchantment of the State 77
The Trajectories o f the Indian State
Marks, Shula, and Dagrnar Engels. 1994. Contesting Colonial Hegemony. Lon-
omnipotent. T h e r e is n o e n d i n sight o f Indian society's strange en- don: I.B. Tauris.
chantment with the modern state. Mill, J.S. 1962 [ 186 1). Considerations on Representative Government. In
A.D. Lindsay, ed., Utilitarianism, Liberry, Representative Government.
London: Dent (pp. 175-6).
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 Political Culture in Independent India 79
set out what I take to be Professor Kothari's 'problem', in the form in
which he has constituted it. In the second I present what I take to be
the logic of his 'solution', and state why I find it difficult to agree with
his view. In the third part I agree that there is a fundamental questiop
implicit in his analysis, though, in my view, he does not see it in its cor-
Political Culture rect form. I shall, finally, suggest some ways in which this problem can
be reconstituted; but I do not suggest any firm answer.
in Independent India Both in the critique and the incidental remarks, my preference for
a marxist analysis will, I think, be apparent. I shall suggest however,
An Anti-Romantic View that a theory of the electoral process, as distinct from electoral insti-
tutions and parliamentary democracy, is still a major gap in marxist
political theory.3 Marxists have yet not given systematic attention to
this crucial aspect of political life. Much greater attention is paid to
rofessor Rajni Kothari has offered an excellent account of Indian
more alluring abstractions like state and class power.
politics as we would like it to be, not as it really is.' Indian
society would have been a lot more humane, political life much
less meaningless if what he said were true. The struggle for winning
democracy for India would then have been in the past, and not, as I
Let me state first what I take to be the underlying problem in Professor
believe, in the future. I am afraid what he says, though pleasant, is not
Kothari's argument. I shall take some liberties with his language and
quite the case. In the rest of this essay I shall state why.
present it in a form closer to my concepts. There will therefore be some
problems of shifting an idea across the frontiers of one conceptual
system to another. But this is unavoidable.
This essay is explicitly negative. It sets down some reasons for not At the centre of the Indian political experience, Professor Kothari
considering Professor Kothari's view of ideological structures as the argues, lies the wonder of Indian democracy. It is a wonder in a rigor-
only possible one.' I have stated my case in four parts. In the first I have ous sense. For the establishment of a stable democratic state in India
went against all established laws of political history. Theoretically,
This essay first appeared in Teaching Politics, Delhi, 1979. 1 both classical political scientists and marxists had been sceptical about
'Kothari 1978. Substantially similar to ch. 7 minus the section on ~olitical the success of the democratic experiment in India. Followers of Mill
socialization in Kothari 1970s. One is a little disappointed, since one cannot would have been appalled at the prospect of universal suffrage in a
know how Professor Kothari feels about the alterations, if any, in our political country with an extremely low rate of literacy. Classical marxists too
culture since the early 1970s. From his other work i t appears that he thinks his
'consensual model' is cracking up. Cf. his articles in Seminar and Kothari 1976.
Though democratic institutions were revived after the emergency, the 'con- Most Comintern documents since the late 1920s discounted the possibil-
sensual model', in its strict sense, has hardly survived. Can there be two parties ity of stable democratic post-colonial states in these regions, including India.
that are consensual in the same way in which the earlier Congress was? Is One could sample the analyses of M.N. Roy, Rajni Palme Dutt, and other
Janata a consensual party of the s r n e type? Unfortunately, all such interesting less-known people. There was a similar theoretical akbivalence towards demo-
questions have to be kept in suspension. cntic institutions in communist party documents upto the mid 1950s: an
The ones that Kuhn had called translation problems. These are not exactly interesting mixture of apprehension that it could not last long with the relief
translation problems of the same order. fhpt it was still working. For concrete examples, Sen 1978.
80 The Eajectories o f the Indian State Political Culture in Independent India 81
would have been sceptical about the prospect of bourgeois democracy t o understand how Indian democracy works, a n d t o evaluate its
o n historical grounds. Historically, modern democracies have been prospects.
associated with certain economic conditions. It was only in the coun- I think Professor Kothari's answer can be schematically presented in
\
tries of Western Europe, in the period of expanding colonial control terms of three related formulations:
and uninterrupted capitalist expansion, that liberal democratic political
forms first appeared.4 For roughly the same reasons, it was only in (i) The happily imprecise 'traditional' society of India had a pluralistic
those countries that they acquired historical stability. T h e possible way oflife, particularly in the organization of its culture. Indian unity
objection that such countries as U S o r Sweden were n o t imperialist had been a cultural, not a political, phenomenon. A people that has
practised tolerance (= pluralism) in one field, can also do so in
powers is too formal. Forms of capitalist economic control can be
another. Indians had practised pluralism (= tolerance) for long. True
direct or mediated, explicit o r covert. At least historically, there is a
they had not been pluralistic in their politics. But it is simply a ques-
constant association ofdemocracywith expanding industrial capitalism, tion of transferring the same logic to another field.
preferably reinforced by colonial empires. (ii) Political institutions in post-Independence India are based on plural-
I think the structure of this problem is implicit in m u c h of Professor ism=tolerance. Concretely, this principle involves constitutionally
Kothari's analysis of Indian d e m o ~ r a c yDemocracy
.~ is not seen norm- limited, impersonal powers ofthe politic4 e l ~ eand
, the corresponding
atively as a system that ought t o exist; a n d o n e that can exist if m e n rights of all citizens (tolerance in this sense).
could be logically convinced a n d mobilized t o work for it. Rather, it (iii) A democratic political system based on pluralism and tolerance can
is seen as something that historically seems t o require objective cir- exist in India precisely because it does not go against, but takes the
cumstances for its sustenance.7'he entire interest in a 'theory' of Indian assistance of, our pre-existing cultural tradition.
democracy stems from the fact that here these conditions are n o t pre-
sent; at least not to a n equal degree. So, both from the functionalist a n d
the marxist point ofview, a conventional answer is ruled out. For India,
o n e must look for a n alternative sustaining factor. Professor Kothari Unfortunately, I disagree b o t h with Professor Kothari's description
finds this in the pre-existing pluralist political culture of o u r tradi- and his analysis. There is an initial difficulty about what is exactly
tional society. This is clearly a significant question for anyone trying meant by tradition. 'Traditionalism' is explicit only in a negative sense.6
By a 'traditional society' we mean o n e that is fundamentally different
Liberal states, or their prefigurations, had come into existence in England from a modern, industrial bourgeois society. But a society can be non-
in the seventeenth century; in France, a hundred years later. Liberal-oligarchic modern in many ways. Akbar's India was traditional; so was Asoka's.
government assumed a purer form in the United States, because there it did But they were basedon different principles of organization. W e should,
not encounter feudal resistance. But liberal democratic practices in the strict
therefore, not assume an undifferentiated a n d homogeneous 'tradition'.
sense started only by the middle of the nineteenth century, still later in most
We can then find o u t which aspect o f the present traditional structures
cases. Two long spells of economic expansion of industrial capitalism, 1815-
71 and 1875-1910 helped this to a great extent. is derived from which particular period o f o u r history. T h o u g h I believe
Though it is latent in Kothari's work, it is quite explicit in a lot of other
'behavioralist' literature. This specific argument was used to justi& imperialist 6Apart from the theoretical criticisms that one can advance against the
intervention in the politics of the third world. Since purely endogenous factors term 'modernization', it indicates another interesting problem with a logical
could not sustain democracy, i ~ w a sobviously the responsibility of West- structure similar to that of ethnocentric prejudices':In maps of the world, one
ern democratic states to shore up weaker members of the free world. ina all^, tends to put one's own country at the obvious centre. In thinking about history,
they had to advance from a simple assistance to virtual superintendence. The there is a remarkably similar tendency to regard one's own time as being obvi-
Americans went down this slope in Vietnam. ously 'central' to human experience.
82 The Trajectories of the Indian State Political Culture in Independent India 83
our traditional structures were uniformly repressive, the ingenuity of population of individuals, say a to z, is distributed among these poli-
the ancient and medieval ruling classes cannotbe d o u b t e d . ~ h showed
e~ tical territorial units.
great inventiveness in engineering their repressive system and its moral
code tosuit the requirements ofparticular situations.The social structure
showed a curious mixture of rigidity and elasticity.Through a constant
elasticity of interpretations, the repressive function was kept uniform.
Despite formally rigid rules, the structure was not the same from one Suppose, further, that all these are princely autocratic states, that is,
stage of feudalism to another. When a tradition is merely referred to we imagine them to be as close to the traditional Indian states as pos-
as 'traditional', I find it difficult to understand which specific social sible: a rules P; g rules Q and n rules R. In ruling, that is, taking the
practice is meant-pre-feudal, feudal, medieval, colonial, or any of most significant decisions affecting these units, a never consults b, c,
the numerous discrete forms of feudal society. All such forms do of d, e, f, and so on. How do we characterize the situation? In fact we have
course have some common distinguishing qualities in contrast to chosen an uncharacteristically civilized specimen, because it includes
modern capitalist societies. Still, this mode of reference hides their only political inequality. It could be rendered more realistic and more
specificity and distinct organizational principles. complex by introducing other elements like caste and sex inequality.
My disagreement with Professor Kothari's argument is not only But let us continue with this relatively simpler model. Would we be
methodological. It has to do mainly with his content. Traditional India entitled to characterize thissituation as pluralistic = tolerant = culturally
certainly lacked a stable political centre. No one would disagree with democratic? If I understand Professor Kothari's argument correctly,
him that the Indian sense of identity was primarily cultural. A North he would reply in the affirmative: pluralistic = tolerant, and if not =
Indian and a South Indian may not have lived under the same politi- democratic, at least conducive to democracy in the long run. I, how-
cal regime, or a similar set of laws. Still, they would have regarded ever, do not see quite how.
themselves as having some common identity. This identity must there- Political democracy refers, I think, to a quality of relationships
fore be extra-political. How this happens-why political disintegration existing between the rulers and the ruled. It finds expression in uni-
did not lead to cultural diversification-is a much larger- question.
- But versal consultation, accountability,' majority rule, rights of citizens,
I find it difficult to accept Professor Kothari's implicit argument that and definitive restrictions on the powers of the governors. None of
this represented a case of pluralism; and pluralism of this sort is equal these conditions obtain in our model of traditional society.
to tolerance; and, finally, that pluralism of this kind can function as the The conditions that do exist reveal two equally significant char-
cultural understructure to modern democracy. I do not think what we acteristics. There is a certain pluralism in the sense of existence of
consider pluralism in the context of democratic politics is the same variation. Equally certainly, there is no democracy, and no consci-
thing as pluralism in the context of ancient or medieval India. ous, rational tolerance for other modes of behaviour. The coexistence
certainly, in traditional Indian society there was a large variety of
'Universal consultation is not an abstract constant. Both in democratic
cultural and political forms. We can call that society pluralistic in the
theory and in practice its content is differential. Democratic theory can be
sense that there werenumerous coexistent political units, and sometimes
divided into three clear stages: a liberal-oligarchic, or liberal constitutionalist
a certain variety of lifestyles. But that is simply a registration of vari- stage; a liberal democratic-stage; and an elite-democratic stage. In the first
ation. Indian animal life or plant life also shows great variation. We do stage, the legal principle ofresponsibility of the government to the propertied
not, however, call it pluralism in the sense of democratic tolerance. was explicitly sanctioned. In the second stage the'formal right to participation
Using euphemisms, we can Ferhaps call it a principle of 'mutual Pes- was extended to all citizens. In the third stage, although the general universal
pect'. But let us examine what we mean by this term. right to political participation was not explicitly denied, the meaning of 'par-
Suppose, in a cultural system X, you have political units P, Q, R. A ticipation' was constantly watered down.
84 The Trajectories of the Indian State
Political Culture in Independent India 85
of numerous local communities, which would have liked to impose
general norm) in matters of secondary importance. There were sure-
their ways on others had they the power to do so, cannot be regarded
ly variations in the subcaste systems of different regions. There were
as pluralism = tolerance. It is a pluralism which represents a powerless
differences in the detailed practices of Hindu religious ritual. It is im-
intolerance. Several contiguous and mutually independent autocracies
portant to note these variations for certain types of social science
do not represent a democratic culture. At best, one can argue for
research. An anthropologist, for instance, should not fall into the error
an antecedentfederal tendency in our tradition. But I think the idea
of believing that the active caste system means the uarnas and overlook
that federalism is intrinsically democratic is not self-evident. Federal-
the complexities of the jatis. But, for a political scientist seeking to
ism does ensure greater equality among rulers in a lateral division of
understand the political functioning of the traditional society, I think
powers. It does not ensure that the relations between the rulers and
it is equally dangerous to overstress the plurality ofsubcaste formations;
the ruled within each unit possess a democratic quality. The US is a
for him the more fundamental fact is the unity of their legitimation
democratic state; but I doubt that its democracy is the result of its
function. To give a dramatic example of what I mean: Hindu society
federalism. Historically, I think, one can make a case that the reverse
in south Bengal may have respected the right of north Bengali society
is true. Real democracy emerged in the US after the initial or 'real'
to burn its widows in its own way. North Bengali upper-caste men may
federalism had disappeared as a result of the development of large-scale
have reciprocated by tolerating the pluralistic principle that, when a
industrial capitalism.8 Conversely, the United Arab Emirates, may be
low-caste man was to be punished, scrupulous regard was to be paid
regarded truly federal. But the nation is hardly democratic. 1understand
to local custom. But 1 am sure Professor Kothari would not expect us
the argument that antecedent plural cultural forms made federalism
to regard these as examples of pluralism.9 This, unfortunately makes
necessary for India. But I do not understand how a pluralism which
it all the more difficult for me to understand precisely what he has in
does not involve any theory of consent or responsibility can even re-
mind when he refers to our traditional pluralistic culture. Pluralism in
motely be called democratic, or how it can be an apprenticeship for .. a democratic sense would involve asking the widow and the Harijan
democratic government.
their views on the matter. It is difficult to believe that this was done on
Traditional Indian culture was deeply aristocratic, repressive, and
a large scale in India.
massively violent towards the oppressed. It is of course a remarkable
There can 1think be another argument against this part of Professor
feature of the Indian system that there was rarely a challenge to the
Kothari's case. Democratic tolerance is not based on political ineffective-
repressive system from the lower orders. But this again is not an ex-
ness. When a case is made for political autonomy to individuals or
pression of democracy The fact that the lower orders acquiesce, either
groups, its premise is not that the central government is unable to con-
because they are faced with an overwhelming force, or because there
trol them administratively. You cannot give away what you never had
is an effectivelegitimation system, does not make the system democratic,
in the first place. Professor Kothari's traditional pluralists were most of
though this certainly calls for an explanation of the behaviour of the
the time politicallyineffective.Perhaps historical circumstances imposed
oppressed. The argument of acquiescence is actually rather dangerous.
pluralist behaviour on them. O n the few occasions some of them were
British rule in India was not effectively challenged for a long spell after
able to establish relatively stable empires, they shed their pluralism. A
1857. It had not suddenly become democratic. It represented the peace
similar argument would apply to Hinduism. Certainly, Hindu society
of the graveyard.
did put up with external interference, and developed very interesting
Let us put this argument now in a second form. The Indian tradi-
mechanisms ofsocial and cultural absorption, But here too I think one
tion accepted pluralism (in t b sense of variation, or deviation from a
should not be romantic. Hinduism is not a homogeneous religion. Its
internal structure is marked more by ineffective intolerance, than
For a rare application of the theory of capitalist development to the study
of American politics, and particularly to the unlikely field of judicial behaviour,
Etymologicdly, these variations should be termed plural, or plurality. Ism
cf. Lerner 1958.
e, denotes an element of consciousness that is entirely lacking in this case.
86 The Trajectories of the Indian State Political Culture in Independent India 87
ideological tolerance of a positive kind. This has led to peevishness and existence of Muslims. Some Assamese are not quite reconciled to Ben-
irritation more than mass violence.The early Buddhists, who overrated gali residents in Assam. Members of Parliament from North India
the effectivenessof an ideology oftolerance, had to pay heavily for their consider it rather unreasonable that southerners insist on speaking in
mistake. They were thrown out of the Indian mainland and had to a different language.
- -
look for shelter elsewhere. In this connection I find Professor Kothari's The record of the state has not been encouraging either. The police
mention of Shankara's tolerance puzzling. officer from the upper caste is insufficiently reconciled to the idea
The attitude of tolerance that goes with political democracy does that his victims can now formally claim some rights. In most cases of
not come out of lack of political power. It is a rational and consci- communal rioting and police firing, violence by the state is sought to
ous decision flowing from the idea that even if you do have the power be condoned by the leaders. One can refer to incidents at Pantna-
to impose your way of life on others, you choose not to do so. It is a gar, Aligarh, and the two districts of Andhra Pradesh where the state
different situation from one in which you would like to impose your has not only tolerated violence, its executive wing has actually orga-
will on others but cannot-because you lack the means of doing so. nized it.
I am afraid Professor Kothari does not make adequate conceptual We must therefore keep abstract formulae distinct from the facts of
distinctions between these two meanings of pluralism. Consequently, the political process. Formal rules of democratic government enjoin
he has an incorrect understanding of our culture. He interprets what that there should be equality of rights. Repeating this does not really
I think are the least democratic elements in our culture as democratic help us understand Indian reality. A critical question rarely asked by
elements. This has large implications for political practice. It will lead academics is about the depth of the democratic process. Curiously,
to confusion about the allies and enemies of the democratic process. however, most academic enquiries, while proclaiming an empiricist
epistemology, actually start with definitions. In textbooks, democracy
is defined as a system of equal rights, but in the real world these rights
are not enjoyed equally by all.
Professor Kothari's second general proposition is that today we have a A democratic system is certainly preferable on rational grounds.
political structure based on the principle of pluralist tolerance. This But political decisions ofsocial groups are not always guided by logical
pluralism is revealed in two ways. First, any democratic system is of considerations. They are dictated by interests. Land-owning classes
course based on the abstract principle ofpluralism and bargaining. But in England consistently obstructed the growth of democratic institu-
Indian politics is distinguished by pluralism of another variety. It is tions. The early bourgeoisie also opposed first the inclusion of the
based on a political culture of consensus-a tendency to sort out issues petty bourgeois and then of the proletariat into the political process.
by bargaining, not by forcing issues. Most significant is the fact that Early bourgeois parties fought against any hint of democracy, against
this bargaining is entered into by a party which has no need to so bar- the conversion ofa narrow property-based liberal scheme ofgovernment
gain, because of its overwhelming electoral preponderance. to a universalistic liberal-democratic form. The good bourgeois of
O n the first question, one would agree with Professor Kothari. the eighteenth century would have remonstrated against any suspicion
Democratic government involves a formal equality of treatment and of democratic ideas. The rise of democracy was partly the result of
a strategic historical defeat of the bourgeoisie. Democracy was won
an open system of political articulation. The only problem here would
be to judge how much of this abstract notion is realized in practice. I
in the teeth of bourgeois opposition, wrencbed bit by bit from its
tend to think that the 1ndianFecord has not been particularly impks- clenched fist by bloody mass protests in the streets of London and
sive. Social tensions have not disappeared. Communalism, provincial- Paris. No ruling class is persuaded by arguments to give up its power.
ism, and linguism have used political channels offered them by poli- It would have been surprising had the Indian rural elite given in to
V
democratic assaults on their traditional fortresses without a fight.They
tical democracy to mobilize essentially undemocratic social forces.
Even today, some Hindus in Aligarh find it difficult to tolerate the t did not. The bourgeoisie made it easier for them by opting for a fabian,
88 The 7 r a j e c t 0 ~ 1(IJ'the
~ ~ lrzdi~znSt~ztr,
instead o f a radical bourgeois, strategy o f social change by accepting has s o m c r i m c l x c n talc el^ LIP hy rich hlrnners. -[.he (;ongrcss go\;ern-
a n incomplete bourgeuis transformation of agrarian relations. O n ment's policy o t f a b i a n capit:~lismhas gi\,cn fill1 scope t o t h e rural rich
all accounts, t h c d e ~ l i o c r a t i cprocesses havc n o t yet percolated t o t h e t o manoeuvre thc s i t ~ l a t i o nt o their aJ\.:untagc. '1-hev havc n o t merely
countryside.'" I'hey have c o m e u p against traditional power structures. f l o i ~ t c dthe Ianci ceilillgs. 'l'hcy 11ai.c largel!. chiaped rlne rules o f d e m o -
British rule fortified the undeniocratic o f feudal landed interests c r a ~ i c o n d u c t . L o c ~ government
l instit~irionsare concrolled by those
t h r o u g h land reforms a n d ocher types o f political engineering. C o l o - w h o 0\\~11 I:IIIC~. At the Io\ver Icvcls, there is a s i m p l e a n d visible transiti-
nial intervention reinforced earlier hierarchies in rural societies where vity of e c o n o m i c i n t o political po\l,cr, \\,it11 fe\\r n)ediations. 7.here
they existed. Occasionally, they also created n e w forrns o f inegalitar- are n o screens. Mediations increase a n d bcconle m o r e coniplex as
ian structures. D e m o c r a t i c n o r m s e n c o u n t e r organized resistance o n e moves LIP to\vards t l ~ cstate a n d central governments. B u t even
f r o m chese inrerests. T h i s is because political r e l a t i o r ~ s h i ~ins pre- at t h e i n t e r ~ n c d i a t elevelh-in state cabinets a n d administration, fc)r
independence Indiawere o r g a n i z e d o l ~antithetic principles. Democratic i n s r a ~ ~ c e " - ~ r e s ~ ~from~ r c rhe land lo1)l)ic.s is usually decisive. T h e
processes have t o be established by overcorning rile opposition o f these i n ~ c r w e a v i noftlie
~ economically powerfL1 a n d rhcofficially i m p o r t a n t
interests a n d not, as Professor Kothari suggests, with their help. issyn~biotic,oItcnpersonal. At each remove, the political represenracives
*The rural elite in India has responded t o democracy t!lrough a o f t h i s g r o u p becorne a lirtle m o r e prcse~ltahle,thc connections a littlc
complex strategic mix. O n [he surface, there is an acceptance o f elect- m o r e difficult t o g u e s . Srili, life processes in t h e village are n o t nl tered
oral power as long as it helps legitimize t h e power o f che tradicional f u ~ ~ d a n i e n c a l l yMurders
. o f rccalcirrant peasants, the b u r n i n g cIo\\rn
elite. T h e rural elite has bent, m o r e o r less successfully, i n s ~ i t u t i o n so f of l o w ~ ~ r - ~ ae1\\.clli1ngs,
stc r;ipeh, cvcry ti)(-111of \ ' i o l , ~ t oi ~f ~l ~l u ~ ~ ~ a ~ ~ i
formal democracy t o t h e service ofcxisting power structures. 1:ormerly \vhich is p.ut oi':~fclldnl a11c111ot a I ) o ~ ~ r g c ol,olitical
is or-der, arc all daily
the village cyrant h a d a patcrnalisric claim t o a ~ ~ t h o r i t N y .o w h e wins OCcUI-I-cI~cC.
elections. T h e ~ n o m e nelectoral
t channels threaten existing hierarchies, C i t y ~ ~ e w s l ) ~ p I~CC-o~lcilcd
crs, n c ~~ lI :I ~
to thc,sc ~ i ~ ~ t >~l ~~ cr~in ~o ~l ~give L L, I ~ I
they are resisted w i t h fbrcc. I n case there is a possibility o f chose lower littlc artcnrion, o r hirnpl!. a n d misleaciinglv cl;~\silj.rhcm '1s 'cri~ncs'."
d o w n the I~ierarchy~ v i r l n i n gt h e elections, there are eicher n o e l e c t i o ~ ~ s
or, in extreme cases, chere arc n o candidates left t o contest t h e m . I I TIlc prr~sonnclL)I- rhc.sc b u r c ; ~ ~ r i r ~ ~. IcIi-c~d~r \, ~ \ \ nine.r.c;~$in~ly
fron) ~hc.
O t h e r shifts havc also occurred, hhif'rs t h a t are subtler a n d easier r o rich pc.as.lnc. I;rsr-srncr;~rio~l cd~rc:~r~cl 5rr;lr;l. .~nno~rncin:rhc ;II-riv.11 o l rhc,
neglect in a r ~ a l ~ s iTs .h e composition o f the rural elite has changed eci)nornic;~lly~ O W ~ T I I I Ii11to [hc p r ~ , c i ~ ~OF( c [ bL I I ~ L I I . ~ I Ipri\ ilcgc 'IIKI I ~ I I - I I I : I ~ po\vcr.
since t h e colonial days. 'The place offeudal landlords a n d moneylenders 1'111shas changcci l i l t . iha1.1c~riof rhc ccil~carii)r~,ll proccss. 'I hcrc srrard h,lvc ; I
frank ix)wer or~cn~arion co\\;~r~ls c d ~ i c ~ ~ r icmphai/ingon, rllc ~lrgrcci\,hich
"'
Ordinsir). behaviour~liscsarc nor usually borhcred by such uncienrific Iegitirni/.c, [heir .l.\\urnprio~~ ot' ioi~br h , ~[Ire! ~ ccur-c >I! \oci,~lp r w u r c a r ~ d
obscaclcs in [he r~o:lci ro science. O n e cannot posc a quchtionnairc co people connccriori\. 'l'hc!- .II? .Ipr L O look u p o n ~ h cold-t:~shior~cd Rrirish-rl-;~irlcc],
on rhc balance of liberty and tcrl-or in chc \.illage. I n any tax no 'community ra~ion~llisric cmt)l~.~sis o n skills . ~ n kno\\lcdgc ~l \virh conrcmpr. In the colo11i.11
lcader' is guirig co answer qucstionc on how many f-iarijnns he has prc.vcr~t- period chc.sc f~rrcrion.~ric.s \\c:-c s~~pk)licd ro .In irnpcriali\,~loi.clcrkship\ from
ed from voting. So we norn1,lll work o n chc asbumption char all is well. AII Rengal. Ron~ha):and hlatirn5. ?'hr new f;~i~criorr;lrio ,Ire sorncrirncs morr rr-

extreme example was an elecror~lscudy which sought to prove that the 1971 pressive than their predcccsors. 'The c;irlic~r- gl-oup\ of offici,ll\ \\ere n o r imnlc-
elections in West Bengal were 'frw and fair'. One can perh'lps ignore such diarely involved in tht. local social contlicrs. Tliis is no ;lpology for ~11~. ti,rmcr
casrs because [he motives insP irin b rhe study were probably more directly official. Only, rhc new tyrancb .Ire 1lal.dly bcrrc,r.
polirical chan political-scienrific. H t ~ this
t i, part of [he epistemological pfiadox " In Indiari siriii.r) anti i r h press one i5 immcdi.ircli. struck;!,I [ire dilli.rcriti;~l

of bet~aviouralelection studies. Question5 char are arnenable ro its procedures rrcek?cion ofcri~ncs.(:rirllc . ~ g , ~ icl~ilil~-cr~ ~ ~ s r or atitrlcccnr\ o l ' ~ h uly)c~- c miclillc
class creacc a n il~sranrscns,~rion--~~i~ ~ I I \ ~ L L I I - ~ ;[ I, VI I I~K \ , L I I ~ , O I I ~111or1g ~11.rict11~rc
are crivial-ic arnounrs to a later~rchcory of rhc incvicabiliry of'trivializarion of
poliric,~lscudies. ciry d\\.cllcrs. Si111il:irC I ~ I I I . ~~ ~\ . ~ i r i iLl JhiIiir.cn
r otIc\\ / ; ~ - L L I I \.~I.~riccI I . I ~ C ~pi~~citts
~.
90 The Ttajectories of the Indian State Political Culture in Independent India
In fact, to deserve the attention of the cultured city, the brutality has unfortunately, never gets more complex. No one denies that there is
to be monumental. Only a Pantnagar, or Belchhi, or Aligarh ruffles some bargaining. But the notion that all groups come into the market-
the placid conscience of the city, and the democratic citizen tolerates place with an initial equality of resources or leverage is simply mis-
its interference with his morning coffee for just a few days. Usually, leading.
there is a ceremonial elegy from the city, little sustained action.The city Professor Kothari also uses the term consensual model to denote a
apparently feels good at proving to itself that it has a conscience. It specific way of handling conflicts. According to him, Indian ruling
is very rarely realized that violence is a continuum. Small and big groups have shown an unwillingness to settle matters by a showdown.
violence are organically related. Every act of violence that you tolerate They have settled conflicts before these could turn into deep cleavages.
without protest, because it is remote from you, brings it a step closer Certainly, under specific conditions, ruling groups in India did not
to your doorstep. It is because small violence is tolerated that big viol- take matters to a breaking point.13 In others, however, they have. I
ence is rendered possible. shall argue that there is a certain logic in the distinction between these
Democracy consequently has become a commodity that can be had two types of situations. Those conditions which encouraged them to
in urban housing areas with a middle-class income. This has happened be tolerant are therefore important. Take the politics ofthe Constituent
not because Indians cannot run democracy; but because of the survi- Assembly.The composition ofthe assembly surprised even sonie Cong-
val of feudal elements in the superstructures. Our ~oliticalculture ressmen. Several extreme conservative politicians, who had collaborat-
not only permits ruling-class violence, it reconciles its victims of the ed with the British and had consistently opposed Congress agitations,
naturalness and inevitability of this treatment. were beneficiaries of the consensual largeheartedness of the Congress
leaders. Representatives offeudal interests were also made members of
the a~sernbly.'~ Not surprisingly, the work ofthe Constituent Assembly
,. was full ofwrangles. And it turned out a document that was somewhat
Professor Kothari also believes that Indian democratic politics has different from the programmes which Congress had placed before the
followed a consensual style with unlimited opportunity for bargaining people. It was considerably less radical. The tussles were no mere legal
over ~oliticaldemands. I both agree with him, and do not. It depends quibbles. They reflected a conflict between those who, na'ively, wanted
on what exactly we mean by this consensus and how we define its to carry forward the programmes of the Congress, and those others
limits. In all democratic forms, there is a market-like operation ofpoli- who, realistically,wanted to back out of them towards a more regressive
tical forces. However, the significant claim is not in the market-like social compromise. There were also those who thought that this oppor-
nature of political transactions, but in the unstated assumption that tunity could be used to fling the Congress back on to a fully feudal or
this market is perfectly competitive. And it must be kept in view that fully nineteenth century bourgeois social programme. In the event, the
Professor Kothari's use of the perfect competition assumption is not a Constituent Assembly sanctified a non-aggression pact between the
simplifying device for the early stages of the argument, which could bourgeois and the feudal interests This was curious. For, the landed
be dropped when the argument gets more complex. The argument, aristocracy had tried to ensure that the occasion for such independent
constitution-making did not arise. Princes, who had an unblemished
record of collaboration with colonial authorities, were given generous
are taken with equanimity and make three-line items on the fourth page. \

Criminals may violate legal code: but they often instinctively abide by the l 3 As Kothari admits elsewhere, this does not apply to Mrs Gandhi's treat-
social codes of a social form. What is remarkable in this contrast is the fact ment of the opposition between 1974 and 1977; nor to Janata's treatment of
that the revulsion of the city middle class is not against the crime as a violation Mrs Gandhi since then. Kothari 1976:passim.
of humanity, but against the violation of its own security as a chs. l 4 Cf. Kothari 1970:passim,specifically 106.
 The Trajectories of the Indian State Political Culture in Independent India 93
92
prize for obstructing national freedom. Communists were punished
terms.15 The colonial bureaucracy, instead of being attacked or dis-
because they tried to take it too far. The Congress surely followed a
mantled, was given a key role in the new set-up. T h e government was
policy of consensus, but a limited consensus accommodating certain
not so considerate in other cases. An example is the treatment meted
groups at the expense of others.
out to radical forces. In Telengana it not only crushed a c o m m u ~ i s t
It is in this sense that a consensus both did exist and did not. This
insurgency, it also took away from the rebellious peasantry the purely
is not a literary paradox. To claim an unqualified consensus, as Kothari
anti-feudal gains ~ f t h e l a n d s t r u ~ ~Later,
l e . ' ~it tried toworkacounter-
does, is to exhibit a highly selective memory. Ifwe mean by consensus
feit land reform through the Bhoodan and Gramdan movements,
the rapprochement between feudal elements and the rising bourgeoisie,
outflanking the militant landstruggles.These two instances-generosity
then the Indian model was certainly consensual. Whereas Marxists
to pro-colonial princes, and harshness to the radical peasantry-have
call it the bourgeois-feudal coalition, Professor Kothari calls it a con-
been taken from the same period.
sensual model.
The tolerance of the state had clear and specific limits. It was orga-
O f course, all bourgeois democracies show internal unevenness.'$
nized around a definite principle. After Independence, because it felt
Britain has Northern Ireland, the US had Detroit. And these uneven-
weak and apprehensive, the Congress leadership gradually evolved
nesses are not static, they shift according to the historical situa-
a strategy of coalition of all owning classes." Thus, the feudals got a
tion. Infringements of formal democratic rules become more serious
in periods of economic stress. There are, therefore, specific limits to
' 5 This was astonishing in the context ofearlier declaration of the Congress.
democracy. Geographically, democratic rules d o not extend much
The non-aggression pact between the feudals and the bourgeoisie was a definite
retrogression from its earlier programmatic vision; programmes since Karachi
beyond the cities. Marxreferred to French democracy in the nineteenth
had led people to expect better things. The radicalism of the Congress was century as a system of freedom in the general sense, but its abrogation
declining in exact proportion as independence drew nearer. Some believe , in the margins.'' We can similarly characterize Indian democracy as a
that the compromise with feudal elements was due to Congress nervousness system of freedom in the city, and violation in the outskirts. Secondly,
on assumption of power. However, even after Congress power was evidently
consolidated, it showed no urgency in attacking feudal structures-proving
rhat this was a policy, not a tactical retreat. Eventually, this offered Mrs Gandhi
The revolution thus moves in a descending line. It finds itself in this state of
a gratuitous opportunity to claim radical legitimacy by liquidating these
retrogressive motion . . .'There is also an interesting supporting argument on
ridiculous anachronisms.
'' For a detailed historical account, see Sundarayya 1972.
why the bourgeoisie may prefer 'impure' forms of its rule in certain contexts:
'instinct taught them that the republic, true enough, makes their political rule
l 7 In a crucial passage, Marx (1975) makes a distinction between two types
complete, but at the same time undermines its social foundation, since they
of revolutions, one following an ascending line, the other a descending one:
must now confront the subjugated classes and contend against them without
'In the first French revolution the rule of the constitutionalists is followed
mediation. . . It was a feeling of weakness that caused them to recoil from
by the rule of the Girondists and the rule of the Girondists by the rule of the
the pure conditions of their own class rule and to yearn for the former more
Jacobins. Each of these parties relies on the more progressive party for support.
incomplete, more undeveloped, and precisely on that account the less danger-
As soon as it has brought the revolution far enough to be unable to follow it
ous forms of this rule.'
further, still less to go ahead of it, it is thrust aside by its bolder ally that stands
l a I consider this an advantage of the marxist analytical framework. It does
behind it and sent to the guillotine. The revolution thus moves along an as-
not fetishize into absolutes characteristics rhat are hi~oricallyrelative. Me need
cending line . . . It is the reversepith the revolution of 1848 . . . Each party
not expect that a democratic form is uniformly democratic in all its parts or
kicks from behind at that driving forward and leans over towards the p & y
over time.
which presses backwards. No wonder that in this ridiculous posture it loses its
Marx 1975: 409.
balance, and having made the inevitable grimaces collapses with curious capers.
94 The Trajectories of the Indian State Political Culture in Independent India 95
this system does not extend m u c h beyond the middle classes, especially for bargaining with government agencies. Businessmen, farmers, a n d
in the countryside. Within these limits, the laws of accommodation, provincial a n d linguistic troublemakers are as a rule heard with pa-
tolerance, a n d o f n o t taking conflicts t o a rupture, all apply. tience. O n e can in fact establish a certain hierarchy of governmental
Conversely, there are clear limits t o the tolerance of the system. T h e response-from tenderness and understanding to irritation t o offence-
borders o f this placid state within a state are marked in blood. Those as one moves down the scale from organized business through 'kisans'
w h o operate the system, specially at the grassroots, see a n d respect t o lowly government employees. W i t h still lower interests, like rail-
these limits. T h i s is reflected in the helplessness of the Block Deve- way workers, the answer is what happened in 1951,21o r 1974,22 or
lopment Officer ( B D O ) in the face of feudal authoritarianism. Young ~antnagar.~%overnents making undemocratic a n d unpluralist de-
bureaucrats are quickly persuaded o u t o f their idealism. T h e y not only mands are as a rule tolerated, their demands conceded, o r their leaders
gradually accept these terms, they also begin rationalizing them. T h i s purchased off by other means. These movements can be accommo-
is a specific result of the feudal-bourgeois compromise. This dual sys- dated because what they demand is the redistribution of surplus a n d
tem operates at its best during elections, when politicians, journalists, privilege a m o n g the ruling elements. If these sacred boundaries are
a n d even political scientists come t o the village from the democratic transgressed, even a government dominated by aged vegetarians can
world. It works at its worst when local people start taking their rights find enough reserves of violence t o suppress them. Both the Janata a n d
seriously, a n d expect the state t o enforce t h e m a n d disobey traditional the Congress have fought heroically against undemocratic demands,
tyrannies. In such cases the usual reminder about the limits of toler- such as a higher pay for workers o r a n agricultural wage.
ance takes the form of a Kilavenmani o r Belchhi. A n event of this kind Finally, Professor Kothari shows a symmetry between India's past
is followed by an advertised h u n t for the major accused, followed by a n d its present. H e believes that we have been able t o create a tolerable
a quiet commutation of sentences a n d speedy r e h a b i l i t a t i ~ n . ~ ' form of democracy precisely because we have been fortunate with
Bargaining is n o t for everyone. O n l y certain types of interest groups
can participate in it. Business interests have institutionalized channels 21 1951 is for the benefit of those who argue that 'Nehru would not have
done this.' By the early 1950s he had sufficiently recovered from his youth-
20 The normal sequence can be as follows: an event, its denial by officials; ful fabianism to order exemplary punishment for railway workers. By the late
its use by unprincipled opposition (Congress people disconsolate over Belchhi; 1950s he had sufficiently recovered from an idealist parliamentarianism to
Janata people similarly over Andhra repression or the Rajan case-hence oppor- dislodge the Kerala government by nonelectoral means. The JP movement
tunistic); a thickening trickle of news gathered by persevering newsmen; used against Mrs Gandhi a weapon thar she had used against Namboodiripad.
admission by government thar the event had taken place, though of course She therefore had little grounds for complaining. You cannot expect people
blown out of proportion by the press; newspaper leads and ceremonial elegies; not to do to you what you have done to others. Between these, of course,
letters by intellectuals (important names and forty others-undemocratic to democratic norms are weakened.
the smallest detail); if excessively provoked, a public meeting and resolutions 22 The massive violence against railway workers was occasioned by their

followed by a satisfied retreat into untroubled daily life; elsewhere, the return unreasonable claim that the government must honour a prior pledge about
of the criminals to their villages; the dropping of cases for lack of evidence or wages.
mediation, a quick return of the momentarily famous village to the solid struc- 23 Pantnagar is for the benefit of those who would assure us, after Janata's
tures of repressive relations-if anything, with greater arrogance from the assumption of office, that we are going to live happily ever after in automatic
criminals because they have shown that they can 'get away with it'; occasional- democracy Janata's record in its short rule is no less distinguished. An Aligarh
ly, a grant of a few hundred rupes to the widows of the victim-whichdoes for a Turkrnan Gate; a Pantnagar for a Muzaffarnagar. Typically, top govern-
greater service to the minister's public image than to the family's budget. And, ment leaders-who are vegetarians for fear of causing pain to living things-
ofcourse, total silence by All India Radio over such crimes in both its shackled did not care to visit the place. On unofficial reckoning, the number of casualties
and its free incarnations. exceeded a hundred.
 -
96 The Trajectoric.~of the Indian State Political Culture in Independent India 97
a proto-democratic culture earlier, because we have been trained in xwes he same epistemic assumptions, the same rules of closure, the
tolerance, as it were, for ages. Only it was tolerance in a different field. a e framework ofconcepts and general theory. Still, there is a differ-
It has only to be transferred to the field of politics. in the way he uses it. He uses it to develop an argument that is
I too believe that there is a symmetry. But it is a symmetry between jipifiantly different from the ethnocentric, ahistorical, patronizing
our earlier hierarchies, pervaded by a one-way violence of the rul- d t i o n - m o d e r n i t y theories. In these theories the complexity of hist-
ing class, and our present democracy with its tensions and tolerated dd ans sit ion takes on a fairytale black-and-white character. It
violence. It exists, I think, precisely because of our earlier political a misleading replication of the development in Europe over
culture-because we have been trained to take intolerance for granted. &e,j7th-19th centuries. Against this simple theory, Kothari has argued
Our political culture was repressive. It still is. In that sense, tradition 1-
more complex and continuous relationship. Traditional factors,
has been modernized. in his view, support and sustain modern democratic norms. It is es-
a theory of an alternative base for democratic superstructures.
,, ,.The analytic problem is to explain how a democratic system can
-on even when what are considered to be its preconditions are
Despite these fundamental disagreements I think Professor Kothari b t . Kothari tries to rescue the functionalist-behaviouralist theory
raises a serious question. It is aquestion that is raised both by the marx- &nn this difficulty. Even if we find his arguments unsatisfactory, the
ist and behavioural problernatiques, though, naturally, they would tpnblem remains with us.
formulate it quite differently. Modern Western political theory accepts
that colonialism and uninterrupted capitalist growth were necessary
VII
conditions for the gowth of early democratic states in Europe. None
of these conditions are present in third world states. Most Western ,- ,Si& marxists are accused of indulging in rhetoric, I shall try to live
observers therefore despair of the prospects of democracy in these yp to this reputation. My disagreement with Professor Kothari is not
states. However, they quickly overcame this despair because the West -the level of analysis alone. I do not accept the way he looks at facts.
was able and willing to supply these conditions artificially, in the form -use we take different methodological ~ a t h s we
, formulate our
of aid. It was not really a question of protecting a free world, but of questions differently. What do we make of events like the repression
creating one. This is particularly ironic. Western analysts usually ac- &I Telangana in 1949-50, the handling of the 1951 railway strike, re-
cusecommunists ~fexportin~revolution. But the typical precondition 9rkssion of the food movements in the 1960s, the 1962 Emergency
for communism-widespread poverty and degradation-are indigen- ak9t 5reserved especially for communists, the Emergency of 1975,
ously produced. However, the preconditions for bourgeois democratic d the repressions of the Janata ~ e r i o d For
? Professor Kothari these
politics-consistent secular growth and uninterrupted prosperity- cases in which our ~oliticalculture failed. For me, they were the
cannot be indigenously produced. They have to be supplied from d t of the imperfect institutions of our democracy.
outside. The Western theory ofdemocracy in the third world, or what 1 I.' There is a deep contradiction in Indian political life between the
they hopefully called 'political development', amounted to an export U t i o n d logic of repression and the democratic logic of
of bourgeois politics by first exporting its preconditions. h e e n the idea of differential rights for various classes and the idea
This shows a certain originality in Professor Kothari's position. *huality before law'. Professor Kothari puts this contradiction in
Unfortunately, this also brihgs out its intrinsic utopianism. Hchas a ~ l o w r e l i eThe
t historic question is how this contradiction is going
complex relation with functionalism and theories of political develop- - *krcs~lved. Will the logic of traditional society prevail ove; the new
ment. Epistemologically, he is within the functionalist tradition. He 5 Wad form? O r will the political form transform society? There
6
98 The Trajectories of the Indian State Political Culture in Independent India
is a third, more complex and untidy, possibility. There can be a long References
coexistence of partial democracy and its negation through the non-
aggression pact earlier mentioned. In cities, the logic of democracy Kothari, Rajni. 1970. Politics irr India. New Delhi: Orient Longman.
. 1976. The Democratic Polity and Social Change in India. New Delhi:
aided by industrialization may transform feudal practices, or send
Allied.
them into hiding. But in the vast rural sector the reverse process seems
. 1978. Political Culture in Post-Independent India. Lead Paper,
to operate. Through the modalities of what Professor Kothari has Panel 11, Indian Political Science Association Conference, Patiala.
called vote banks based on traditional loyalties, feudal power relations Lerner, Max. 1958. The Supreme Court and American Capitalism. In Robert
have forced democratic forms to come to terms with it, to express its McCloskey, ed. Essays in Constitutional History. New York: Alfred Knopf.
logic in a different idiom, to dilute the effectiveness of participatory Marx, Karl. (1852) 1975. Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon. In Marx,
rights, and render them purely formal. Selected Works, Vobme I. Moscow.
Professor Kothari's argument contains a double romaticization: a Sen, Mohit. 1978. Documents of the History of the CPI. Delhi: People's
symmetry between a romanticized past and a romanticized present, a Publishing House, vol. 8.
past that never was flowing into a present, that does not exist. Our past Sundarayya, I? 1972. The Telengana People? Armed Struggle and its Lessons.
cannot fit his description, unless we define the term pluralism the way Calcutta: National Book Agency.
he does. Our present is not the way he describes it either. A politi-
cal system that is wide open, based on perfect competition, unlimited
bargaining, with its leaders eager to reach an unqualified consensus,
would leave little room for discontent. The reality is different. Every
time the economy is under strain, this consensus is destroyed. The
regularity of our political crises can hardly be missed-1 957-8, 1967,
1974-5, and once again in 1977. These were managed with varying
degrees of success.The Emergency brought out one interesting feature
of the political system-the ease with which our democratic structures
can be dismantled. Authoritarianism was overthrown by its own mis-
take, it collapsed because it gave the indignant peasantry a chance to
use the electoral weapon. It was the last peasant revolt in North India.
It showed all its characteristics-the suddenness of the explosion when
everything seemed still; the shock, the abruptness, the finality of the
peasant strike; 1977 was historic. But it shared the usual fate of peasant
revolts. Other sections of society ran away with the benefits of politi-
cal change. It did not change village life in rural India. The electoral
process helps in converting private dissent into formal assent. The
system is rejected in such a way that it is further strengthened. This is
why massive mandates are brittle, for they are votes against not for
something. 'L -
O n ethical grounds, I have no disagreement with him. I prefer the
condition he has described to the one I have. I think his reading of our
politics is wrong. I wish he were right.
 The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 101
reducible to them. For, in the growth ofalate capitalism like the Indian
one, the social form of capitalism itself realizes that the state is a hist-
orical precondition for much of its economic endeavours and for its
political security. Paradoxically, this state, which seemed remarkably
stable and legitimate when Indian capitalism was relatively weak, has
The Passive Revolution come into an increasingly serious crisis with the greater entrenchment
and India: A Critique of the social form.?
Attempted critiques of the Indian polity, to be convincing, must
attempt to do the three things I mentioned earlier: they must try to plot
the simple narrative line ofthis crisis, i.e. provide a structure to the sim-
ple flow of political events. This is to be taken seriously as a narrative.
Stories told of the same thing by various reporters differ: similarly, dif-

T he story of Indian politics can be told in two quite different

ways, through two alternative but mutually reinforcing construc-
tions. The task of a proper Marxist analysis of Indian politics
is to construct internally consistent accounts ofour political history in
these two ways, and to then provide a more theoretical enterprise
ferent types of narratives would differ as to where the ruptures lie,
where the continuities, how much significance to accord to which
incident, e t ~This
. ~ kind of thing could be called an event-to-event
line of causality. But this simpler narrative account must also reveal a
deeper causal profile related to a structural causal field:' it must show
which involves making these consistent with each other. One of these fundamental structural incompatibilities which have expressed them-
two narratives would tell the story ofstructures (if structures are things selves through these upheavals. This could be called a sttucture-to-
about which stories can be told).' This would be a story of the rise of event causal line. In this essay I try to show the kind of political model
capitalism, the specificities of transition, the formation and matura- that might work in the structural analysis of Indian politics; but also
tion of classes, the internal balance and architecture of the social form, that it is inadequate in two ways. First, the model itself is sketchy; and
the making and breaking of class coalitions, etc. Such things take long second, I have not worked out how the narrative can be fitted on to the
periods to happen, and occur through slow glacial movements. The workings of the model adequately. I believe optimistically that such a
second story would have to be constructed in terms of actual political model has better chances ofsuccess than the earlier, more wooden ones
actors, suspending the question of more fundamental causalities for generally in use.
the time being; it must be told in terms ofgovernments, parties, tactics,
leaders, political movements, and similar contingent but itteplace- Some modernization theorists do note this paradox, but they would give -
able elements of political narratives. This second story-the narrative it a bland historical solution by asserting that in the earlier stages the state had
of the Indian state-would be related to the successes (in its own to cope with much lower levels of political 'demand'. Present difficulties of
terms) of Indian capitalism and its failures, but would not be entirely the state arise from the fact that these demands have multiplied through greater
mobilization but the state's resources for coping with them-its 'supports'-
have remained static. This indefensibly marginalizes the question of economic
First presented at the Indo-Soviet seminar on 'The Indian Revolution' in development, and is indifferent to the enormous growth of state resources
Leningrad, 14-17 August 1987. and its deliberate creation of a network of advantse distribution.
'There is a theory which holds that structures are constructs of such a kind In the periodizacion of Indian politics, Rajni Kothari, for instance, saw
that they deflect and obstruct historical reflection. O n this untenable idea the break with the Nehruvian system as coming in 1975. O n my reading, chis
there is an impressive body of literature, the most well known and long-winded rupture is a much more slow-moving affair, and begins much earlier.
being E.P. Thompson 1978. * J.L. Mackie 1975.
 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution a n d lndia: A Critique

Long-term structural compulsions o n Indian politics, the choices complex, historically inclined, identificati~n.~To translate his colourful
of both the ruling bloc of propertied classes and the norch chest rated metaphor is not altogether easy-what does the simile ofa predominant
subaltern classes, arise in several well-known ways: (i) inclusion of the light mean in precise economic terms?-but it would be generally
Indian economy in the capitalist international market and its divi- accepted that the capitalist form predominates in terms ofcontrolling
sion of labour; (ii) the received structure of colonial economic retar- the economic trends of the totality of the social form. Capitalist logic
dation; and (iii) the fundamental choice exercised by the leadership dominates and gives the general title to the economy through its ability
of the new Indian state in favour of a capitalist strategy of economic to reproduce itself on an expanded scale, set the tone and the targets
g o w t h through a set ofbasic legal and institutional forms, e.g. the for- for the economy as a whole, and therefore to determine the historical
mat of legal rights in the constitution, the set of ordinary laws ruling logic of the totality of the social formation. Although there are obvi-
economic and corporate behaviour, the enactment of industrial policy ously other sectors and types of production in the Indian economy,
and other similar initiatives. This was, in a historical sense, a choice their reproduction has been subsumed, both economically and poli-
which obviously structures all other choices. These structures and tically, under the logic of reproduction of capital. It is the second part
their internal evolution have received a great deal of analytic atten- of this nexus which ought to be of special attention in an analysis of
tion from Marxist economists. For an analysis of the state, we have the Indian state.
to assume some well-known Marxist propositions o n the nature of In countries like India the process of reproduction of capital de-
India'scapitalist development. Thesocial formation in India is general- pends crucially on the state. Although the state-capital connection
ly characterized as a late, backward, post-colonial capitalism,5 which has been extensively studied in empirical economic terms, surpris-
functionally uses various enclaves of pre-capitalist productive forms.6 ingly little theoretical use has been made of this in the study of the
Politically, however, it would be wrong to assimilate the Indian capi- Indian state. Still, some minimal generalizations can be made as start-
talist experience into either the model of late-backward European ing points of apoliticalenquiry. T h e state in India is a bourgeois state
capitalism of the Russian kind,7 or into a lower late-backward form in in at least three, mutually supportive, senses. ( I ) When we say that a
which the imminent collapse of an immature capitalism makes the state is 'bourgeois' this refers, in some way (though this particular way
possibility of a socialist revolution real is ti^.^ Although much of the can be very different in various historically concrete cases),'' to a state
Indian countryside still shows the persistence of semi-feudal forms of of dominance enjoyed by the capitalist class, or a coalition of classes
exploitation, one can make a case for a characterization of the social dominated by the bourgeoisie. (2) T h e state form is bourgeois in the
form as capitalism, for the judgement involved in such things is not a sense in which we speak ofthe parliamentary democratic form as being
matter of a simple statistical or spatial predominance. Marx had, in historically a bourgeois form of government. This is not just a matter
a famous passage in Grundrisse, provided a methodological injunc- of registering that such forms historically arose during the period of
tion about how to characterize such transitional economies through a rising capitalism in Europe and spread out through a process of cultu-
ral diffusion. Rather, the Marxist view would posit astronger, structural
However, I do not find the theoretical positions worked out by Harnza connection between bourgeois hegemony (or domination) and this
Alavi about the post-colonial state persuasive in the Indian case. form o f t h e state." It arranges a disbursing ofadvantages in a particu-
6 This is contrary to the traditional linear belief that pre-capitalism is in lar way; and the democratic mechanism works as a usefully sensitive
general (in this case, taken to mean in every instance) dysfunctional to capitalist
\
growth and would be liquidated historically. rn
7 Of the kind analysed by Lenin in his theory of the Russian revolution. Karl Man 1973: 106-7.
l o For instance, the different political trajectories analysed by Gramsci in
Such differences are clearly marked in Lenin's discussions of the colonial
question. the Prison Notebooks, especially discussions of the passive revolution.
Of the type exemplified by China in the Cornintern debates from the " The sense in which Marx said that it is the democratic form which suits
fourth to the sixth Congresses. the capitalist mode most properly.
104 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 105
political index as to when the distribution of disadvantages, which is decisive core is surrounded by looser reformistic advisory clauses,
bound to happen and intensify in a capitalist economy, is becoming and based on some necessary illusions of bourgeois power, such as its
politically insupportable. This is the best construction of Marx's idea extreme constructivism: the myth, seriously believed by the early rul-
that democracy was the most appropriate political form for the ing elite, that patterns of laws can direct social relations rather than
capitalist mode of production. A more Lukacsian view would see this reflect them, an illusion which made the framers carry the constitutional
as a homology between a Marxist economy and a market-like political document to an unreadable and agonizing length.13 However, the
mechanism. Besides, it also lays down norms of management of inte- original constitution reflected the accepted social plan or design of the
rest conflicts in away that, even though political !grievances accumulate, ruling elite at the time of Independence, unlike the subsequent dis-
their political articulation does not assume a pitch and form which ingenuous insertions of ceremonial socialistic principles.14
makes the minimal stability required for capitalist production un- A second institutional frame was provided by the adoption of the
obtainable. (3) The state expresses and ensures the domination of the objectives and increasingly proliferating institutions of planning,
bourgeoisie and helps in capitalist reproduction and a subordinate which explicitly acknowledged the role ofthe state in the reproduction
reproduction of other types of economic relations by imposing on the of capital and in setting economic targets in a way compatible with
economy a deliberate order of capitalist planning. Those directive bourgeois developmental perspectives.
functions that capital cannot perform through the market (either be- Clearly, however, ofthe three reasons for calling our state 'bourgeois'
cause the market is imperfect or not powerful enough, or because such the last two are rather external. They depend, in any case, on the first
tasks cannot be performed by market pressures) the bourgeois state condition of this characterization, and it is the first condition which
performs through the legitimized directive mechanisms of the state. is theoretically most problematic. It is a straightforward case of bour-
The analysis of politics offered below takes such a minimal political geois dominance if the state is 'bourgeois' because it reflects a state of
economy argument on trust from Marxist economists. But what I offer bourgeois dominance over society, if the bourgeoisie's political pre-
here, in itself, is not a political economy argument; because I do not dominance is symmetrical with its directive power over the productive
subscribe to the view that Marxists trying to understand politics too processes in the economy andits moral-cultural hegemony. In addition
d o the same enquiry as the economists, i.e. their cognitive object is the to economic control and directive power, states in advanced capitalist
same. In my view, political scientists should not merely collect the countries in the West employ what Poulantzas calls its 'institutional
political corollaries of the arguments of Marxist economists; their materiality' to reinforce, extend, and elaborate their d ~ m i n a n c e . ' ~
object is different. They study the 'other', the political side. Our third condition can also be expressed in a Gramscian form: one
India has then a bourgeois state, but a state that is bourgeois in three of the crucial legal-formal principles of the capitalist state is the in-
different senses. The last two features are less problematic than the vestiture on the state of the title of universality, a legitimate title to
first. A bourgeois format of the state, or the bourgeois character of its speak on behalf of the society 'in general'; this includes an implicit
legal system, property structure, and institutions of governance are admission that other interests, at least in their raw, economic form
clearly and undeniably evident.12~heseare revealed in the Indian cons- constitute a 'civil society' representing the rule of a particularity of
titution-in its central business oflaying down some limits and ~ r o h i -
bitions through the rights of property, etc., although this serious and
l 3 This is not merely a petty and querulous point. Constitutional documents
must be read and understood by the people. T h e Indian constitution is a law-
l 2 Detailed analyses could-be found in the work of S.K. Chaube and yer's document-a document of the lawyers, for the lawyers, by the lawyers.
S. Dattagupta o n the constituent assembly and the judicial processes, l4 Particularly objectionable is the insertion of the term 'socialist' by recent
respectively. A more philosophically inclined discussion has been presented in amendment.
Chhatrapati Singh 1985. Poulantzas 1978.
 The Trajectories ofthe Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 107
interests. Clearly, in the Indian case, though it would be wrong to the significance of the political functions of the state and to view the
underestimate the survival ofdemocracy for forty years, the Gramscian state as merely an expression of class relations rather than a terrain,
hegemony model of the capitalist state does not apply in any simple, sometimes an independent actor in the power process. In earlier Marx-
unproblematic form.16 It is suggested here that the Indian capitalist ist analysis of the 1950s or 1960s the historical necessity of a coalition
class exercises its control over society neither through a moral-cultural of power was derived from the inability of the bourgeoisie to seriously
hegemony of the Gramscian type, nor a simple coercive strategy on the pursue, let alone complete, a bourgeois democratic revolution.
lines of satellite states of the Third World. It does so by a coalitional The theory of a ruling 'coalition' highlights another essential point
strategy carried out partly through the state-directed process of econo- about the nature of class power in Indian society: that capital is not
mic growth, and partly through the allocational necessities indicated independently dominant in Indian society and state; and, for a series
by the bourgeois democratic political system. Politically, too, as in the ofother historical and sociological reasons, single-handed and unaided
field ofeconomic relations, the Indian bourgeoisie cannot be accorded dominance in society is also ruled out for the other propertied classes.
an unproblematic primacy, because of the undeniable prevalence of It is apolitical, long-term coalition which ensures their joint dominance
pre-capitalist political forms in our governance; also because the vul- over the state. So the coalition is not an effect or an accidental attri-
garly precapitalist form in the political life of rural India must be given bute of a dominance which is otherwise adequate; it is its condition.
appropriate analytic weight. Attributing political dominance to the There are several reasons why, despite its weakness, capital exercises the
capitalist class in a society in which the capitalist form of production directive function in the coalition. By its nature, it is the only truly uni-
is still not entirely predominant thus raises some theoretical problems. versalizing element in the ruling bloc.'' For, among the ruling groups,
the bourgeoisie alone can develop a coherent, internally flexible deve-
Coalitional Relations of Classes lopment doctrine. Pre-capitalist elements have not had an alternative
Marxists in India have commonly sought to solve this theoretical diffi- coherent programme to offer; their efforts have been restricted mainly
culty by offering a coalitional theory of class power.'7 Formerly, Com- to slowing down capitalist transition and en~urin~comfortable survival
munist Party literature asserted that power in India was exercised by plans for their own class. They have contented themselves by operating
an alliance of two dominant classes, the bourgeoisie (in some cases not as an alternative leading group, but as a relatively reactionary pres-
the monopoly stratum of the bourgeoisie, in others all fractions of the sure group within the ruling combine trying to shift or readjust the
balance of policies in a retrograde direction.
bourgeoisie as a whole), and landlords who still enjoyed precapitalist
privileges and control. This picture did not standardly include the In class terms, the ruling bloc in India contained three distinct so-
bureaucratic-managerial-intellectual elite as a distinct and separate cial groups and the strata internal to or organically associated with
them: the bourgeoisie, particularly its aggressive and expandingmono-
element of the ruling coalition. In my judgement this was a flaw in the
original model,18 and stemmed from the tendency to underestimate poly stratum; the landed elites (which underwent significant internal
changes due to the processes of agrarian transformation since Inde-
pendence); and last, but not least, the bureaucratic managerial elite.20
I G I have tried to present an argument of this kind elsewhere: see Kaviraj
1987.
'7 Since Independence, almost all programmes by almost all communist Although this is not the place for long or detailed theoretical discussions,
groups assert that state power in India is controlled by an alliance of classes, I find Poulantzas's concept of a ruling bloc suggeftive but inadequately clear.
although they differ about which"classes, and their relative political weight. 20 Though I advocate the inclusion of this group into the ruling bloc of
'' This was a flaw primarily because, though in economic life the public classes, it is important to define the boundaries of this social group with pre-
sector and state control on the economy were seen to be important, it appeared cision.To include the entire administration in the ruling bloc would be absurd,
these had no political consequences or effects on class formation and class but I would include the high bureaucratic elite and industrial management
behaviour. groups.
 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 109
It must not be forgotten that the policies followed by the ruling bloc Finally, a coalition is always based on an explicit or implicit pro-
often had consequences for its own structure and internal formation tocol, a network of policies, rights, immunities derived from both
For instance, as a result of policies pursued over the long term, the constitutional and ordinary law which sets out, over a long period, the
structure of the classes themselves, especially of the latter two classes, terms of this coalition and its manner of distribution of advantages.
underwent transformation. Although - the redistributive aims of the Changes in the structure, economic success and political weight of
land reforms were frustrated, they had some long-term effects on the individual classes give rise naturally to demands for changes in its
class structure of agrarian society, particularly its upper social strata. internal hierarchy and a renegotiation of the terms of the protocol; and
Over the longer term, as a result of the decline of feudal landlords, a discontented social groups use options over the entire range of 'exit,
newer segment of rich farmers came to replace them in areas where the voice and 1 0 ~ a l t y ' . ~ ~understand
To the centrality of the third element,
green revolution took place-a class of capitalist farmers. This has had and also how the logic of politics intersects with the logic of the eco-
serious consequences for Indian politics. Similarly, the third element nomy, I suggest a further distinction between what is generally known
has also undergone a remarkable expansion in its size, areas of control, as dominance in Marxist theory and a different operation or terrain
and power in step with the development ofthe state-directed apparatus of what could be called governance. Domination is the consequence
of economic growth. of a longer-term disposition of interests and control over production
Traditional Marxist accounts of the ruling coalition suffered, in my arrangements; and in this sort of calculation the dominant classes in
view, because they saw the bureaucratic elite as being too straightfor- Indian societywould be the bourgeoisie, especially its higher strataand
wardly subordinate to the power of the bourgeoisie, and saw what was the rich farmers. This is clearly distinct from governance, which refers
basically a coalitional and bargaining relation as a purely instrumental to the process of actual policy decisions within the apparatuses of the
one. Actually, this third group was a crucial element in the ruling state. Surely the stable structure of class dominance constrains and
coalition of classes. Although not bourgeois in a direct productive structures the process of governance, but it is quite different from the
sense, culturally and ideologically it was strongly affiliated to the bour- first. This could be extended to suggest that the movement of public
geois order. This class was, even before Independence, as some hist- policies would be captured by a different concept which refers to
orical works show, the repository of the bourgeoisie's 'political configurations ofvertical clientilist benefit coalitions that these policies
intelligence', working out a 'theory' ofdevelopment for Indian capital- create among the subordinate classes. Concessions to agricultural lob-
ism, often 'correcting' more intensely selfish objectives of the monopoly
- .
bies may create an affinity of interests among the large and the small
elements by giving them a more reformist and universal form2' With farmers, or, say, among all those who sell agricultural produce on the
the constant growth of the large public sector, some genuine points of market. Such benefit configurations are real and influence policy-
conflict between this bureaucratic elite in government
- and bourgeois
- makers' calculations of short-term political advantages accruing from
entrepreneurial classes began to develop. Most significantly, however, policies. These also ensure that actual political configurations do not
they perform a distinct and irreducible function in the ruling bloc become symmetrical to class divisions in society. Evidently, this does
and its sprawling governmental apparatus. It is not only true that not turn the small peasant into a part of the ruling bloc. But while
they mediate between the ruling coalition and the other classes, they it would be nonsensical to see him as a part of the ruling classes, it
also mediate crucially between the classes within the ruling coalition would be seriously unhelpful for political analysis to ignore such short-

-
itself. They also provide the theory and the institutional drive for bour-
geois rule.
term nexuses of interest built up by directips of policy, since what
are generally known as welfare programmes are explicitly used in this
way. We can account for some crucial shifis in political alliances in
See Bipan Chandra 1979, in which G.D. Birla's behaviour is more startling
than Nehru's. 22 See A. Hirschman 1970.
r,
terms o f such tlelibcrate changca in benefit coalitions by long term. N o state is able to erase its beginninescompletely: initiatives
public policy. taken in forn~ati\reyears o f t h e state t e n d t o acquire f o ~ ~ n d a t i o n a l
T h e coalitional nalure o f t h e ruling $rout3 has anorhcr serious inl- a n d determining character simply because o f their historical prior-
plication for political analysis. 'The groups that are included in the ity. Political scientists have, in m y view, been inattentive towards t h e
coalition d o n o t share equal power: power w i t h i n the ruling bloc is significance o f t h i s period o f fast a n d crucial historical change;15 a n d
evidently hierarchical. Rut i f a n y o f these classes is seriously dissatisfied consequently, discussions o n I n d i a n politics suffer f r o m a m y t h o f
a n d leaves the ruling bloc, t h a t n o t only alters the structure o f t h e exaggerated continuity between t h e late years o f colonial rule a n d the
coalition b u t threatens it with political disaster. Theoretically, it fol- early years o f i n d e p e n d e n t power.
lows, a n y serious political move for each class o r its representatives T h e Congress which assumed power i n 1 9 4 7 was n o t in m a n y res-
within the coalition is two-valued. T h e s e moves are o f course i n a pects t h e Congress that w o n Independence. T h e post-war years, after
general sense directed against t h e classes outside t h e bloc, b u t t h e choi- it was generallyknown t h a t Independencewas conling i n the immediate
ces o f t h e s e moves have real effects o n the internal politics o f t h e ruling future, naturally saw a series o f quick political changes. Resides. t h e
bloc. If a c o m m o n objective. say i n industrial policy, c a n b c achieved formal constitutional structure t h a t was a d o p t e d set t h e framework
b y three dit&rently worked o u t policy options, s.y,z, their preference o f t h e moves o f different social classes a n d political actors for q u i t e a
for these options w o c ~ l db e often differently rariked b y d i f k r e n t l o n g time, until corlstitutional a n d formal language fell i n t o s u d d e n
c o m p o n e n t s o f thc ruling bloc. T h e s e would resulr in different states disuse after 1909-71." Clearly, this period f o r m e d a crucial stage in
ofdistribution of long-term a n d short-term benefits. a n d a m o n g these t h e history o f t h e Indian national movement. Earlier, t h e objecrive of
benefits very often figures t h c political strategic advanrage of t h e m o v e m e n t was the rather abstract o n e o f m a k i n g Independence
having a tivourablc format o f procedure of decisions. 'This sort o f a possible; n o w t h e objective o f every political g r o u p within t h e broad
coalition t h e o ~ ym a y help us understand concrere moves a n d decisions national movelnent changed i n t o struggling for deternlinacion o f t h e
o t political life 2nd link these with configurations o f class interests, structure o f power o f t h e i n d e p e n d e n t state--not a n abstract e n d o f
rather t h a n sr;indarci acadcmic coalition theories Lvhich use individuals
as their srandnrd political acrors a n d plot coalition movernents in refer- ?i
Rccenrly, afrer thc ,lrchivrs ha\re been opcned for these ycarh. there h'ls
ence ro a fo1-ma1 minimalitv norm.23 hcen considerable intcrchr among historian about chis form,ltive period:
howevcr, nor much historical research is !.ct available.
26 Ordinarily, the period of large- ale disregard for consritutional rules is
set at 1975. But ir oughr ro be noted rhar many of the initial moves against
I have suggested c~lsewherethat t h e story o f Indian politics since 1 9 4 7
bour-geois delnocraric legal norms were hcgun and legitimized in the
o u g h t t o b e secn in tcrms o f n cruci~llinitial stage o f political realign-
immediarely preceding period of [he 'left turn'. 'I'he judiciary, for instance,
menrs, followed by f o r ~ rfairly commons en sic all>^ divided periods in
was arracked as conserva~iveand opposed ro [he parlia~nenrarytendency
o u r political life.'" cowards progressive legislarion. This was an argumenr taken from Brirish
political drgumenrs of the 1930s. Of course, i t is possible to make a case that
Realignments 1 9 4 6 - 1 9 5 0
the courts generally incline to be conservative, bur 1ndil.a Gandhi used [his to
In politics, beginnings ofren-dejpite their contingent character- loosen bourgeois consrraints over her government, not to strain towards
take o n the narure o f f u n d a m e n t a l constraining structures over t h e socialism. Unforrunarely, lefrisrs willingly surrendered their arguments to her,
%

in return for small favours. These were used systematically to iusrib precapiralisr
" Cf. W.H. Rikcr's \vi.ll-known discu~sionon rhc size princiflc in Kiker, irresponsibiliry in governance. Much of the present wrecking of bourgeois
1970 (1967):71-6, democratic instirutional norms was done wirh [he help o f a disingenuous use
?' See Kavir.li 1087. of radical rhetoric.
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 114 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 115
worked together as a joint political pressure group for radicalization willing to use the already achieved mobilizational levels for radical
of social policies and their implementation, it could possibly have purposes consistent with its own programmes. But one of the central
counteracted the disingenuousness of Congress land reforms. decisions of the Nehru government was on this question: even though
However, the paradox was that the Congress was formally wedded it sometimes did not abrogate its reformistic programmes, it decided
to what we now describe as the Nehruvian reformist programme at a to give them a bureaucratic rather than a mobilizational form. For the
time when the radicals inside the Congress became woefullyweak, and Congress leadership, clearly, the political task after assuming power
when whatever little striking power they had was mainly concentrated was to demobilize its own movement, not to radicalize ic further. It also
at the centre. From the early years of the government, because of the discreetly renounced promises of distributive justice which had come
federal distribution ofpowers, practically all measures adopted towards to constitute part of its informal programme in the last stages of the
any reform of the agrarian structure were effectively countermanded national movement. T h e basic contradiction of Congress politics in
by its own recalcitrant and more conservative state and local units. The these early years has been analysed in detail in the academic literature:
Nehru government, thus, began its career by playing false to its own the needs of long-term economic strategy and ideological legitimation
adopted programmes. And the quick decline of socialist influence in in a poor country made an abstractly redistributive programme im-
the states of Bihar and UP, where there had been strong peasant mobil- perative; but the ends of mobilizing the effective levers of power in the
izations in the not too distant past, remains among the large un- countryside during ordinary times made a dependence on rural mag-
interrogated phenomena of recent Indian politics. The departure of nates equally u n a ~ o i d a b l e No
. ~ ~party can, after all, expropriate its
the reformist elements from the Congress led to a feeling among the own power (as opposed to electoral) base.
small elite around Nehru of being encircled within their own party Although the Congress was content to accept the continuance of
organization. It provided the initial condition for, and pressure to- semi-feudal rural power, elsewhere in the economy it adopted massive
wards, a 'passive revolution' strategy. plans for capitalist development. But such plans can assume quite dif-
ferent institutional forms and political trajectories. Evidently, the
Experimentation 1950-1956 Indian elite decisively rejected a trajectory of satellite growth, a com-
mon destiny which befell most other newly independent Third World
O u t of this historical situation arose the enormous programme of a
states. Consistent with this general objective, the ruling elite adopted
capitalist 'passive revolution' that the Congress adopted in the Nehru
a plan for heavy industrialization and institutional control of capital
period.27 First, of course, the programme of serious bourgeois land re-
goods industries through the state sector, a largely untried experi-
forms was abandoned through a combination of feudal resistance,
ment at the time in underdeveloped countries. Economic plans led to
judicial conservatism, and connivance of state Congress leaders hip^.^^
some serious shifts in the internal power distribution of society,
Legal arrangement of property institutions, sanctioned by the cons-
though primarily within the elements of the ruling bloc itself. Political
titution, reinforced such opposition and gave it juridical teeth. Thus
mistrust offoreign capital and, to alesser extent, ofthe potential power
the only way in which agrarian transformation could take place was
of private capital in India, led to much of this new, crucial, and poli-
through a conservative, gradualist, and 'molecular' process.29 Feudal
tically privileged segment of the economy being given over to a new
and other conservative resistance could, in principle, be broken down
and fast-growingpublicsector, in the face ofstrong political opposition
if the Congress encouraged the mobilization of the masses and was
from internal conservative^.^' -.
%

27 For the idea of 'passive revolution', see Grarnsci 1971. 30Frankel 1978.
28 For a detailed account of this process, see Frankel 1978. 3'The politics of planning and the public sector, alas, remains a seriously
29 Grarnsci 1971. under-researched area.
116 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 117
The larger theory and the economic projections for this huge state- The more Nehru was politically weakened inside the party orga-
controlled sector, which, in turn, controlled some crucial parts of the nization, the greater the resistance at the state level to his reformist
larger economy by financial mechanisms, came from a new bureaucracy policies, the more he was forced into the passive revolution logic of
of economic and technical personnel who entered the earlier, more bureaucratization, which saw the people not as subjects but as simple
limited format of the colonial law and order bureaucracy, and changed objects of the development process. The theoretical understanding be-
its structure and practices. Planningassisted and ideologically justified hind this development strategy was also in several ways excessively
an enormous expansion ofa 'welfare bureaucracy' which set in motion rationalistic: it falsely believed that external 'experts' naturally knew
some internal conflicts in the administrative apparatus of the state, e.g. more about people's problems and how to solve them than those who
the debate about the relative decisional weight of technocrats and suffered these problems themselves. By the mid 1950s such an over-
bureaucrats, and, more crucially, the division of their respective do- rationalistic doctrine became a settled part of the ideology of planning
mains of control. and therefore of the Indian state. 'The state', or whoever could usurp
At the general level, however, they had some common interests. this title for the time being, rather than the people themselves, was to
They gratefully accep ted the chance of a quick proliferation of bureau- be theinitiator and, more dangerously, theevaluator of the development
cratic occupations and a consequent tendency to bring under bureau- process. A partly superstitious reverence for natural science, undeserv-
cratic administration any new field of social activity. And since the ingly extended to economists, sociologists, and similar other pretenders
decision about how much the bureaucracy should expand was made to absolute truth,33justified a theory which saw popular criticisms of
by the bureaucracy itself-though occasionally under some thinly as- state-controlled growth
- as 'civic disorders'.
sumed disguises of committees and commissions-it is not surprising Every advance of this rhetoricized bureaucracy in the control of
that this sector spread rapidly in size and increased its strategic control social life was celebrated as a further step towards a mystical socialis-
at the expense of more traditional controllers of productive resources. tic pattern of society in which, although 'socialists' controlled state
This led in the long run to the growth of a large non-market mecha- power, economic and distributive inequality of other sorts rapidly
nism of allocation of resources, a process which was originally justifi- increased. Although - it is important to undermine its unfounded and
ed by 'socialist' arguments of controlling private capitalist power, but arrogant socialistic claims, it would be unrealistic not to see that this
shown by later events to be increasingly prone to arbitrary distribution state, under this particular balance of its ruling bloc, worked out
ofeconomic patronage by politicians. Originally, this social group had a fairly elaborate theory of import-substituting industrialization and
enthusiastically supported the spread ofan intricate regime ofcontrols ran a limited, in the sense of unevenly spread, system of parliament-
through licences, permits, and government sanctions, which they saw ary democracy. Two points, however, have to be mentioned about the
slipping out of their grasp and being put to retrograde uses. Eventual-
ly, this entire state-directed economic regime could be singled out
for criticism for its political arbitrariness and inefficiency, although its own economic programmes. Evidently, the Congress follows a special logic
actually the public sector is criticized by using examples that travesty in defining consistency and programmatic loyalty.
33 This group of course emphatically includes ~oliticalscientists who had
its functioning.32 Anyway, politically this allowed the bureaucracy to
convinced themselves that the truisms they uttered about Indian politics were
gain control over other people's time frames, if not actual decisions.
different from popular wisdom by the important fact that theirs were produced
by the application of the scientific method. I ha* omitted them from the
32 The ways of the CongressParty are truly inscrutable. It expels leading list because the spirit of the age has not been in their favour, and they were
members for being too vocal about economic scandals and kickbacks, but given much less advisory importance than their colleagues in the dismal science.
allows its minister for culture, Vasant Sathe, an equally important member, to Although their labours in the spread of a degenerate form of positivism was
launch frontal attacks on the public sector, presumably an important part of second to none, they never made it to the high advisory councils.

The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique
The larger theory and the economic projections for this huge state- T h e more Nehru was politically weakened inside the party orga-
controlled sector, which, in turn, controlled some crucial parts of the nization, the greater the resistance at the state level to his reformist
larger economy by financial mechanisms, came from a new bureaucracy policies, the more he was forced into the passive revolution logic of
of economic and technical personnel who entered the earlier, more bureaucratization, which saw the people not as subjects but as simple
limited format of the colonial law and order bureaucracy, and changed objects of the development process. The theoretical understanding be-
its structure and practices. Planningassisted and ideologically justified hind this development strategy was also in several ways excessively
an enormous expansion of a 'welfare bureaucracy' which set in motion rationalistic: it falsely believed that external 'experts' naturally knew
some internal conflicts in the administrative apparatus ofthe state, e.g. more about people's problems and how to solve them than those who
the debate about the relative decisional weight of technocrats and suffered these problems themselves. By the mid 1950s such an over-
bureaucrats, and, more crucially, the division of their respective do- rationalistic doctrine became a settled part of the ideology of planning
mains of control. and therefore of the Indian state. 'The state', or whoever could usurp
At the general level, however, they had some common interests. this title for the time being, rather than the people themselves, was to
They gratefully accepted the chance ofa quick proliferation of bureau- be the initiator and, moredangerously, the evaluator ofthe development
cratic occupations and a consequent tendency to bring under bureau- process. A partly superstitious reverence for natural science, undeserv-
cratic administration any new field of social activity. And since the ingly extended to economists, sociologists, and similar other pretenders
decision about how much the bureaucracy should expand was made to absolute truth,33justified a theory which saw popular criticisms of
by the bureaucracy itself-though occasionally under some thinly as- state-controlled growth as 'civic disorders'.
sumed disguises of committees and commissions-it is not surprising Every advance of this rhetoricized bureaucracy in the control of
that this sector spread rapidly in size and increased its strategic control social life was celebrated as a further step towards a mystical socialis-
at the expense of more traditional controllers of productive resources. tic pattern of society in which, although 'socialists' controlled state
This led in the long run to the growth of a large non-market mecha- power, economic and distributive inequality of other sorts rapidly
nism of allocation of resources, a process which was originally justifi- increased. Although it is important to undermine its unfounded and
ed by 'socialist' arguments of controlling private capitalist power, but arrogant socialistic claims, it would be unrealistic not to see that this
shown by later events to be increasingly prone to arbitrary distribution state, under this particular balance of its ruling bloc, worked out
of economic patronage by politicians. Originally, this social group had a fairly elaborate theory of import-substituting industrialization and
enthusiastically supported the spread ofan intricate regime ofcontrols ran a limited, in the sense of unevenly spread, system of parliament-
through licences, permits, and government sanctions, which they saw ary democracy. Two points, however, have to be mentioned about the
slipping out of their grasp and being put to retrograde uses. Eventual-
ly, this entire state-directed economic regime could be singled out
for criticism for its political arbitrariness and inefficiency, although its own economic programmes. Evidently, the Congress follows a special logic
actually the public sector is criticized by using examples that travesty in defining consistency and programmatic loyalcy.
j3 This group of course emphatically includes political scientists who had
its functioning.32 Anyway, politically this allowed the bureaucracy to
convinced themselves chat the truisms they uttered about Indian politics were
gain control over other people's time frames, if not actual decisions.
different from popular wisdom by the important fact that theirs were produced
by the application of the scientific method. I ha* omitted them from the
" The ways of the CongressParty are truly inscrutable. It expels leading list because the spirit of the age has not been in their favour, and they were
members for being too vocal about economic scandals and kickbacks, but given much less advisory importance than their colleagues in the dismal science.
allows its minister for culture, Vasant Sathe, an equally important member, to Although their labours in the spread of a degenerate form of positivism was
launch frontal attacks on the p~tblicsector, presumably an important part of second to none, they never made it to the high advisory councils.
118 The Trajectoories of the Indian State The I'assive Revolution and India: A Critique 119
internal balance of the regime. Successful functioning of this regime its abstract eradication in the elections of 197 1, though none
depended on, first, the existence of a strong constitutional-legal sys- of the conditions which forced Nehru's hesitation had changed.
tem, which enforced legal responsibility; and second, it worked Although no theorist, Nehru certainlyhad a statesmanly nose for read-
successfully in the early years because the relation between the bour- ing 'the dialectic of the concrete', and he picked up the elements of a
geoisie and the new bureaucracy was relatively antagonistic rather fairly coherent social and political design as he went along, mainly
than collusive. Bourgeois political interests attempted to fight it out reading the logic ofcolligation between one basic policy and the next.
frontally, in an ideological battle, trying to argue through political The use of political power by a ruling elite involves serious recursive
doctrine that a more market-oriented approach would be better for calculations about the effects ~fearlier~olicies, andensuringconditions
economic growth than allowing a ceremonial programme to stay and for the success of one policy by means of others. If the bloc in power
buy surreptitious reprieve from its rigours through large-scale corrup- survives over a long enough time, this makes it likely that a coherent
tion. Both these conditions were reversed in later years. policy design will gradually emerge. But here again a prior political
condition is that the elite must feel securely in power and work on a
certain short-term dissociation between the political objectives ofcon-
Consolidation 1956-1964 tinuance, economic distribution, and creation of resources. It is this
To emphasize these features of the political economy of the Nehru which can allow tying up resources in investments with longer periods
years is not to deny that modern Indiais still held together byapartially of gestation, against the temptation to use resources in the form of
infringed frame which is a legacy of his period, despite the best efforts direct subsidies to volatile sections. Since Nehru's regime never had
of the party he had once led to break down its structural principles serious doubts about its electoral future, it couldembarkon programmes
during the rule of his political succe~sors."~ Unfortunately, Indira like the Second Five Year Plan; for later governments, similar uses of
Gandhi and RajivGandhi can be seen onlyas his filial, not his political, economic resources under government control became politically un-
inheritors. If his policy frame has not been entirely destroyed, it is feasible.
certainly not from any want of effort from his party or those who fol- Although Nehru did not enter office with a fully worked-out pro-
lowed him into power. Nehru's historical importance is signalled by gramme, he did eventually create a distinct policy design. In its final
the fact that any programme of bourgeois reconstruction still speaks form, its elements were internally coherent. Political stability and the
ofa return to his 'system' as opposed to the later Congress performance realization of independence of decision-making required an improve-
in the political and economic fields. ment in the food situation, since American food aid, from earlyon, was
It is false to claim, as Nehru's official admirers often do, that Nehru used by the USA to exert political pressure on basic policy issues. This
was a political theorist who had worked out a prior strategy for 'inde- meant that in foreign policy India should seek alternative sources of
pendent capitalist development' which he slowly unfolded when in international support. Parallel considerations-of protecting the poli-
power. In fact, he was no theorist; but he had an overwhelming sense tical sovereignty of developmental decisions-led to the major thrust
that political programmes in countries like India must be set in the ofthe Second Plan towards primarysector industrialization. Gathering
frame of objectives in the historical long term, so that, for him, poli- the results of these policies depended to a large extent on keeping these
tical ideology meant an interpretation of historical possibilities rather sectors of the economy under direct control of the state. Driven by
than populist gimmicks. Nehru's regime thought seriously that re- political-economic calculations of this kind-the Indian state opened
duction of poverty would ne7essarily be slower in a state in whichlegal up its diplomatic relations with the USSR. Of course, a whole range
bourgeois rights to property exist; Indira Gandhi's regime cheerfully ofexternal circumstances helped this process ofa surprising connection
between the leading socialist state and the country in the Third World
34 I have tried to deal with this in Kaviraj 1984. in which capitalism had a somewhat greater chance of success. This
120 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 121
was greatly helped by the fact that the USSR pursued in its foreign because land came under the state list in the constitutional division
policy minimal objectives as opposed t o the unpractically maximalist of powers.37
ones of the USA.35This mutual need was the ground for early friend- Indeed, the federal division of powers could be seen in terms ofour
ship between the two countries, rather than an Indian attempt to build model as a coalitional proposal directed at the regional bourgeoisie and
a version of socialism, or Soviet assistance to a regime trying to build dominant agricultural interests, giving them relative autonomy in
a 'non-capitalist form' of society.36 their own regions. The insistent requirements of capitalist develop-
However, there were two ways in which the Nehru model was ment now threatened to infringe that agreement within the protocol.
subverted by later political initiatives: much of it was an inversion Besides, the decline of the zamindars and direct feudal landholders left
'from inside', as it were, as in the case of bureaucratic control over the field free for the accumulation of power in the hands of a stratum
the economy-turning the power of overriding market mechanisms of richer farmers who wished to inherit political immunities implicit
by the state over to the service of an arbitrary granting of favours to in the initial protocol. This introduced a conflict of interests within
pliable corporate houses, companies, and individuals. O n some ques- the structure of the ruling coalition in India, the effects ofwhich were
tions, however, there was a more explicit reversal of formal government significant in the long run. Nehru's policy initiatives in the late 1950s
policy about the generation of growth and managing its distributive and early 1960s led to a double process of polarization in politics.
effects. One significant element of the Nehruvian !growth model, dis- Government initiatives in three interrelated areas-creation of heavy
cussed at length during the finalization of the Second Plan, was the industries in the public sector, increasing reliance on Soviet assistance
connection between industrial and agrarian strategies, a doctrine de- in their construction, and pressure from the planning element in gov-
cisively rejected during Indira Gandhi's regime. A strong push to- ernment for changes in the agrarian sector towards cooperativization-
wards industrialization in the heavy industrial sector was supposed to led to sharp criticism of the Congress. Individual capitalists, sometimes
be related to a parallel drive for land reforms through a large programme even the entire class, have to be pardoned for occasionally failing to
for cooperativization. This involved pressing reluctant and procrasti- see what was to be beneficial to the system as a whole. These Nehruvian
natingstate governments to enact more serious land reform legislation. policies, celebrated now as a triumphant design for the successful cons-
Government doctrine asserted that the requirements of raising sur- truction of retarded capitalism, came under strong fire from a panick-
plus resources for massive industrialization, increasing agricultural ing combine of representatives of proprietary classes. The Congress's
productivity, and preventing a fast cost-push inflation could be served industrial policies were interpreted as the thin end ofthe socialist stick;
by change and redistribution of control over land and resources in land reform proposals, shamefully mild and solidly bourgeois, appeared
the rural sector in a more egalitarian direction. The Nehru regime, to them as the programme of an agrarian revolution from above; the
with its finer sensitivity to legal propriety, had felt legally handicapped public sector, intended merely to displace the centre ofcontrol towards
the state, was seen as an attack on private enterprise. For the first time,
35 A simple definition of minimal and maximal objectives in international a large right-wing coalition of conservatives inside and outside the
politics would be as follows. When state A wishes state B to do what it wants ruling party seemed to be emerging.
it to do, that could be called a maximal target; a minimal objective is one
when A wants B to do something different from what its rival C wishes B to
do. 37 It is interesting to note that Indira Gandhi's regime increasingly freed
3%ee the famous controvery in communist circles about the article by itselfof these legal encumbrances, leading to a generaMecline of the institutional
Modesre Rubinstein arguing that the Nehru government was proposi;g to system. Initial arguments in Favour of this softening of bourgeois legal norms
follow a non-capitalist path. Ajoy Ghosh wrote a remarkably scathing reply were made by using 'socialist' ideas; but, remarkably, the room for manoeuvre
to this article. created by this has never been utilized for radical reforms.
122 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Puive Revolution and India: A Critique 123

The political consequences of such misreadings of Congress policy disgruntled elements retained their loyalty to the protocol byannounc-
were considerable. Two trends of political realignll~entsbegan soon ing that they would retain their Congress labels with suitable adjectival
after the adoption of the Second Plan package of policies. Grievances m~dification.~'
against industrial policy and related issues led t o the formation of the T h e fates of the two critical realignments were eventually very
Swatantra Party; but more significant changes happened in the rural different. T h e relative success of the policy of heavy industrialization
political scene. Congress pressure for cooperativization came just at and the Second Plan was soon generally accepted by even the recalcitrant
the time when the beneficiaries of the agrarian changes were enjoying bourgeois groups; and the Swatantra Party consequently sank into
the first impulse of their power. This led to serious shifis within the political irrelevance. But the secession of the farmers' lobbies over
ruling bloc. Although, in terms of the distribution of unequal benefits, much of northern India, led first to a political debacle of the Congress,
the rural elite must be considered to have been part of the ruling coali- then to internal changes in Congress policies. Their withdrawal of sup-
tion, they constituted undoubtedly its most quiescent part.There were port from the Congress weakened it seriously in both class and party
imaginary threats of disadvantage;38 but, more concretely, grievance terms; and the Congress leadership saw it as a double-valued move: an
against the fact that they were not getting a larger share of advantages, exercise of the exit option, which concealed a -proposal
- to return if the
and that their rising economic power was insufficiently translated into protocol was restructured in their favour. In coalitional politics, every
political authority because they thought the rulers of the parliamentary threat is an offer. Changes in Congress policy in agriculture towards
game constantly wrongfooted them, made them increasingly restive.39 a 'technical' solution of the food problem, through heavy government
T h e farmers' groups, in other words, demanded a more equal share investment in 'advanced' sectors-which was known to be likely to
of the fruits of inequality. There was large-scale exodus of farmer result in an accentuation of rural inequality--showed that the Congress
support from the Congress and the formation of regional farmers' had read this move correctly and was prepared
. -
to make alterations in
groupings. This should be seen in my judgement as a move by these its policies to accommodate the ambitions of regional farmers' groups.42
two subordinate and quiescent groups to set up relations across the Foreign policy issues so heavily dominated the last years of the
boundary of the coalition with other dispossessed groups.40 All over Nehru period that some of the long-term -
consequences of his pro-
India, but particularly in the more agriculturally successful states, gramme of passive revolution took longer than normal to surface. T h e
peasant parties sprang up and became part of the growing opposition imbalances left behind by Nehru's government affected the policies of
blocs in the fourth general elections. Their typical leaders were Charan successor regimes. Such imbalances threatened to rupture the coalitional
Singh and Rao Birendra Singh-the latter more typical than the for-
mer, because he later rejoined the Congress. Because his self-respect 4' The country was full of non-national Congresses of all kinds-Bangla

was not plastic enough, Charan Singh could not do that. Some of these Congress, Kerala Congress, and so on-asserting the reassuring concreteness
of regional identity as opposed to the greater abstractness of the national one.
4 2 Surprisingly, the farmer lobbies were proper examples of the theory that

38 There is always a hypothetical calculation of possible benefits made by there are unmarked, but very significant frontiers of regional consciousness.
classes and groups quite apart from threats of disadvantage. Thus, a potential national combine of such groups-which would have been
j9 Most of these demands are spelt out clearly in Charan Singh 1978. formidable, if not simply overwhelming-has not really come into existence.
40 If the whole society is made up of the letters of the alphabet, and abc are Peasant lobbies seem incomprehensibly trapped within frontiers of regional
in that order wielders of power, if c is disgruntled, it can establish alliances consciousness;for some reason, they cannot recognize an entirely abstract we,
across the boundaries of the ruling coalition with d e f . . . This would-bring linked entirely by modern economic interests, unsupported by any directly
instability to the coalition where a + b + c was a condition for their being in available form of historical self-conceptualization like lat, or Kamma, or such
power. But c's leaving the a b c coalition would not be read properly if we do cultural identity. If they describe themselves as inhabitants of UP, this would
not see this leav-ing itself as an offer to return to an a c b coalition. indicate a more abstract consciousness of territoriality.
124 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 125
unity of the ruling bloc by creating a rift of interest between the bour- the Nehruvian plan for a reformist capitalism, with its policies of pub-
geois, bureaucratic, urban segment, and regional bourgeois interests lic sector, state control over resources, planning, and a relatively anti-
and agrarian propertied classes.43 imperialist foreign policy could all be renegotiated.45 Indira Gandhi's
This picture ofthe Nehru periodshould not be taken as unhistorically government initially gave in to some of these pressures, its most cele-
one-sided and pessimistic. Although all Third World societies with brated collapse being acceptance of the devaluation of the rupee. In the
ambitions of capitalist growth have failed, I do not deny that Indian fourth general elections, Congress fortunes declined alarmingly, and
society has failed much better than others.44 There are undoubted it was evident that to get out of the deepening politico-economic crisis,
advantages to the Indian case over other competing models, like Pakis- the party needed some drastic measures.The initiatives taken by Indira
tan, or now, more fashionably, South Korea. India is quite obviously Gandhi in the years after 1967 showed that in her view the Congress
better than the tinpot but nonetheless vicious dictatorships in Latin was facing a crisis of legitimacy. Unlike the years after Independence,
America and also some unproductively austere regimes in Africa that it was not seen as a force of redistributive change, but a conservative
were given a prematurely lyrical reception by radicals in the 1960s. party underwriting social inequality. Legitimacy could be renewed by
Such successes of the Nehru regime are accepted, but remain unstated restating the objectives ofdistributive justice with dramatic splendour.
here because I primarily intend to draw something ofa causal line from Some changes in economic policy were evident to the earlier policy on
what we consider our 'best' period to our worst. agriculture, with an implicit acceptance of the iniquitous social con-
sequences of the new line and the gradual decline of emphasis on plan-
Instability 1965-1975 ning,46 and the policy of large investment^.^^
Contradictions in the policies of the Nehru period surfaced after the The politics ofthe Indian state and the Congress Party entered adif-
somewhat artificial national unity of the mid 1960s disappeared. ferent historical stage by the fourth general elections. Earlier, electoral
Nationalist hysteria naturally created a temporary alliance ofsentiment survival of the Congress, and the simple control over state governments
which brought together political forces from the hard right to the mild which was a precondition for making and shaping policies, was never
left into an easy patriotic combination that isolated the communists, in question, aftkough Nehru's electoral majorities were never dramatic.
especially the CPI(M). But the artificiality of this was shown by the fact
that, within three years of Nehru's death, left forces could regroup 45 1 have sketched rhis out more fully in Kaviraj 1986.
sufficiently to form coalition governments in states. 46 Planning had become too much of a slogan for the Congress to be drop-
India passed through a deep political crisis in the immediate years ped altogether, and the concept carried pleasant reminders of Nehru. Although
after Nehru's death, a crisis that, in policy terms, was fraught with the the thing could not be dropped entirely, its substance could be hollowed out
most serious retrograde possibilities. An orchestration of ~ressures- and thrown overboard. Economists who are critical ofgovernment policy have
concentrated too much on the technical economics of the plans rather than
from both internal and external reaction-created a situation in which
their larger ideological concept. To an untechnical eye, whatever its
mathematical triumphs in recent years, planning seems to have degenerated
4"or an economic pursuit of this phenomenon, see Ashok Mitra 1977. increasingly into an accounting and housekeeping operation rather than a
44 Nothing illustrates this more clearly than the abandonment in the 1970s
directive mechanism for the productive forces of the economy. Planning was a
of the argument popular with Western bourgeois theorists that India and blessing for the self-reproducing bureaucracy. Every claim for creating the post
Pakistan were two opposed models of development for Third World societies. of an unproductive, and possibly corrupt, bureautrat could be said to be in
Although the attachment of large Western democracies to an oppressive and the general interest of the country's economic progress. Thus, although we
economically unsuccessful tyranny like Pakistan was always difficult to explain, have much less planning, we have, happily, a much larger commission.
now Pakistan has become too obvious an ideological liability and is defended 47 Several Marxist economists have forcefully stressed rhis point. Cf: Bardhan
by purely security arguments. 1985.
126 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 127

Going by purely electoral statistics, Nehru would appear retrospectively It is not necessary to retell the melancholy narrative of how quick
to have been permanently insecure, enjoying u n s p e c t a ~ u l a rsimple
l~ -
but indecisive victories contributed to a long-term crisis of the state,
and how the state structure was centralized to such an extent that the
majorities in parliament. By contrast, Indira Gandhiand RajivGandhi
would appear unassailably secure, riding great waves of popular af- political difficulties of the leader or the government party became
fection. This only shows, in the face of much political science in the generalized into a crisis of the entire state.51We shall simply mention
last twenty years, that electoral 'behaviour' is a rather poor indicator the political shifts introduced by her 'pragmatic' translation of Nehru's
political strategy.52
--
of what a people politically do to themselves. Actually, there was a
In one sense, Indira Gandhi faced a situation similar to the one
displacement of the question at the heart of these elections. Formerly,
Nehru had encountered, with the difference that she obviously, in the
the major question was not whether the Congress would remain in
power. It was assumed that it would; the debate was about its ~olicies. mid 1960s, lacked Nehru's irreplaceability within the party. Thus,
After 1967, every time, except in the last elections, the question was by the logic of the situation she had to intensify the passive revolu-
tion features ofthe Nehru period, often however to a point where these
whether it would remain in power or not. Thus pre-1967 politics
tended to subvert their own original purpose. Control over government
revolved around real ideological issues-what should be the path of
initially, because of the parliamentary format of political power, de-
national development, what would be the distributive character of
economic growth? After 1967, the attention of Congress politicians pended on her control over the party. Since after Nehru effective power
within the Congress
- had shifted to the state bosses, and they could
went entirely into electoral issues and the matter of staying in power.
and did mount an offensive against her leadership position, she set
In my view, contrary to what is often said, Indira Gandhi's politics
about systematically undermining state Congress caucuses. This had
became decidedly less ideological.48
two types of effects: first, party posts and patronage at the state levels
By a populist move Indira Gandhi solved this electoral crisis of her
party.49 ~ u thet long-term effects of her policies have created a crisis
of a different kind. Congress politics was marked by a paradox of con- a weak truth in these objections. Surely, Indira Gandhi did not wish to wreck
tinuity. No one would normally claim that Indira Gandhi wished to the Indian state, but equally certainly, she nearly did. Part of the problem lies
take the country on a very different line of development or diverge in our ambiguous use of the verb phrase 'Indira Gandhi did x', which is
sharply from the policy design left behind by Nehru; yet probably no underdetermined between 'intended to do x' and 'effected x'. Even unacademic
one would claim either that she left this design- unaltered, or deny that observers ofpolitics would admit, I suppose, that between two lists-the first
her initiatives or interpretations have had serious negative consequences of which showed what Indira Gandhi wished to but failed to do, and another
for the Nehruvian model.50 which showed what she perhaps did not deliberately intend but nonetheless
caused-the second would be the analytically more serious one. A structural
argument need not entirely erase intentions, only de-emphasize them. It has
48 For the contrary view, cf. Ulyanovsky 1974.
no quarrel with the reporting of intentions as long as that does not displace
49 I have suggested that this has altered the significance of elections and
the causal line. For instance, as long as intentional arguments do not go into
turned them into plebiscites: Kaviraj 1986.
rationalizing forms saying 'Indira Gandhi intended to eradicate poverty, but
50 Some criticisms of the argument of this essay at the seminar where it was
unfortunately,unimportantly, she could not', they are not seriously harmful. It
presented touched on this point. Several critics thought that the line was too
is in this sense that S. Gopal's book tells half the story of the Nehru era and
heavily 'structuralist' in the sense that it did not recognize the possibility that
gives an account of Nehru's intentions. To usg our argument a trifle
politics of indubitably bad consequences could have originated in 'innocent',
lightheartedly, it requires a complement which would state more fully Nehru's
defensible, and entirely understandable intentions. Structuralism need not ;Seny
consequences.
the necessary untidiness of political life and the complex, asymmetric rela-
51 Kaviraj 1984.
tion between intentions and consequences. It is simply required, in the face of
52 Ibid.
such criticism, to stare a sufficiently complex theory ofintentionality and accept
G
 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique
shifted towards less effective leaders, t o people who had n o political S.K. Patil, a n d Nijalingappa, never enjoyed great moral stature and
base in their states. Though o n some occasions the process of replacement dealt in quite a malodorous form of patronage politics-and thus
of older Congress leaders by the new type was accompanied by ideo- Congress did not have m u c h moral eminence t o lose. But the new
logical rhetoric-for instance, the new leaders being dedicated remov- leaders were not even products of local factional conflicts; they were
ers o f poverty-this was not taken seriously by the public, nor was the simply imposed o n state parties externally. T h e y were not even signi-
pretence kept u p for too long. N o o n e suspected the new leaders of ficantly hated, they were merely unspeakable non-entities.
harbouring ideology. In the event, most of them proved themselves t o In such circumstances, it was hardly surprising that although
be m e n of astonishing doctrinal suppleness. In the days of the socialist securely in power as long as they enjoyed the confidence o f the central
forum they thought only socialism could end Indian people's sufferings; leadership, these leaders lacked the ability t o resolve state problems o r
but during the Emergency they were quick t o appreciate the advantage serious regional
- conflicts, a n d tended to send up all local issues for a
of the Brazilian path; a n d some, the subtlest of all, declared in the days central settlement. T h e advisers of the Gandhi regime read the shirking
of the Shah Commission how they h a d nothing to d o with the Emer- of responsibility by the new vassals as a touchingmark o f their loyal<
gency regime b u t helplessly enjoyed its benefits. Although this certainly showed loyalty t o the centre a n d kept the
Second, after the fall of the earlier, older generation of state leaders, minions gainfully underemployed, it tended t o overload the centre in
Indira Gandhi's Congress did not allow electoral processes t o be re- terms of Fhe sheer number bf decisions it h a d t o make. In effect, this
vived, and these organizations, nominated from the centre, remained also shifted the power of decision-making- from those w h o knew state
completely ineffective. T h e resultant ineffectiveness ofthe state Congress politics well t o those w h o knew it less, a n d accounts perhaps for the
machinery made it inevitable that power would be shifted even more wildly fluctuating pragmatism o f Congress rule in the states after
towards the b ~ r e a u c r a c y A
. ~n~d this was a bureaucracy that would 1971.55 T h e new state leaders lacked the ability to hold political equili-
soon declare itself 'committed' t o unspecified i d e a l ~ . ~ % i n e should bria in the states by the creation a n d manipulation ofinterest coalitions
n o t be seen as a n argument that prettifies the older state leadership a n d factional politics-an unpleasant but efficacious art that Congress
of the Congress. Earlier leaders o f the Congress, like Atulya Ghosh, leaders had perfected in the earlier period of condominium with a
more distant, non-interfering centre.
As the internal linkages in the party turned increasingly one-way, T h e destruction of state-level Congress organizations was n o t acci-
governance required some two-way flow, and it shifted to the only alternative- dental, for it happened n o t only at the time Indira Gandhi was under
a degenerat-ing bureaucracy. pressure but continued way beyond 1971, when she was in uncon-
54 A committed bureaucracy was an odd idea. And i t was not consistent tested control of the party and the state, a n d the Congress went
with the professed purposes for which this idea was advanced. If this meant o n in unembarrassed cheerfulness with nominated state committees,
that the bureaucracy would remain committed to the elected government, the reducing stace leaders t o mere clients rather than supporters of the
idea was redundant, because it was meant to be so anyway. If it meant
commitment to a party irrespective of its electoral fate, this was blasphemous, 55 Congress pragmatism was fluctuating in the following sense: various social
because it went right against the principle of democracy. If it meant a lobbies-ordinarily caste and regional groupings-perpetually contended for
commitment to socialism, it was the most paradoxical of all, because socialism control within the Congress Party. Access to high government positions made
is a matter of policies; and either before or after the bureaucracy's commitment it possible to restructure governmental benefits in their favour. Often, one
to the government, the government failed to commit itself to socialism. If it interest lobby of this kind would be replaced b y another, and immedi-
meant a coded appeal to IeadersSor preferment to a small coterie of politicians ately restructure benefit legislations to the utter detriment of consistency in
and bureaucrats for their commitment to socialism in some mistily distant government policy. In recent years, this has happened most frequently through
past, this was understandable and part of a solid tradition of sycophancy caste-related reservation legislations, for example in Gujarat in the very recent
stretching into medieval times. past.
central a u t h o r i t ~ . ~ "hus,
7 Indira (;;lncihi changed the Congress into a turned political ideology-n ser-ious disputation a b o ~ ~ thC
t
highly cer~rralizcda n d undemocratic part!, organization, frorn thc social de.;isn d u r i n g t h e N e h r r ~er:~-into a tncre electoral diccourse.
earlier federal, democratic a n d ideological fornlarion that Nehru had H c r use o f vacuous slogans werc n o t m e a n t to be translated i n t o gov-
led. It should b r n m i n o r issue o f Indian politics t h a t t h e party - . which ernnlent policies. T h e shift o f ( : o n ~ r e s s to populist politics quickly
vowed t o defend democracy in India could n o t retain it within its set LIP a n e w >rrLlcrure of p l i t i c a l c o m m u n i c a t i o n i n whicll Indira
o w n fold. Also, t h e earlier unstated doctrine was that a strong centre G ~ n d h couldi appeal tiirectly t o t h e electorate over t h e heads o f part!.
could be based only o n powerfill states: in her regime, t h e power of the orgariizarions.'l'herelationbetween t h e party a n d its leader was t u r n e d
state governments a n d of t h e centre began t o be interpreted in entire- around: instead o f t h e organization carrying her t o power, she carried
ly zero-sum rerms, irrespective o f whether states were controlled by them. Naturally, t h e Congress hecamea less serious political mechanism
rhe Congress o r opposition parties.5- Eventually, w e witness a furrher because b o t h o f its significant I.unctions were slowly taken away: elec-
paradox o f po\ver. T h e Indira G a n d h i regime's answer t o a general tions were w o n by Indira Gandhi's ability to directly appeal to t h e
sense o f gathering crisis was a n obsessive centralization that defeated masses; daily governance was slowly given over to t h e official government
its o w n purpose. She was arguably a m o r e powerfc~lprime minister machinery a n d a n increasinglv politicized administration. D u r i n g its
than N e h r u in terms o f control over t h e party a n d t h e stare. But she great electoral victories in t h e early 1')70s, amidst t h e celebrations t h e
presided over a system which, though m o r e centralized, h a d a c t ~ ~ a l l y Congress Party as a polirical organizarion died a quiet death.
become far weaker. A naturrll correlate t o this was t h e gradual shift o f political (as o p -
Gradually, t h e rt:dund,lncy o f state parrics also extended to t h e posed to adm inistrativc) tasks t o t h e higher echeions o f t h e bureaucracy,
centre, a n d effective power shifrrd e n t ~ r e l yt o g o v e r n n ~ e n t a echelons.
l which became increasingly m o r c powe~.fula t t h e cost o f becoming
C e r e m o t ~ ~ aledderzhip
l o f t h e (:ongrrss I'arty became a redundant more politici7ed.ix As the logic o f m o d e r n bureaucracies is ccntralisr.
function: cither Indir'l (;andhi herself was the leader b u t derived her thisnided the tendency towards a mindless centralization ofincreasingly
legitimacy frorn being t h e premier; o r w h e n it was s o m e o n e else, his irresponsit,le powel-. (:ountervailing institutions gave way, through a
position w a s p ~ ~ r e ldve c o r a t i v e . T h i s d e v e l o p m e n t implied t h e s i m u l r , ~ t i c o ~decline
~s o f parliament a n d t h e court-though t h e first
clestrucrion o f o n e o f t h e checks within t h e Nehruvian structure: t h e was less remarked becausc m n c h o f its humiliarion a n d inrffectivrness
p ; ~ r t ycould often balance t h e governmental wing. Except in times was self-ir~flicred.Majorities became s o large as t o m a k e rheir tetiding
o f elections, Indira (;andhi ran w h a t c o u l d ironically be called a a n d discipline unnecrssarv, Ieadir~geventually t o t h e cotnic sirunrion
parryless government, i n which, symbolically, s o m e o f h e r m i n o r officr o f t h e presenr Congress I'art? worrying a h o u t t h e attendance o f irs
fi~nctionariesassumed m o r e importance i n terms o f access, timing, members in crucial debates in p ~ r l i a ~ - n e n t . iAlthough
" shortsighted
a n d powers o f facilitating a n d delaying decisions, than senior party bureaucrats may have initially rejoicecl at this accessior? t o power, often
leaders. misreading this as a n instrumcnt o f reformist policies, it was gradually
Bur this decline o f t h e party c o u l d n o r have happened had not
Indira G a n d h i changed t h e entire nature ofpolitics. T h i s new, pop~llist
5"Politicization' herc doer nor mem the hurc~ucrdcy'sdevorion ro social
programmes on ideological lines, bur to a pertonal leadership of [he state.
'" Tendencies of this kinci ro~xirdsarrophy of rhc parry mechanism have Ironical13 i t became so dzvoreci char ir lost all capaciry for self-defence when
been studied for quire some rime, nor surprisit~glyInore often by liberal aca- the high coterie fell for [he sed~lcrionsof the 'Brazilian parh'.
detnics than by h4arxists. %
59 The Congress Party had ro issue a particularly srern admonition ro its
5' T h e central Congress leadership appears ds suspicious of an H . N . members to respecr [he whip. 'There was an alarming rendency among parlia-
Bahugund a? ofa Jyori Basu, an esrraordinary artirude ifone rook party divisions mentarians of [he ruling parry ro take rheir masivc n~ajoriryfor granted and
seriously. pursue orher inrerc5t! whcn pdrlialnenr \\as in sewon.
 The Trajectories o f the Indian .State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 133
132
the tasks of poli- earlier achieved massive mandates, could face equally massive popu-
realized that bureaucrats could not always
lar movements, as happened in Gujarat in 1974. Popular criticism
tical leaders, and the decline of procedural civilities of capitalist
ofgovernmental performance was deprived of its legitimatechannel in
democracy could be eventually used to the detriment of all elements.
elections because of populism spilling out on to the streets. Indira
Particularly fatal was the loan that the CPI lobbies made to the Cong-
Gandhi's answer to previous electoral instability under opposition rule
ress of its own slogans, symbols, argument, and language-to their
in the states was not much better than the earlier situation. Instabil-
own detriment, as it turned out in 1976.
ity was not reduced, but internalized. Instead of unstable opposition
A remarkable feature of the new politics was the quickening of the
coalitions following one upon theother, now equally unstable Congress
political cycle. Indira Gandhi had carried her party to power in 1971
coalitions followed in quick succession; and since Congress did not
o n promises which were more radical and proportionately more un-
have a clear programme in terms of policies they could follow widely
realistic than earlier programmes. Factors which obstructed the real-
divergent trajectories in distributing benefits to social groups.
ization of milder promises still remained and equally pevented any
The evolution of the Congress in the years of Indira Gandhi ought
realization of the stronger promise, if of course this was taken literally.
Governments had to pay the price of such sooner than not to be seen in purely party or governmental terms. I have suggested
that the Congress debacle in the late 1960s was related to a threatened
expected. Under Nehru, the electoral majorities ofcongress had never
secession of rich agrarian groups from the ruling coalition. But, as
been comparably large; yet none ofthose administrations had difficulty
every threat is an offer, it represented their willingness to return to the
in seeing through their appointed constitutional terms. Remarkably,
fold with the terms ofthe protocol renegotiated in their favour. Under
after Indira Gandhi's victory in 1971, no government has actually
the pressure of the Emergency, and partly through the systematic
lasted its term. By 1973, Indira Gandhi's large parliamentary majority
concessions given to the agrarian rich, the Congress gradually got them
notwithstanding, shewasin deep political crisis.TheJanata government,
back into its fold. Congress organizational positions were laid open
with a large majority, lasted barely three years. Indira Gandhi, in her
to these politicians, who were sometimes unused to the subtleties of
second term in power, was politically in trouble at the time of her
bourgeois democracy The agricultural policy of the government
death.
showed reluctance to either tax or impose other levies on the major
This calls for some explanation. In fact, the textbook translation of
beneficiaries of the green revolution.
electoral majorities into administrative capabiliry to rule was failing
The Emergency, ofcourse, overshadowed all other political questions
to take place. Indeed, it seems that the larger the majority of the
for some time. Although initially defended by seemingly economic
government, the more difficult it finds the general business of orderly
arguments, the Emergency regime soon ran out ofarguments of justi-
governance. I have claimed elsewhere that this is due to a change in the
fication in redistributive terms. Polirically, however, it showed an ex-
nature of elections-which was initiated by the government party, but
treme point of centralization. It showed literally how a personal crisis
later used by the electorate to register its protest against the current
ofthe leader could be turned into a political crisis ofthe state. It showed
political dispensation.
how, through a combination of centralization and the suspension of
Elections have turned increasingly into populist referendums, in
normal constitutional procedures of responsible government, actual
which a highly emotive, rhetorical issue is placed before the electorate
power could shift to extra-constitutional caucuses. In a country with
immediately before the polls, screening offfrom view the mixed record
such a rich and varied culture ofpast tyranny, this revealed aparticularly
ofan incumbent regime. This has given thesegovernments exaggerated
dangerous trend. It also showed, finally, how an excessively authoritarian
electoral majorities witho; clear mandates; but, more significantly, it
regime blocked off its own channels of communication to the extent
has destroyed the effectiveness of the electoral mechanism as a register
ofbelieving that it could win elections after the Emergency Historically,
of popular dissatisfaction. Thus, governments which a few months
 The Trajectories of the Indian Stute The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique

however, the experience of the Emergency demonstrated that a solu- highly likely. The Emergency did not improve either the state's eco-
tion to India's political ills should not be sought in an authoritar- nomic performance or administrative functioning, and appeared a
ian alternative. Democracy had lumbered on untidily for thirty years; gratuitous exchange of bourgeois authoritarianism for bourgeois
authori-tarianism took less than two years to male the country democracy. Hut it made some earlier detractors of 'bourgeois' demo-
ungovernable for itself. cracy see its limited advantages-something that had not appeared
clearly to some radical groups in the thirty years when rights were
available became clear in the nineteen months when these weredenied.
Crisis 1975-1987
An ironic 'gain' of the Emergency years has been a greater appreciation
Though the period after the death of Nehru was one of political of the value and vulnerability of bourgeois democracy when no higher
instability, the character ofpolitical turmoil and the sense ofpessimism form seems to be in sight.
associated with it were of a different character from the present ,gloom. The end of the Emergency, however, did not see an alteration of this
What declined then was a government party and not the institutional crisis politics. The Janata regime failed its mandate in all possible ways.
structure ofthestate. Slowly, suchdistinctions have become obliterated, First, it wrongly translated a matter of principle into a question of
and the general tone of thinking in India has become perceptibly personal vendetta, which invited the nation to read the principles and
darker, movingfrompoliticaldisquiet to adeeper historical pessimism. issues involved in the experience in a wholly misleading way. Second,
And this sense ofapprehension about the fragilityofIndiandemocracy, it entirely misjudged a negative voce against the Emergency into a
and pessimism about the tasks which the young state had once hope- positive vote for its more conservative policy inclinations. To put it
fullv set itself, is naturally deeply associated with the dark experience rhetorically, its leaders first thought this was a vote of no-confidence
of the Emergency years. by the nation against theNehru model ofpolicies; while, in fact, it was
There has been a great deal of debate about the significance of a vote calling for a return from the Emergency rule of Indira Gandhi
the Emergency period: whether it was inevitably caused by a crisis of to the policies ofNehru, avote for the past Congress against the present
capitalism or simply a generalization ofapersonal crisis in an excessively one. In any case, it did not have a long enough term to clearly work out
centralized state; whether it was an aberration or showed a more in- its policies on major politico-econornicquestions; so that its supporters
sistent long-term tendency towards authoritarianism. Although the and critics can carry on an infructuous debate, maintaining that if it
form in which the political crisis erupted during the Emergency has had been in power for a long term this would have been, respectively,
gone into the past, I think it can be argued that the period marked the for better or for worse for India than under the Congress regime. Its
beginning of a quite different kind of difficulty for the political order internal factional squabbles, its inability to set its own terms of policy,
in India. This is a process in which a crisis-laden ruling group is its acceptance of the terms that an out-of-power Indira Gandhi set to
drawing the party, the governmental system, eventually the state itself, it, converged to bring about an ignominious departure from ineffective
into crisis. Empirically the assertion that the period since 1975 has power into abusive exile. But its greatest failure was in not being able
been one of almost uninterrupted political disorder hardly needs to restore politics to policies and principles of bourgeois democratic
demonstration. Occasionally, the crisis has changed form, terrain, ex- government. In fact, its atracks on Indira Gandhi actually increased
pression, nodal points-in structuralist language, its site, and its bear- the indistinctness of persons and institutions. The joyous enthusiasm
ers. But a sense ofa historical crisis-a sense ofincreasing vulnerability with which the liberal intelligentsia joined thete personal debates and
and exhaustion of the s t a e in face of self-produced disorders-has debased questions of principle into a ledger of personal qualities con-
scarcely ever disappeared in the last ten years.The way the ~ m e r g e n c ~ tributed to this denouement. As a result, what could have been turn-
ended showed that authoritarianism blocks off its own channels of ed inro an occasion for restating an agenda of political principles went
political communicatiun and response, and makes aviolent retribution waste.
136 The TYrlje~toriesof the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 137
As the Janata Party failed to pose questions of principle, Indira of 'modernist' politicians, believers in the powers of modern advertis-
Gandhi's return to power in 1980 did not involve any serious critical inganda judiciouscombination ofreligious and electronicsuperstition.
self-reflection on the part of the Congress. Consequently, several ten- What was remarkable about Indira Gandhi's leadership was the equal
dencies opposed to bourgeois principles of democratic governance, tolerance she extended to such diverse 'ideological' groups and the
introduced during the Emergency, came back with her restoration to equal willingness to unsentimentally distance herself from them when
power.The equation ofthe fate ofa nation with that of theNehru fami- the occasion arose.
ly, the open support for hereditary succession to power, and the total Indira Gandhi's rule, notwithstanding its rhetoric, resulted in a
suspension of electoral forms within the Congress remained entirely decline ofpolitical ideology, a delinking of power from ideological and
unchecked and uncriticized within the ruling party, due mainly to social programmes. This has led to a general debasement of politi-
the ineptness of the Janata Party in posing a principled challenge. cal ideology in the popular mind (except obviously in states ruled by
These were simply the more dramatic instances of a reintroduction of left parties which treat ideology as serious business), to which the
retrograde, nearly feudal, forms of irresponsible power in the bour- opportunism and personalism of her opposition made a distinguish-
geois state apparatus itself. And since the state occupied such a large ed contribution. Eventually, her last years came to be dominated by
space in modern Indian society and was, in a true sense, the educator two regional movements which, though superficially antithetic, were
of educators, appointer of appointers, and patron of patrons, these actually linked to each other by internal relations of a structural sort.
deformations travelled rapidly down thesystem into a quicksubversion These were related because they show two poles of the intensification
of principles and formats of equality of opportuni ty and merit at every of regional inequality due to unrestricted and unreflective capitalist
level of institutional life. It helped do away with bourgeois principles development. At the time of her tragic death, Indira Gandhi faced,
of recruitment and advance, and replaced them with a system of for the third time in her eventual political career, a threat of encircle-
patronage in the huge network of public institutions, starting from the ment by difficulties and insurmountable problems. And even if she
planning mechanism to the socially irrelevant uni~ersities.~' had fought the elections it is likely that she would have won with a far
The dominant patronage groups in such a system changed rapidly, reduced and insecure majority. Her career illustrated the deeper crisis
along with bewilderingly quick changes of policy orientation-an of Indian polity: that even dramatic electoral victories were indecisive
abject indecisiveness rationalized in the name of pragmatism. T h e and could turn dramatically into their opposite.
'correct' ideology in the early 1970s was a vague espousal of socialism Indira Gandhi's period in power, underneath the misleading formal
uninsistent on its policy realization. Those who attained eminence continuity of the Congress system, revised some of the fundamental
from this political group were replaced during the Emergency by premises of the Nehru model. These are not accidental or style differ-
politicians who favoured the 'Brazilian path' and forced steriliza- ences, but of principles of structuring the political order. The Nehru
tion as solutions to the country's economic problems, and confus- elite tried to take a historical view of the possibilities of social change
ed improvement of society with the beautification of its capital and came to the conclusion, written into its social theory, that the
cities. Subsequently, even these leaders made way for a newer group construction of a modern, relatively independent capitalism required
a reformist and statist bourgeois programme. Indira Gandhi's successor
regime gradually abandoned the element of historical thinking as a
Indeed, the kind of decline the universities have undergone, their pitiful
matter of dispensable luxury and went for whacit rationalized to itself
collective inability to ensure the imparting ofskills which their degrees certify,
could have been rolerated by sozety only because they were in a large measure as a more pragmatic programme. It reduced even the planning appa-
irrelevant. H a d it been otherwise, there w o u l d have been s t r o n g ratus, entrusted by Nehru with the task of serious long-term deve-
counterpressures from inrerested groups like the entrepreneurial class and the lopmental reflection, to more short-term accounting, though depending
middle classes to make [hem deliver the goods. on its statistical ability to turn the poverty of the people into the wealth
'.
 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution and India: A Critique 139
of the nation. Its pragmatism led it to abandon some of the points of the aftermath of Independence. Capitalist development increased the
the Second Plan kind ~ f s t r a t e g y . Gradually,
~' the government allowed economic power of two regionally conscious groups, the rich farmers
a massive campaign to gain momentum for the privatization of indus- and the regional bourgeois interests. In face ofthe first wave ofregional
try and other economic activities, reducing public investment, and movements in the 1950s, the Nehru government had made a relatively
altering the nature of the investment where it still existed. Its successor clear distinction between cultural and economic questions, and had
regime also started plans for extending this policy of liberalization conceded the first kind of demand. Demands for linguistic states
towards greater foreign collaboration in order to obtain more sophisti- or the use of vernacul.ars in state administration, occasionally even
cated technology. Politicians within the cabinet began to launch open negative sensibilities, such as opposition to the introduction of Hindi,
attacks on the public sector on the grounds of its inefficiency, though were accepted through a generally consultative process. Strikingly,
much ofthe inefficiency is due to the interference and wasteful exploit- acknowledgement ofsuch demands did not weaken the process ofcen-
ation of its facilities by the government bureaucracy and politicians. It tralization of planning decisions about the economy. Decisions re-
abandoned the earlier strategy of institutional changes for agricultural garding development investments were left, partly due to the political
growth in favour of a green revolution strategy unaccompanied by any quiescence of these groups, to the central planning machinery.
redistributive controls. Under Indira Gandhi, the situation changed drastically. Increasing
Political changes were equally vital. The Congress government pressures were now mounted for regional allocation ofheavy industries
under Indira Gandhi gradually allowed a profitable breakdown of and other such symbols of regional prestige. It is misleading to believe
bourgeois frameworks of formal propriety since they were occasionally the vulgar theory that opposition parties alone pressed for economical-
inconvenient encumbrances in its path. In bourgeois political systems, ly unjustifiable regional demands. Indeed, many of these regionalisms
there must be a reliable relation between the structure of classes and were first articulated within the ruling party itself, Congress often hav-
the format ~ f ~ a r t i e s . abandonment
~~~he of ideological politics by the ing absorbed them.63 Indira Gandhi's state increasingly gave way to
ruling party and cheerful retaliatory imitation by opposition groups such internal regionalisms. Often, it would have been better to des-
causes this relation to break down through defection, the bending of cribe the Congress as the only party which was hospitable to regionalisms
constitutional norms, etc. This can destroy popular faith in democratic of all areas, with a thin crust of the central leadership and, naturally,
institutions. Besides, the breakdown of ground rules of political be- the central bureaucracy providing a failing counterweight. Worse,
haviour tends to make the political world unfamiliar and unrecognizable occasionally the regime played one regionalism against another, as it
to the political actors rhemselves, encouraging behaviour that is blind, also did with religious communici.es, hoping to benefit electorally
wild, and anomic. from their double insecurity. Surely, these were clever manoeuvres in
The Congress under Indira Gandhi, in effect, renegotiated some the short run; in the long run they undermined the bases ofnationalism.
of the fundamental definitions of Indian political life. Two of In fact, the region of the national capital came to develop a pampered
these crucial principles were those of 'the national' and 'the secular'. regionalism of its own.
Some amount of regional political articulation was unavoidable in Evidently, similar things happen with regard to communalism too.
Concessions given to religious communities as communities under-
mined the theory of a common individual citizenship and created
There is a fairly large and incisive literature in Marxist economics about
this turn in the nature of government economic policies and the consequent \
retrogressive trends in p l a n n i e . 6 3 The two clear examples of Congress hospitality to regionalism in recent
'* This does not mean, however, that a single class would be represented by times are the handling of the Andhra agitations of a decade ago, and the early
a single party. It simply means that for social pressures to work through the encouragement to breakaway groups from the Akalis in the hope of splitting
party system, there must be some reliability in party programmes. the Akali vote in Punjab.
~ I i cgrot111il51i)r .I r;~picI increase o f n ~ ~ ~ j o rciot m y m u n a l i s n ~ FIi.lling
. has further intensified these irnbalc~nccs. No\z,l~crci 5 r l i i rc.\ i,ali,cl ~ i i o r ~ ,
hl~15lin1s ol or t i e ~ ~ m i n o r i t ~ ~ c o ~ n m ithat
~ ~ ltheir
i r i e sfatewas secure only than in theinternal incompatibility b e n v c e ~ ~.egioll,~I
i ~ [ C I I ~ . II<cy(ili-
II~[~.
\ \ i t 1 1 rlic ruling p,u-ty kcp[ sijcli insecurities alive. Most seriously t h e alism in l'unjab is e s s e ~ ~ t i a l al yn anii-reciibirihi~~ivc ,\gir,\iioll \ \ l ~ i 11i
govcrnllielit c~llo\zc.J;I subversion o f secular principles o f the state by insists o n retaining and extending t h e economic. ,icl\.~l~t.~t;c ot tl~c
incrcc~jiliglyili\,oking t h e religious principle o f snrvndLlnrmnsnmn- state, particularly o f farmers, o\,er orher st,Ltes, r c g i o n , ,~nctc-Ia\jch.
~ / / ~ i ! j v i ,clitirc.l!, i ~ l c o m ~ ~ a r iLvirh
b l e democratic secularism. l ' h e Indian T h e Assam agitation presses w h a t arc, in essence, r c c l l h t ~ - i i ) [ ~itc- r~\~.
stare rocla!. dcclarcs itself to b e multireligious, a complete reversal of m a n d s on t h e central government: a n d t h c t ~ z ~ki11d5 o ot'c[c.~il,~~icls .IIT
t h e Nchru\.ian principle t h a t there was a n equality ofall religions to be incomparible.""The ccnrre also somcrimes plays t ~ rcgio~i;~l p clc1n.i11c[5
practised :IS t h e private affair o f individuals. Finally, t h e inability o f with incredible shortsigl~tedness.At prcseur, i t is miIcil\. c.~~i.ot~r;?>:in$
t h e C:ortgrcss government t o clearly d e n o u n c e t h e c o m m u n a l riots the causes in C;orkh,~landa n d fighting t h e conscclllcrlcc5 in 1'~11!j.~h, a
.liter Indir'l (;antihi's death provided a significant encouragement to subtlety o f approach truly w o r t h y o f t h c preselll Incl1,111el~tc.."'
tlic forces o f t-li~iducolnmunalism. A crisis can be called strucrur;~l,nor c o n j u n c t l ~ ~ . ai lt ,' i ~,~risc,sfl-0111
'I'hc st;ltc c i ~ r i o ~believes l ~ l ~ even today that t h e best way ofcontroI- inside t h e basic laws of m o v e m e n t o f a sy5tc111, I . J ~ \ I V I . rh,i~ltr-0111 ex
lir12 rcligiol1s h n a r i c i s n ~is t o lend t h e government-controlled media ternalities. Several aspects o f t h e present crisis ol'thc I llcli.i~i~ [ , I I L . tiecd
to r ~ l i ~ i leaders, o ~ ~ s a n d give t h e greatest coverage o n T\I t o routine to be noreti. It is n o t a simple crisis o f t h e cconoriiy I r.~ll\I.~~i'ci c1c -
rcligio~lspractices. I l u r i n g rhc N e h r u period, Dussera, Diwali, Id, a n d terministically into political di\ordei-. S o m c ~ ) rh', t i-nlrlit .\I 1)) o i c , \ -
(:h~.isr~ii;~s, celehrared presumably u ~ i t l customary
i enthusiasm, passed ses o f crisis have hardly a n y t h i n g t o d o , directly . ~ Ic.,i>~.
t \ \ , ~ i lt ~i ~ cl o g i c
off un~ioticecih y radio, in contrast wirh t h e prcsent coveragc by seculat o f economic development. No d e e p r c o n o ~ n i clogic 111;1(1~ 1 1 clc \t~.o!,
television. A state arnicd wirh such suicidal weapons does n o t need elementary d c f nitions o f secularism. .l'he checrt;ll incli tfci i.li~c.\ \ , ~ r l i
c o m m ~ l n a lp:irrics f;)r its desrabilization. Remarkably, tlle subversion which it has allowed t h e education sJfsrcrn t o d c c l i ~ i ei j c-c.rr.~ilil\.riot
o f rhc definition o f secularisnl was not d o n e by c o m m u n a l forces a n d induced by e c o n o m i c necessity. .I-his has given t h e starc ,I g r c , ~clioicc ~
par-tics b u t accomplished by [he stare. o f w e a p o n s with which t o deal self-intlicteci w o ~ ~ n odns its o\\ 11 5tr~1c.-
'l'lie lack of historical self-analysis by t h e stare a n d its s u p p o r t i n g ture. Interestingly, these trends have appeared tior b e c , ~ ~ ~L.:it)ir.lli\ni sc.
intelligentsia and its conversion t o a doctrine o f pragmatism m e a n t , in has n o t been able to develop adeqilately h u t precisel!. h e c a ~ i ~o ct I he,
effect, that even normal rational procedures o f rctlection o n effects o f
carlier policies havc hcen a b a n d o n e d in G v o u r of a n exclusive search
for electoral power. Its correlate, o u t by economists, is a ten- "4 I r is remarkable how [he logic of regional dcm,lnci\ ot'lhc I L ) i O \ . l l l L l ( 1 1 ~ .
dency to channel resources i~xcreasinglyi n t o 'dole' p r o g r a m m e s rather 1970s difkrs. The demand for '1 liliguisric sr,trc, o ~ ~ ci oi .i ~ i c ~ l iIn~ dO I I ~i . i \ r
than the creation of-productive resources, which have longer gestation srrerlgrhcned ihc case oforher, similarly p l ~ c c c~~lI c , ~ In
> . ihc .l\i. o f ' ~ 1 1 vdi.~lr.i~l~i

pel-ioJ5 a n d c a n n o t he aJ;tptcd to t h e eventful electoral calendar. for ecorlornic rcsouuceb, rhc g,mc is p~iricipallyc.cr.o-\l~i~~. \ \ ~ r hr l i i . \ t ~ , r : L 01'
I)olitici;ins o f t h c N e h r u era would have been surprised if told that, one srare curring againsr [he ,hare ofall orhers.
Ii)rtv yc,~rs'after Indeperidence, the state they h a d set u p w o u l d be riven " Since the wriring ofrhis c5sa!,, rhc 5r;lrc h ; ~ I)I.OLI~III
, . I ~ O L I L J L I ~ I C L ,I I ! [ l ~ i

hill areas ofWcsr Bengdl. Bur ho\\ far 'lnd ho\\ long ir hold\ I \ to 1 ~\i.crl . I IIL
h>.colitlicrs ovrr t\vo retrograde fbrces-regionalism a n d conlmunalism.
few years of Raii\. Gandhi's rule ha\,c bcrn 5rsca.n wirh rhc ili.l)~-i\ o t /,.lr r i
/ l n d t h e rcgiolialisni t h , ~ tthreatens t o engulf t h e polity toda!. is q u i t e
and accords. He has made Inore pacrs rhan Xlerrcrnich: a ~ ~chi. c i i;~c I r 1 i . i ~i 1 1 : i i -
clea~-l!r;~ consecluencc o f t l i c inequities o f the capitalist growth process. nal conflicts in rhc Indian srarc are arrcndcd to i n ,I \r!.li, of t l i p l o n ~ . ~\,I!\ ~!
( ; o \ , c r n n ~ c ~ iI ti s, l \ ~l x c n co~isisrenrlyinattentive to regio~ialeconomic ~ r proccnes of narional in[cgr,lrion rh,ir [hi. (:o~i;:l-i.\\I I . ~ \
something a b o ~ the
i l i c . ( l ~ ~ , ~ l ililierired
i~! From rlic colonial period. C:apitalisr development set in niotion.
142 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Passive Revolution a n d India: A Critique 143
manner of its growth. So, with greater g o w t h of capitalism, these we consider only the socially relevant tears, the promise is as distant
incompatibilities are likely to intensify and not ease off. today as at the romantic time when it was made.
T h e idea that capitalism is a social form implies that to expand or
to simply carry on, its economic structures require some political-ins- References
titutional complements. There are certain typesofpolitical-institutional Bardhan, Pranab. 1985. PoliticalEconomy ofDevelopment in India. New Delhi:
forms which constitute preconditions for a purely economic repro- Oxford University Press.
duction of capitalist society. Indian capitalism is in a state of serious Chandra, Bipan. 1979.Jawaharlal Nehru and the Indian Capitalist Class. In
political crisis. Conservative economists would argue, though I think idem, Nationalism and Colonialism in Modern India. New Delhi: Vikas.
u n c o n ~ i n c i n g l that
~ , the Indian economy has done reasonably well, Frankel, Francine. 1978. Indiai Political Economy. Princeton: Princeton
if you ignore the distributive performance of the system; no political University Press.
analyst can, however, claim chat the Indian state has done reasonably Grarnsci, Antonio. 1971. Sekctiom fiom the Prison Notebooks. Trans. and
well in quite the same sense. It is reacting defensively, and adopting ed. Q Hoare and G. Nowell-Smith. London: Lawrence and Wishart.
undemocratic and precapitalist responses on vital issues. Most alarm- Hirschman, A. 1970. Exit, Voiceandloyalty. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Uni-
ingly, it is increasingly proving incapable of providing the most vital versity Press.
Kaviraj, S. 1982. Economic Development and the Political Syscern. Paper for
precondition for bourgeois development-the provision of political
acolloquiurnon Indian Economic Development,October 1982,University
stability.
of Economics, Vienna.
T h e state's difficulties should be seen as a structural crisis. Political . 1984. On the Crisis of Political Institutions in India. Contributions to
crisis may break out through the mismanagement of political op- Indian Sociology, no. 2.
tions by rulers, or sub-optimal decisions by the ruling bloc. A crisis is . 1986. Indira Gandhi and Indian Politics. Economic and Political
structural if it arises out of self-related difficulties, because it emerges Weekly. September.
not out of the failure of the social form, but its successes. It is not a Kaviraj, S. 1987. Gramsci and Different Kinds of Difference. Seminar on
condition of 'abnormality' which could be expected to disappear with Gramsci and South Asia in July 1987, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences,
a change of leaders or parties. It is coming to be a condition ofstressful, Kolkata.
violent normalcy of this late, backward, increasingly unreformist, Mackie, J. 1975. Causes and Conditions. In E. Sosa, ed., Causation and
capitalist order. It is different even from a standard Gramscian case; Conditionah. London: Oxford University Press.
because here even a passive revolution has not succeeded, but is laps- Marx, K. 1973. Grundrisse. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Mitra, Ashok. 1977. Ems of fiade and Class Relations. London: Frank Cass.
ing into failure. Those who would see present difficulties as 'failures'
Poulantzas, Nicos. 1978. State, Power, Socialism. London: New Left Books.
of Indian capitalism would find this difficult to explain. It is the 'suc-
Riker,W.H. 1970 (1962). The Theory ofPoliticalCoalitions. New Delhi: Oxford
cesses' of Indian capitalism that have caused them. So, if it becomes and IBH.
more 'successful' in the ways it has pursued over the last twenty years, Singh, Charan. 1978. Indiai Economic Policy. New Delhi: Vikas.
these problems will not go away, but perhaps intensify.The tragic thing Singh, Chhatrapati. 1985. Law between Anarchy and Utopia. Delhi: Oxford
is that the crisis of ruling-class politics plunges not only the ruling bloc, Universiry Press.
which has ruptured its protocol, into serious disorder, but the whole Thompson, E.P. 1978. The Poverty ofTheoryandOtherEssays. London: Merlin.
country. An exhaustion of the politics of the ruling bloc does not auto- Ulyanovsky. R. 1974. Socialism and the Newly Indepen4nt Nations. Moscow:
matically prefigure a radical altbnative. It is a particularly sad chapter Progress Publishers.
of a story which had begun with the promise of something like an
'Indian revolution', an understandably unpractical and sentimental
beginning which promised to 'wipe every tear from every eye'. Even if
r,
 On the Crisis of Political Institutions in India 145
account of the attempts at institution-making in the first period of
Indian politics-its patterns and premises; in the last, I try to analyse
why these quasi-institutions have come under increasing pressure.

O n the Crisis of
Political Institutions in India Unlike other traditions of social theory, marxists use fairly strong- con-
ceptions of a social totality. In recent years, however, there has been a
distinct move in the marxian concept of a totality from an expressivist
notion around a mode of production, to a more authentically complex
concept of an overdetermined structure (Althusser 1969; Althusser

H istorical puzzles appear to be generally of two types. Some are

about facts-those arising out of our not knowing what had
been the case. There is a second kind of historical puzzle in
which the difficulty is that we know the facts but not what to do with
them. Puzzles about contemporary history are often of the second
and Balibar 1970). Traditionally, marxists were quite content with the
use of a single ordering category ofa mode ofproduction which helped
them make their two elementary principles of ordering. It provid-
ed them with a structural map of the social form; and usually with the
structural map went a recognized stock of historical inferences. They
kind. These problems elicit different kinds of response-in the first, could infer, for instance, what its most likely points ofstress would be,
empirical solutions, in the second, solutions of an interpretive kind. what types of conflict were likely to arise, and their probable course.
This essay is an attempt at interpretation, putting together the possible But in the entire history of marxism there was a parallel tendency to-
causes, patterns, and consequences of a crisis of political institutions wards a more complex picture of the totality. In Marx's own works,
in an intelligible design.' after 1848-9, there is an explicit distinction between 'first way' and
Because the way something is explained depends logically on what 'second way', or classical and belated capitalism.
is first shown as being in need of an explanation, and given that later Apart from significant economic differences, one major difference
explanatory moves always have some collusion with prior descript- between the two paths was a dislocation between two types of struc-
ive ones, it is necessary to set out the frame in which my questions tures, or their transformation in differential rhythms. In classical cases,
are posed and sought to be answered. I take my frame to be marxian the capitalist transformation of the structures of production was ac-
political theory; but the way I see it may be controversial. I think much companied by antecedent, consequent, or in any case functionally
of the space in marxian political theory is underdetermined by its related transformation of other, non-economic structures also, par-
general theoretical propositions; and these can be filled in by different ticularly the structures of the political and cultural levels. In late
explanatory styles (Kaviraj 1984: passim). The argument here is pre- capitalism, as in Germany, the relation between these two processes
sented in four parts. In the first, I briefly set out the theoretical frame seems to be sundered, and becomes increasingly a~ymmetric.~ This
in which I have tried to work my explanation. In the second, I examine seems to provide a conceptual point that can be used as a point of de-
some theories about the historical derivation of political institutions parture for the study of Indian political reality. A society, on this view,
in India, especially some optimistic ones. The third part gives an does not have an essentialist centre in its economy, such that economic
= change would bring its corollaries inevitab1y;xIts centre was in fact an
First published in contributions to Indian Sociology, no. 2, 1984. 'overdetermined' centre. The 'structuralism' of Marx included this
' For recent exercises with very similar objectives but of entirely different
theoretical provenance, see Sheth 1982 and Kothari 1984b. The locus classicus for this argument is of course Marx 1848.
146 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Crisis of Political Institutions in India
element of historical contingency in the logic of the structure i t ~ e l f . ~ has been strong enough to prevent a collapse of bourgeois industrial-
What is crucial for our analysis here is the way it renders the concept ization (unlike in other parts of the third world) but weak enough
of a social design complex-a social design, this implies, consists not to leave institutional structures largely untransformed despite initial
only of a map of primary economic relations; it includes an at least efforts. In the concept of a 'passive revolution' Gramsci condensed
equally significant map of institutional power. And the exact structure three related processes, all of which occur in India. First, the relative
of a society would depend, consequently, on what this institutional weakness of the bourgeoisie leads to a state of affairs in which agri-
map did to the economic one. By corollary, what can be called the cultural production remains backward and unaffected by capitalist
'logic of the society' would have a structure identical to Althusser's out- relations, marked in social terms by an absence of agrarian reforms.
line of 'historical time' (Althusser and Balibar 1970: ch. 4). It would Secondly, a passive revolution has some political features: it is not a
be the result of what the logic of these different structures did to each revolution led by a hegemonic class like the French or English bour-
other, and to the social whole. geoisie. It is not a class, a force of civil society which accomplishes the
This conceptual logic has been carried forward in the modern argu- capitalist revolution through exercising a moral-political function of
ment about the conceptual relation between modes of production and 'leadership'. Because of its weakness, relative political isolation, and
social f ~ r m a t i o nAs
. ~ a result, marxists now work with more complex lack of cultural leadership, it abdicates its tasks to a state bureaucratic
initial presuppositions, and also regard the principles of ordering agency which accomplishes social transformation through a function
as more complex and plural. Briefly, one can now suggest a method of ' d ~ m i n a t i o n ' In
. ~ historical terms, the state is a poor surrogate for
of using social abstractions stretched over three levels: (i) a mode of the class, for the transformations by the class are worked through the
production orders (ii) something which is itself an abstraction-the institutions of civil society, through a politics of discourse, by a slow
functional concomitance between the economic and other structures, but certain change in the structure of common sense, a process that
now called a social form-which is checked against (iii) the historical is democratic. A state bureaucracy does it by fiats, through a non-
evidence of concrete societies. In my view, a marxian analysis should discursive politics of commands. In the first case, people are talked to
enquire about modes of production, domination, and consciousness and can talk back-which eventually structures the new moral order.
in a lexical order.5 If we use the common distinction between the In the second, the state seeks to regulate and control by commands,
economic and non-economic, then this means that the basic ground with the attendent danger of violent reactions. Third, i n a passive re-
plan of the social design could be worked out by running the produc- volution the common sense of society is not restructured around
tion map through the society's institutional matrix. principles of rationality. So the society that emerges from a passive
Finally, the transition to capitalism which India is undergoing revolution lacks internal coherence between the logics governing its
should be characterized as a form of the second way, or what Gramsci economic, political, and cultural instances. Thus, it is a 'revolution
calls a 'passive revolution' (Gramsci 197 1: 105ff.). For, the central fea- without a revolution'; for the term revolution has two connotations in
ture ofthis is the relative weakness ofthe bourgeoisie, asocial force that marxian theory. It signifies a deep social transformation; but it also
means a transformation through a mass movement. Late capitalism
3 I have tried to show this in logical terms elsewhere (Kaviraj 1984). mostly produces a revolution in the first sense unaccompanied by the
For a brief account of the issues involved in this debate, see Hindess and second.'
Hirst 1977, particularly ch. 3.
It is I think quite wrong to klieve that any moves of this kind lead to a Several Indian marxists have seen the possibili>es in the conceptofa passive
collapse of marxism into explanatory pluralism, for the obvious reason that revolution. One of the first to do so was Sen 1976;Chatterjee 1984 is another
pluralists would deny the existence of such ordering principles (which they attempt in the same direction.
regard as dubiously transcendental),while this line of thought retains the idea 'There is another count on which Gramsci's model fits our conceptual
of an ordering principle, but makes it internally complex. needs. It is part of the argument condensed in the model that 'second way'
 011 the Crisis of'Politic,rl Znstitutiorzs in Zndi'z 149
colonialism a n d t h e post-colonial state, by stating ~ n p r o b l e m a t i c n l l ~
t h a t British rule s o u g h t t o build rationalist insrirutions with t h e usual
T h e historical experience o f Indian sociery after I n d e p e n d e n c e has list-the c o m m o n law, rhe bureaucracy. rhe judiciary. Obviously,
been o f a transition ro capitalism, b u t evidently o n e that fits Gramsci's there was a certain negarive effect in being subjecr t o a single set o f i n i -
model. B u t , as in t h e European cases o f l a t e capiralism, ir was initially quiries, adminisrered by a c o m m o n set- o f rules u n d e r t h e control of
widely believed thar a transirion ro s o m e t h i n g less fragmented a n d outsiders, f r o m which it was more difficult t o reprieve by t h e
inrernally conrradictorywas possible. In a n y case, [here were conrending traditional routes o f corruption a n d influence. B u t t h e insritutional
theories a b o u t whether insrirutions o f bourgeois democracy could be instinct ofBrirish imperialism was hardly coherent. Spells ofevangelical
established in post-colonial India. T h e r e were, i r seems, three srrands utilitarianism were tempered by a n ingenuous regard for traditional
o f pessimism, w h i c h shared n o premises b u t arrived b y different routes eminence. M a n y o f these colossal structures of colonial 'rarionalism'
ar a similar conclusion. Classical colonialists saw these institurions h a d feer o f vernacular clay."' A t t h e m o s t general level, t h e y lacked a
f r o m a E u r o p e a n essentialist perspective-i.e. they were so linked t o crucial precondition o f institutions: o n borh t h e D u r k h e i m i a n a n d [he
t h e peculiarities o f E u r o p e a n hisrory chat they were nor replicable else- Gramscian views, rhese have ro be part o f a n unforced c o m m o n sense.
where, a n d this view often recommended a political f o r m o f 'inter- Rules ofbehaviour. ro become institurions, require 'moral'legirimacy,' '
mediate technology' instead o f exaggerared a m b i t i o n s o f w o r k i n g a a sanction by t h e D u r k h e i m i a n ' c o m m o n consciousness'. A colonial
parliamentary democracy."here was a mirror image o f this a m o n g order lacks [his element by definition; its m e t h o d o f d i r e c t i n g society
chauvinists arguing f r o m a reverse essentialism. Marxists t o o expressed is a n y t h i n g excepr hegemonic.
a similar pessimism, t h o u g h differently g r o u n d e d . " ~ terestingly, w h a t True, rhe British exerted rhemselves t o ensure a sorr o f surrogate
has h a p p e n e d i n rhe years after Independence does nor bear a n y o f rationality for t h e u p p e r o r d e r o f t h e bureaucracy by gradually training
these o u t . u p a small srrarunl o f bi-culrural bureaucrars t h r o u g h t h e ICS ins-
T o understand why political institutions have n o t raken root, tead o f t h e initial policy o f d e p e n d e n c e o n simply bilingual subalt-
o n e must- c o n t e n d w i t h a r g u m e n t s w h i c h were optimistic t h a t they erns. B u t ro see this as a plan for a rarionalization o f t h e social order
w o u l d . T h i s optimisnl was n o t entirely graruirous. Apart f r o m t h e is ro misjudge their crucial a n d limited instrumer~tal intent. W i t h
general u r o p i a n i s ~ nabour decolonization in t h e 1950s, they rested o n grearer integration o f t h e colony in politico-economic rerms, this be-
three-now i r seems oversin~~lified-readings o f political history. c a m e a necessary requirement for a p i ~ r e l yadministrative 'meshing' o f
Even nationalist rextbooks often asserred a curious continuiry between t h e u p p e r bureaucracy in I n d i a w i t h t h e resr o f t h e administrarive
structure in metropolitan Britain.12A minimal order h a d t o becreated
simply t o ensure that rhe I n d i a n adminisrrarion functioned i n a social
capiralism produces grearer regional imbalance, which Gramsci analysed in
"I Most of the so-calletl rationalistic institurions wcre bywords in perry
his arricles on the 'Southern Quesrion'. Cf. Gramsci 1978 for an elucidarion
of [he idea of passive revolution and Buci-Glucksmann 1979, 1780: 54-63. corruption-incl~rding the blindfolded sword-bearing figure of justice. As
It is not uncommon to find vestiges of this attitude ro this day, advancing social no\.cls ofren point our, she could only understand English, and oftcn
an 'intermediate technology' argument in politics and expressing relief that hel- rationalistic deliberations were conrrolled by the translating, less highly
most third world countries have adopted forms of authoritarian politics rather prilicipled babu. The law was often shockingly exploited by cr~~ciall!;placed
than the more delicate mechanisms of represenrati\.e democracy. bilingual scoundrels.
'Democratic institutions, so t h ; argument rum, wcre successful only in " A term which, oddly Durkheim and Gramsci use iri exacrly the same
sense.
situatio~lsof colonial capitalist expansion in Europe; as rhese conditions are
I ' The famous trials of some of the successf~rlcoloni:llisrc probably had
unrepeatable, to rxpect democratic insritutions to take root is an optimistic
fallacy. something to do with this. 7'hosc who camr to know rhe ropcs in the Indian
 On t / i e Crisis c!j'l'o/itz~,i~/
/~rstitrction,iw ftldiicr 151
language that rhc colonial ot'ficc undersrood. Such arcenlpts at ration- ch. 2). In the culrure of colonialisn~there was thus a peculiar conver-
alizarion brerc. anyway 11cd~c.din I,y exen~ptionsfor rhe lower ~ ~ I I - C ~ L I - gence of opposites-colonialists who thought char Asiatics could not
cracy, rhe cnornious administrative ~ ~ n d e r w o r ltoo d vast .tnd too work these with chauvinists w h o regarded these as alien constructs.
insignificant to be transformed. British administration iollowed 3 Historians with a more nationalist inclination ha\lesometimes taken
policy of sti~diednon-interference in the social institutiorls of [he a second line ofargument about the possibility ofbourgeois democra-
colony. I n the princely states, and in other spheres ofpolitical life, the tic institutions. Oppositional movements can escape absorption by a
British underwrote the existing styles of pre-capitalist authority. T h e superior power only if their internal rules of governance are different
institutional legacy of colonialism was indeed extremely mixed. in principle from those of the society they wish to subvert. Colonial
Attempts at introducing modern i n s t i t ~ ~ r i o also
n s led to some para- rule could not be hegemonic; 1)ut there were the makings o f a counter-
doxes. I'racticall!; it was false to believc that institutions of Western hegemony in the national nlovenlent ( B h a t t n ~ h a r 1979).~a Institutions
provenance could not be worked by Indians. Economic structures like ofdenlocratic decision-making, and traditions of secular, national (as
handling companies or stock exchanges were soon mastered by eligi- opposed to regional) policy, it is said, emerged through the activity a n d
hle Indians. Marwari businessnlen o n the C a l c ~ ~ t jute t a market were experience of Congress nationalism. It was therefore a simple transfer
getting the better of their English o r Scottish counterparts, though of rules which had governed the internal functioning of the Congress
wholly unassisted by the Protestant ethic (Goswami 1982). For poli- into general rules governing the politics of the whole society. T h e
tical institutions, howe\ler, there were some difficulties in a simple troublewith t h i s a r g ~ ~ n l eisn tthat in its extreme form it restsona highly
extension of this argument. Certainly, the early development of the idealized portrait ofwhat t h e national movement was like. It exagge-
Congress as a lawyers' institution had parallels of a sort; rates the homogeneity of the movemenc and the connection between
and the preconditionality of a knowledge and use of British law for the elite and the masses; and it discounts the play oflocal and personal
the work of breaking it continued in subtle ways, ironically, into the interests and of the regional fractures within the Congress set-up.
Gandhian period of mass mobilization. T h e legal preconditions of Modern trends in historical research have undermined these narionalist
Gandhi's strategy are, I think, illadequately emphasized: only one myths." T h e labours of the Cambridge historians on the unlovely
w h o knew British law exceedingly well could know how to d e b it so side of the Congress machine have shown that it was internally more
perfectly." Bur the fact that these institu~ionswere of British proven- contradictory than is c o m ~ n o n believed. l~ It is possible now to see
ance created ideological obstacles to their easy absorption. Politics, underlying continuities in political attitudes and actions between the
afcer all, was the theatre o n which the evcryday defeat oF the Indian pre-Independence and post-Independence periods of its history.
was enacted. 'This made i t possible for some to adopt an attitude of T h e a t t i r ~ ~ d of
r s Congresslnen towards institutions were deeply
retrograde relativism which perceived these structures as '~tlien'and schizophrenic. Institutions signifi, in terms ofchoice theov, a kind of
c u a s (Austin 1966:
therefore to he rejected once i ~ ~ d e ~ e n d e ~ l cachieved pre-conimitrnent.'i Such precomrnitment can have t\vo t y p c of
sources-fi rsr, in a calculation ofinterest: through the conviction that
if one sticks to certain norms, even though this is constraining in a n
sysrem anti handleti thcin well to thc adv;ulrdgc ofrhc C:ornpariy found them immediate way, it creares reciprocal constraints o n other plavers.
untransJarnblcinro rhe norms of adrninisrrarir.~hehaviour in Britain. Without these. uncertainty and the attendant risks become too high.
' 3 Of (;andhi's many p~rsonaliriesthe most neglected is char of rhc lawyer.
Aparr from his as a mysric, politician. erc., his arnbide~terir~ with horh
Brirish .lnd Indian codes of hehciour and rarionaliv musr have colisrirured a 'Qesearchrrs of rile so-called 'C;lmbricige school' and, more rrccnrly.
crucial clemcnr in hia succcs\. I r is hi.; F'lmiliariry \virh rhc British lcgal sysrern SubaItcrn Sz:r2*die~have done [his in opposirc wayi. Cf. Seal 1968, C;allaghcr.
char enabled him ro feel hi, way r c l irs ccn~rc,.lnd ro posc i r yucrions which Johnson, Seal 1973, Baker. Tohnhon, and Scal 1981, and (;uha 1982, 1983.
I i Elstcr 1978 pl-ovides nn intci-estingaccounr in thrsc t e r m .
often i t corild nor ~ I ~ \ u . c\,CI.Y
I . \vcII,
152 T h e 7i-nl~rtorze.cof the Indiicln .?tirte
socialist programmes and of hal-d bourgeois ones f ; ~ar f i ~ t u r esocial
A second source could be a moral commitnlent to a rational social
design. 'This \vas less a sign ofhelict-rll;lt these could be mixed into a
order, which had to be supported, if European experience is any guide,
workable synthesis than o f a lack of seriousness a b o ~ ~ the
r question
with an intellectual tradition that annlysed, in a kindofslow reC1la): the
itself.'Thus, on any cclunt, the institutional 'legacy' that the new Cong-
historical experience of each round of social conflict. T h a t Indian so-
ress regime carried wirh it at the time of Independence was incon-
ciety has lacked this is perhaps beir reflected in the absence of a rra-
siderable.
dition of social o r political theory."
If these arguments are righr, and we are nor romantic ahout either
O n none of these counts was Congress opinion entirely undivided.
colonialism or the C:ongress o r the pluralism implicit in rraditional
Internal cohesion of an organization as diverse as Congress required
society, then it will be seen [hat the task of thc founding elite was ex-
some pre-commitment, but of an imperfect sorr. But there was hardly
tremely complex. There werc n o tender i n s t i t ~ ~ r i o nwhich
s they
any c o m m o n enthusiasm for a rationalistic institurional order. Ir was
brought wirh them; these had to he built, not with the assistance of
too easy t o d a m n these as Eurocentric visions. Congress bodies (some-
tradirional social structures bur againsr their logic. I'articularly, the
times even top leaders) obeyed rhese rules halfheartedly, as the incident
tolerance o f the British for pre-capitalist forms ensured th;ir structures
of t h e z i p u r i Congress presidency showed clearly. Congress. however,
ofirresponsible power existcd.?h build institutions was tocircumscribe
certainly wanted some pre-commitmenr to rules o f the game o n the
these with limits, rules, and accounrahility.
part of the British. To ask the British to stick to some rules was one
thing, to act oneself by them was quite another. T h e inrernal practi-
ces of Congress showed a coexistence of varying styles, and an ad hoc
manner of resolving differences between them. Crises were resolved
pmvisionally, without much attenrion t i the quesrion of adesign, and Parlianientary institurions were introduced in India in co~lditions
by intervention ofgreat men, whocould, as Gandhi didatTripuri, take radically different from Europe. In Europe, there was a slow growth of
u p stances of an endearing unreasonableness." a stratum o f i ~ ~ s r i t u t i o through
ns the church, the elncrgence of a legal
Unlike some other revolutionary organizations, Congress did nor order, and the rivalries berween the church and rhe absolutist state
raise the question ofsocial design-of rhe kind L,enin did when he said which eventuall>-specified the limits ofiurisdicrion for both. O n top
that it would be easier to make a revolution in Russia bur more diffi- of these institurions, democratic polities were constructed from the
cult to build socialism; in Germany it would be the other way round. seventeenth ro the nineteenth century. These limits, rules, and condi-
Congress had lirtle clarity about the social design i r espoused, or [he tions of political conduct werc irrlposed on the elitc from the outside,
posirive tasks of the political order against traditional society, once by repcared waves o f popular movements. In India, these lirnirs o n
power was transferred. This was reflected in rhe peculiar ecumerrism the elite's power had to be self-imposed. Besides, it is a popular fallac?.
of its social programme: its equally cheerful acceptance borh of hard that the Congrc.5~soughr rcl impose rhese limits; a scgmenr of i t did--
against hard resistance from another group. I-arlier differences of at-
I " What is odd in [his is chat philosophical skills were nor lacking; whar was titude cowards these 'Wcatern' in5titurio1lswcl-e hardly ct,mposed aftcr
lacking was [he crucial hypothesis rhar [hey could, if applied ro a replay of assumption of office; these were exacerbated. T h e conflict between
history, lead ro a more rarional and conrrollcd pursuic of polirical business. factions around Parel and Nehru was so bignificanr precisely h C L.;IUSC
' - A rhird line of opriniisric reasoning held, somewhar unconvincingly in a whole series of conflicts found a dramatic conderrsation irr it. Essen-
rn)~opinion,char [he 'pluralisn~'inrernal ro Hindu religion could be rransferred
tially. it wasaconflict aho~ltsocialdesign. and the rel:~tionthe political
ro rhe polirical level, and [his could provide an alrernative base fol- a pl~~ralisr
order would bcar to the logic of traditional society; whethcr it would
political regime (Korhari 1970: ch. 7). 1 rhink [his conflares two different
simplyexpress thar logic. or try to curb ; I I I ~tr311sfi)rmi[. I t W;IS hardly
sense5 of [he tCrlrr 'plural' and underesrimates [he repressive aspecc of rradition:ll
Hindu social srructure (Kaviraj 1083). accidental that rhcse two elitc groups had structurall) c4 'I ~ ~ C I . CtI hI ; ~ s e ~
154 7 % fi,qe~.torzes
~ of the Indz,~nStilte

of support, and that the major drive towards institution-building [unlike others in Italy and Germany. where it was left to the state). I n
came from he modernists. Europr the critical institutions emerged through a long social debate,
Although perhaps in pure social weight the traditional opinion may which provided an opportunity for a kind of expcrirnentalism which
not have been weaker, Nehrii's victory i n the factional conflict symbol- perfected their function, increased their coherence, a n d won accrpt-
ized the triumph of the modernist forces, starting he most long-drawn ability for them. 'l'hrough political revolutions, the entire society was
attrition in Indian politics. But the efforts of this elite were marked present as it were at the spectacle in which the boundaries of powers
by what jzute de miezls can be called a historical evolutionism-a and institutions were slowly interrogated. In India, the opposite hap-
complex ofbeliefs that governed m u c h early constitutional experiment pened. Nehru's isolation in the political machine made him depend
in the third world. It regarded history not only as a succession o f social increasingly on the bureaucracy. But a bureaucracy is unsuited to d o
forms, b u t also treated this sequence as a rational order. T h e underlying these jobs in a double sense. First, [he revolutionary classes in Europe
premise was that if two types of social organizations are placed side by had a greater homogeneit. of interests. Secondly, the bour_geoisie had
side, the less rational or less advanced would decline inevitably, col- a strong ideological cemenr, a Calvinist sense of purpose, a political
lapse almost o u t ofembarrassment. Social change is seen as a teleology programme. Where the agents of change in Europe saw a mission t o
of transition; not a clash o f opposing forces, in which each short-run transtjrrn the world, the bureaucracy sees a tiring daily chore. In the
outcome is uncertain, however final the long-term transition may be. formation of institutions a n d the transformation of social relations in
Evolutionism is, in this sense, the direct opposite o f a mobilizational India, this was the central paradox. T h e modernist elite was doubly
picture of a social revolution. These evolutionist beliefs provided the encircled: first, by the opposition o f a f a c t i o ~of~ the Congress; second,
fi~ndamentalideology of the passive revolution.*liansformationo f t h e by the intended instrument of bureaucracy.
society, it was believed, was not to he achieved through a mass move- 'I'here was not o n e bureaucracy, hut two. Under the thin crust o f a
ment; it could bc safely left t o a large bureaucracy to s u p e r v i ~ e .T' ~h e Europeanized elite, the British had rolerated the unrro~ihledcontinuance
logical obverseofrhis bureaucratization o f t h e problem ofdevelopment of large cxpal3ses of vernacular graft. 7'he only good thing about the
was the demobilization of the Congress from its earlier militant poli- larrer was its lin~itedness.It was an arm o f a n essentially negative state,
tical form into ordinary ministerialism. T h e mixed character of the limited to the task of maintaining law and order. Traditional legacies
Congress, an invaluable asset in the struggle against imperialism a n d interfered wirh even well-intentioned legislation. For each decision
a considerable instrument for winning elections, made it a n inappro- there was the internal distance in this large and ill-regulated machine,
priate agency for directed, decisive social change. For the opposition as i t journeyed from adumbration as a policy, through its transrnis-
to these changes came not only from without, b u t also from within. In sion, decimation, a n d eventual ironical ' i ~ n ~ l e m e n t a t i o nofien
', in
its ruling coalition the bourgeoisie enjoys a partly gratuitous ascend- unrecognizable forms.'" Secondly, across [he massive structure of this
ancy, for it is won more by default than by serious leadership. bureaucracy (which became steadily larger with more welfare and
Classical bourgeois revolurions achieved the rransformation of accounting functions) fell the shadows of class and culture.
whar 1 have called the institutional map through a politics ofdiscourse Bureaucratic h n c t i o n i n g w a s decply dftlicted by thc two cultures in
Indian Folitics.7'hc modernist decision-maker at the level of minisrries
l 8 OF course, it now appears from researches by matxist historians that the shared n o c o m m o n language with the village clcrk whose ideas ofsocial
picture of the 'classical' revolution implicit in Marx and Grarnsci was perhaps reasonablelless were radically different. Ccrrainly, deliberate evasion
overdrawn. The state had much more ro do wirh the development ofcapitalism and non-implementation did occur o n issues'in which interests were
in France than was initially Fres;med. Thus, the distinction beween the first
directly involved. But, o n other issues, a complex order, originating in
.~ndthe second way has heen chipped away to some extent. Bur the disrinction
holds good if it is read in a double sense, as 1 have suggested: if the criterion is
not the internal structure ofthe economy, but the balance between rhc cconomy "'1't.rha~~stIic
hcst cx~mplcof' this u.oi11d hc 1.1nd ~.ctibrn;\.5c.c f:r.l~~l;el
a n d the othc~.instances of the social f01-niation. 1978: ch. 4.
 011 the Crisis oj'l'olitic.nl I~/.itittrtio~~s
iu lizdiit 157
one culture and ill its perception of the social world, had t o negotiate the making of institutions correctly: as an imposition o f t l i e logic of
the boundaries with another in its course down the administrat- democracy through the political order o n the pre-capitalist logic of
ive structures. All efforts at rationalization and democratization had society-against the normalcy of caste, community, regionalism, and
to contend with rhis subtle b u t irresistible attack of interpretation. other cell~llarpressures. It had also been able t o induce a quantllnl leap
Kationalistic and democratic ideas very often lost the battle against this in industrialization, and a considerable urban constellatiori. This was
attrition of administrative hermeneutics. T h e division between rwo follo\ved by a period of political changes rhat seemed unimportant in
sectors of the polity was n o less marked than the economic. Policies the short run but which appear, over a somewhat longer perspective,
from the metropolitan, central sector faced an invincible coalition at to have restructured political relations in aretrograde direction, a pro-
the rural a n d state levels-between the traditional Congress elite con- cess that began, like many significant historical processes, unspccta-
trolling the state organizations, and the lower bureaucracy; especial- ci~larl~.
ly because the lower orders of administration, unlike the IAS, were
locally recruited, and were vul~ierableto local pressures. T h e Nehru
years saw a continuous struggle between these two alphabets of so-
cial action. After Nehru's death the adaptation of the political system ro these
A further reason for the difficulty in social transformation could be changes was itself a test of institutionalization. It was to show how
the nature of the social totality itself. It has been forcefully argued by m u c h of his authority had been charismatic, and how much part of a
some (Kothari 1970; Nandy 1980; Sheth 1982) that a crucial feature 'rational' constitutional order. 'The Congress immediately heed ar
of traditional Indian society was its ability to margin;~lizethe political least three types of difficulties. First, the two rounds of selection ol'
order. It developed a cornplex determination of its structure such rhat individuals for leadership put the internal machinery of the Congress
the logic of political change remained isolated from the logic of social to great strain. Secondly, the relation between the Congress as the
order. This could be done only if the state, in its resplendent majesty, central party and the political world around it went through a drarnatic
could be kept a relative stranger which did not interfere in the locally transformation-reflected in its disastrous electoral performance in
struck balances between local interests."'The country had two histories, 1967. Finally, it soon faced a crisis of legitimacy (Sheth 1982).12 In
as it were-the fast-moving history of the theatrical world of high combination, these led to a reversal of the most fundamental relation
but its height also rendered it marginal; and the quiet history in Indian politics; between the state o n the one side, and the social
of the everyday with extraordinarily long rhythms of change." structure and structures of traditional ideology o n thc other. T h e state
But by any account the advances made during the Nehru per- lost its superordinate position between the two instances of the social
iod, despite late anxieties, were considerable. These two theatres totality; and the relationships which constituteri the 'historic bloc'
of existence-of politics a n d society-were being brought into one were renegotiated. Driven by the need for survival, the state elite began
single whole. More significantly, the early elite p s e d the question of to seek alliances with pre-capitalist forces o n a larger scale, a n d lost irs
abiliry t o dictate t o them, t o a large extent. Instead it began to register
XI TI11s
. is
' an idea of extremely cminenr bur also extremely complcx ances- passively the trace of the resurgent forces in the social order.
cry, flowing from European orientologisrs, ro British erhnographers, to Marx Three types of changes seem to have set in as a result of the alter-
ro modcrn funcrionalists. ations in the late 1960s. T h e overwhelming preponderance of the
' Onc way ofconrrasring Europan wirh Indian history has been ro contrasr
their obviouhly differenrial rhyrhrns; but [his view gocs furrher by linking rhis 22 Sherh argues [hat Nehru'~Congress enjoyed legirimacy, which the
differellrial rhythlrr wirh a corrrrasr in rhe prirlcip1t.s organizing rhc social Congress has lacked later on; bur one consrrucrion of his own evidence can bc
[hat [he earlier C:ongress did nor have to pass a resr of Iegirin~~ic~.
 The Tvajectorzes of the Indian State On the Crisis of Political Institutions in India 159

Congress in the political system as a whole became a decisive factor; All these contributed to a weakening of institutional drives; and
because although, in a technical sense, some of these were changes lack of concern about the fundamental social design was rationaliz-
in the structure and balance of the Congress Party, as the Congress ed as a policy of pragmatism. The changes around 1967 were often
occupied so much of the political space, the rest of the political order welcomed by political scientists as a shift forward from a monopolistic
could not isolate itself from the effects of these occurrences. First, to a competitive structure (Morris Jones 1978: 144-59); actually, it
institutions sometimes came in the way of political survival of the was a watershed of a different kind. The relation between the politi-
high elite; and they thought, implausibly, that an occasional defi- cal level and the social structures of traditionalism were reversed in
ance of norms for self-defence was permissible; after the situation those years of political instability. Political structures lost the capacity
normalized, norms could be called back in. This misunderstood the of reordering social relations; these latter, on the contrary, reasserted
reciprocal nature of institutional norms, a point that Western poli- themselves over, and soon through, the political system. The political
tical thinkers have sought to underline by the metaphor of a contract. elite abandoned the practice of reckoning in historical terms, preferring
Transgressionsofnorms make the implicit contractual pre-commitment a pragmatic reckoning of their own record, reflected perhaps in the
collapse. vastly different attitude towards planning. Short-term solutions and
Second, the limitedness of he reforms of the Nehru era took its concessions on questions of religion and regionalism were to embar-
revenge, as it were. With the weakening ofthe political centre, and the rass the elite subsequently. But it is not easy to avoid the consequences
gadual alteration of politico-econornic balances in the rural areas, while courting the causes. Besides, the beauty of pragmatism as a
social groups that had earlier been weak partners in the ruling coali- political doctrine is that it reckons everything, even historic things, in
tion began to renegotiate its terms and surface at the national and measures of the everyday, and reconciles people to a collapse of struc-
state levels.23 Their unfamiliarity with, and intolerance of, limits, tures because it comes in easy instalments. As democratic institutions
rules, and principles of accountability began to tell on the upper levels in India were largely a question of self-invigilation ofthe powers of the
of the polity. The circumstantial weakness of the new leadership forc- elite, without strong democratic popular movements to keep them
ed then1 to alter their policy of trying to change the logics of society from transgressing institutional limits, changes of attitude among the
into one of accepting them, and reflecting and registering them in rulers had signal consequences.
policy-making-causing long-drawn, subtle, qaduated but never- To say that institutions which had been set up in the Nehru era
theless definite redefinitions of political ideals like secularism, nation- collapsed during the period of Indira Gandhi, as is often done (e.g.
alism, etc. Shourie 1978) is to overstate the case. It ignores the frailty of the
Finally, subtle but significant alterations tookplace in the structure structures in the earlier epoch: the Nehru period provided the Indian
of legitimacy. Legitimacy of institutional power was increasingly giv- polity not with sturdily functioning institutions but with an institu-
ing place to a legitimacy of individuals; and perhaps still more signi- tional design. It confuses, plausibly, political stabilitywith institutional
ficant, the new rhetoric of socialism, indiscriminately used by nearly strength. But it also misjudges the time scales in which alone the ques-
all political forces, signified something often fatally misunderstood. tion of the rise and decline of institutions can be asked. Fifteen years
Socialist rhetoric often gave a respectable cover for the re-emergence or thirty is not the span in which institutions can get either built
of an essentially pre-capitalist alphabet ofsocial action. It looked upon or destroyed. Nonetheless, there was a definite shift in the career of
impersonal rules and application of rationalistic norms with derision, this design; and politics in India has come to assume a pattern vastly
as forms of 'bourgeois' fasti?fiousness. different from what it had in the 1950s and 1960s:~ though this must

23 I have argued elsewhere (Kaviraj 1982) about the nature of this coalition, 24 For three recent accounts of these, see Sheth 1982, Manor 1983, and

and the modifications in its structure in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Kothari 1984b.
160 The 7iajectories ofthe Indian State On the Crisis oj'Politica1 Institutions in India 16 1
imply the mild paradox that randomness and contradiction are Thus, the meanings of secularism and nationalism (as an antonym
themselves ingredients of a pattern. for regionalism) have been largely renegotiated through accumulating
There is a double logic in the politics of crisis after the 1960s: first, concessions, altering very largely the rationalistic ground plan of the
there is a logic of crises fanning outwards from a political centre-the constitutional system. Secularism means a process in which religious
crisis of a leader becoming the crisis of a party, and that turning into considerations gradually become irrelevant to public decisions; instead,
a crisis of the system. In reverse, there is also a logic of condensation it has come to mean an equal right of religious elements to meddle in
of political crises-from the periphery to the centre, from the larger public decisions-a not unnatural development in view of the policy
system to its central institutions, to the party, to the elite. of concessions so structured as to sensitize people to their community
Institutions represent a form ofpre-commitment in making political identities rather than to forget them. In a crucial throwback, secularism
decisions,*j but there are some preconditions of a pre-commitment itself has come to be defined in religious terms. A national perspective,
strategy. Pre-commitment techniques can figure only in strategies of similarly, often means a simple contingent average ofregional pressures.
the long run. Actors who agree to a strategy of pre-commitment must The principle of bargaining, sometimes celebrated as a central principle
possess a fair knowledge of the kinds of crises or problems that are of the democratic system in India, had retrograde effects because it
likely-in other words, a historical foresight. Moreover, the knowledge became often a case of bargaining between non-secular or sub-national
of possible dangers has to include not merely the dangers from outside identities.
or from others, but also those from the self; an understanding not only This is not to say that such identities did not surface in earlier phases
of external threats but also of those arising from the disposition of the of politics. They did-but with a kind of shamefacedness, looking
actors themselves; for it is largely a strategy against one's own failures. for masks of different slogans. But after 1971 even the ideological en-
Constitutionalism, as a version of pre-commitment, is therefore relat- vironment of Indian politics has changed. Manor has recently talked
ed to an ability not to take courses of action which might offer imme- about a depreciation of the language of politics (Manor 1983: 727).
diate relief but are fraught with dangers of long-term calamity. This came about through the Congress attempt to use a language of
Even in Nehru's time, this kind of self-invigilation by the Congress socialism in its support, an irresponsible introduction of ideology. But
was imperfect. In case ofconstitutional crises in states (especially in the it led, in a way familiar in Indian politics, to its use by all other political
1959 incident about the communist ministry in Kerala), the Congress contenders, and an eventual collapse of the essential tools of political
disregarded constitutional norms. Secondly, despite the formal prin- identification. As ideological divisions declined, it became easier for
ciples of the system, caste sympathies and solidarity were enlisted for primordial forces to reappear without masks.
electoral purposes. In situations ofcrisis, both these trends intensified: Forms of constitutional behaviour in the Congress were related, in
indiscriminate use ofpresident's rule under thin subterhges undermined the 1950s and 1960s, not only to cultural accomplishments of the up-
the federal system and led to the far more explosive regional contra- per political elite; its decline afterwards was also not purely because of
dictions of the 1970s and 1980s. Electoral necessity often tempted the absence of such training. For institutions get developed and ac-
political parties of both government and opposition to enlist other cepted not through the personal cultivation ofelites, but because these
primordial identities besides caste, particularly religious and regional serve functional necessities in the system. It has something to d o with
mobilization. the collective self-interest of all political actors in keeping the terrain
of their conflict recognizable, and the returns f o actions
~ predictable.
2 5 The Ulysses myth brings out dearly the preconditions of a pre-commit: Perhaps the most potent cause for constitutionalism is the realization
ment strategy: a fair knowledge about what might come, which is based on a that political risks are reciprocal. What a party in power administers
knowledge of the self, and of adversaries and environment (Elster 1978). to its opponents is exactly what it can expect to get when others are in
162 The Trajectories of the Indian State Orr the Crisis of Political Institutions in India 163
power. The rise of constitutionalism had surely as much to do with of containing, often pre-empting, opposition. Most of these institu-
such universalization of risks as with the rational power of Lockean tions can therefore be traced to their fit, however transient, with some
theory. configuration of interests and perceptions. But there was always, in the
In the Nehru era, although the Congress was too electorally pre- structure of this politics, a real possibility of a fundamentally different
dominant to be concerned about such risks, its internal structure did kind of solution-a tendency which has surfaced recurrently after the
call for such rules. The Congress was inhabited by such discordant Nehru period, as Congress became increasingly unmindful ofquestions
ideological tendencies and social interests that its internal politics re- of social design: the danger of a 'Bonapartist' solution, a style of func-
quired some minimal trust, which could be secured by an implicit tioning that combines the ad hoc with the arbitrary in mediating be-
adherence to norms. The heterogeneity of the Congress made it neces- tween conflicting interests, a solution which gives the political elite
sary to work by some abstract, general, impersonal principles. For more power but weakens the political order against other instances of
example, the principle of the majority decision usually went in favour the social form.
of the modernist elite at the central levels of the Congress organiza- After Nehru's death, there was certainly no change of course by the
tion; but equally frequently it went in favour of landed elites in the Congress Party. If anything, the new elite paid great attention to pre-
provinces/states. In these circumstances, the Congress functioned by serving continuity with its objectives. But this masked an alteration in
a miraculous balance of forces; social or class divisions were reflected the principal fact of the political world-the new leadership around
with almost linear directness in its spatial and structural characteristics. Mrs Gandhi had a different relationship with the political universe. Its
In these circumstances, a functioning by fiat from the top, very largely considerations of survival led it into conflict with some established
the rule since the early 1970s, would have been insupportable. The institutions within the Congress, and later with the constitutional
majority rule, thus, was accepted as a shared institutional practice system. Continuance of Nehru's policies was bought at the cost of
not because of its overwhelming Lockean rationality, but because it some of the institutions he had helped to fashion. As initial challenges
randomized victory well enough to be acceptable to both factions or to authority came from state-level leaders of the Congress, state orga-
both sets of interests. nizations were systematically undermined. As a means of keeping con-
Often, this was also the functional necessity behind the resurrection trol over the state organizations, the Congress largely dispensed with
of the supposedly traditional Indian method of consensual politics. internal elections, and substituted these with nominations from
Although it made resultant decisions inevitably fuzzy, it gavesomething above. This severed state leaderships from the flows of local politics,
to everybody, and therefore an incentive to all parties to the consensus prevented the training of new leaders, and attenuated the political
to rationalize what every side conveniently thought had been decided. effectiveness of the lower orders of the Congress organization-lead-
It was a sort of proportional representation of interests in every single ing to greater reliance on Mrs Gandhi's charismatic authority. Ins-
decision, once more a practice which had more to do with the hetero- tead of a system of gradients, the Congress became a curious amalgam
geneity of interests and their cellularity, rather than an improbable of two increasingly distanced processes-at the centre and at the
resurrection of a morally compelling tradition. local levels.
In any case, in both instances-of majoritarian institutions or their It has been widely noted that the Congress that emerged from the
informal shift to consensualism-these political forms were based on turmoil of the 1960s was quite different from the earlier Congress.
institutional pre-commitments, and these forms performed a function Nehru presided over a strong centre which-rested o n strong states.
which was seen as being i m p r t a n t by all players in the political arena. Mrs Gandhi's regime increasingly saw their relation as zero-sum and
To the marginal groups, they ensured some minimal consideration in worked on an implied policy that the weaker the states, the stronger the
the decision-making process, which in their absence these groups were centre. Partly, this was due to the rise ofnon-Congress state governments
unlikely to achieve. For weightier interests, they provided a possibility after 1967, making it claim that the strength of the nation depended
 Several other changes in politics are related to the decline of these
o n weakening such rrcalcitrant governments. But paradoxically the
institutions. Institutions provided ;I lit stage o n which conflicts be-
lndira (;andhi regime faced far more intense regionalist pressures than
tween political interests were fougllt out. It was a public spectacle.
the Nehru regime did, after the initial problems about the reorganiza-
while now there is a n increasing trend towards settling disputes out-
tion of stares. *l'hc reasons were a combination of regional inequalities
side them. Politicians who earlier used to enact this spectacle regarded
i>roduced by the growth of capitalism, and the hardening of central
themselves as represenratives of large social interests o r recognizable
policies. As the infor~nalfederalism within the Congress broke down,
ideological positions. T h e new politicians now have little legitin~ac):
more states went to non-Congress parties, the central government
and the institutions which could have trained them have collapsed.
faced demands ofgreat obduracy and stridency, and more significant-
T h e skills o f d i p l o ~ n a c ybenveen interests have therefore been in short
ly. ones which, under the abstract classification as 'regional' claims,
supply Defections from one party to another. and the generosity of
were mutually i n c o n ~ ~ a t i h l e . ~ ~ Oinattention
ften, to regional problems
parties in opening their never very strait gates to them. Icads to long-
early enough let them grow into proportions in which the only res-
term results. Defection is not only morally execrable: i t also introduces
ponses could be concession o r massive repression. T h e first would
a functional disability in the system. In a highIudiverse society like the
immediately set off similar demands from elsewhere, the second a
one in India, the political process needs ro have some kind of stable,
downward spiral of attrition, both in the last analysis weakening the
intelligible relationship with social cleav;lgcs. r h i s is a preco~rdition
state. Concessions are unwise because ungeneralizable: and the use of
for political self-recognition ofgroups, as much as for politic;ll self-
repressive measures is ineffective unless the forces have been politically
expression. Interests need not always find satisbction within the
isolated in advance. W h a t is remarkable in regional difficulties of the
dominant government party. It is equally possible, and indeed im-
regime is their 'structural' nature. For several of the regional articula-
portant. that groups which feel that their i~iterestsare not really looked
tions were nursed in their more tractable adolescence by Congress
after by the government (as regional bourgeoisie a n d rich far~nersfelt
governments.
in the 1960s) support oppositional parties. t o exert their negative,
In the case of both the government and the opposition one can
restraining. critical influence o n policy-making. Defection o n a large
apply a model in which the 'rationality' of the agents (individual or
scale disrupts this m a p of political relations, for it undermines the
collective) undermined the rationality of the system. Actors, in maxi-
reliance o n the party system as a reliable register of political attitudes.
mizing their utilities, have made demands which would disrupt the
It is not a government, or a party, that is undermined by this, hut
system, which is a precondition for their own existence. In doing this
the state. Recently, observers have persistentlv reported two
both the regime and the opposition have increasingly played beyond
kinds of developments. First, there is a !growth, in m y view somewhat
the institutional map. Mrs Gandhi's regime did this in one way at the
overestimated, ofgrassroots movelnerlts which seek'non-state' solutions
time of the Emergency, and by the constant drive for centralization.
to political questions (Sheth 1982, 1984; Kothari 1984a).'- This in
Opposition parties have done this by increasingly articulating non-
itselfis fraught with potential dangers. For problems which are of local
ideological, regional demands. It is a significant mark of the change in
origins arc not necessarily of localizable consequences. Therefore. even
Indian politics that Nehru's opposition was primarily ideological:
initially workable solutions at the local level may, as time passes, lead
Communists, Socialists. or Swatantra contested the design of society
to difficulties of composition. Secorldlv, there is a marked t e n d c n r . ~
but concurred in regarding this question as fundamental, while Mrs
for social tensions to break out into violence (Kothari 1984b). Caste
Gandhi's opposition has been increasingly regionalist.
. conflicts in eastern and central India. p a r t i c ~ l a r appear
l~ to be of this

?'' The Assam and Punjab agirarions. though these are borh regional demands
27 I find their undcnrandiilg ofthc crusci ofthcrc dcrclopnlrrlrs ylalibihlc.
again~r[he centre, have economic demands [hat are dldmerrically opposed bur of their possiblc conreqllellicr o n i u n v i n ~ ~ n ~ .
,~ndincomparible.
166 The Trajectories of the Indian State On the Crisis of Political Institutions in India

kind-in which the combatants deliberately move the theatre of A second response by the state has been through a form of frenetic
violence outside the normal markings of legal authority. And thus ~ e n t r a l i z a t i o nBut
. ~ ~ centralization arguably is a wrong answer to the
some of the most fundamental conflicts of rural society tend to hap- basic problem; it misreads what was involved in institutionaliza-
pen, paradoxically, neither against, nor in favour of, but bypassing tion itself. For the question of institutionalization was of effectivity of
the state. This threat to the state is no less portentous than the direct the political order against the logic of pre-capitalist social relations.
onslaughts on it. For even an attackon the power ofthe state recognizes Centralization means simply a reordering of relationships within the
its centrality to social experience. Occasions of violence which happen political order itself, rather than reordering the relationship between
without reference to the state, in which the arms of the law act, if they the society and the state.30If, as I have argued earlier, traditional forces
act, expost-such occasions question even its claims and capacity for or the logic of their operation find a sanctuary within the political
this sort of centrality. order itself, it can hardly carry on the task of reworking the map of the
The state has answered these difficulties through two strategies. The older social relations. Centralization, if anything, shows the decay of
first is one of isolating what are seen as core areas. Institutional struc- institutions rather than their revival. For these, if they are working,
tures have been informally disaggregated to defend the 'core sector' to assign conflicts to pertinent levels and roles, instead of sending them
the detriment of its periphery. This has happened in sectors as diverse all up for what can only be hasty solutions. But the gathering crisis is
as education, transport, and politics, so that it can be plausibly seen as not simply political. The development of a large modern industrial
the logic of a strategy of pragmatism. Skills which such core sectors structure in India has continued unabated. Despite its inherent ini-
require or provide will be defended, it is occasionally announced, 'at quities, it is the economic expansion that has continued. But running
any cost'.28 Such policies heighten the contradictions in two ways. alarge-scale economy ofthis kind requires commensurate, concomitant,
First, of'course, there is an immediate rush to get into these sectors or social and cultural skills. This is the central idea behind the notion
institutions, so designated into an unfortunate eminence, so that these of a logic of a social form. For economic growth-achieved largely
are threatened by severe overloading. Besides, it misjudges what is through imported technologies and organizational models-has no
isolable within structures of modern society. Efforts at preserving magical powers of working all other institutions around to mesh with
excellence in particular educational institutions have failed simply its own logic. This is why the role of the state is critical in providing
because these are fed by other parts of the structure which are allowed capitalism with the conditions of reproduction of its production rela-
to decay. In general, the main fallacy in this strategic argument is that tions. It is not merely contradictions within the economy, but the
elite institutions are fed by the non-elite ones; and therefore this kind further contradiction between it and other instances ofthe social form
of segregation does not protect the high institutions from the logic which is precipitating the social crisis in India.
of decay; it merely inserts a lag. The logic of decline does catch up with
29 Although I think the usual policy ofcentralization has been misconceived,
the high institutions too, but with a lag; and because of the inevitable
I do not wish to suggest that decentralization is either an effective solution or
relativity of all comparisons, these can still be mistaken for centres a morally justifiable alternative under all circumstances.
of an insecure excellence. In India, in nearly all sectors, one can find 30 Kothari 1984b offers a similar argument. However, there are important
examples of such a downwardly mobile excellence. points ofdifference with my argument, especially at the theoretical level. I do
not accept his thesis that the state is always autonomous of class interests in a
28 Examples could be found from all important sectors of social life: elite
democratic polity; mantisa, when talking about relat&e autonomy of the state,
educational institutions like 1 1 3 and the central universities; in the railways mean something quite different. Secondly, he uses the term civil society as
the trains which run between metropolises and cater to the upper middle opposed to state to mean simply society, rather than in the precise Gramscian
class: the frequent establishment ofelite groups in the police and administration connotation used here or in Sen 1976 or Chatterjee 1984. My contention is
all seem to exhibit the same optimism about a small part along with a pessimism that many of the deformities of capitalist development in India arise precisely
about the whole. because of a lack of development of what Gramsci calls a 'civil society'.
 ~nscitutional PI-e-commitment restricts t h e options available to social design is n o t a dispensable consideration, t o b e taken u p only if
political actors, b u t yet these constitute a g r o ~ ~ n d m ao pf relationships politicians feel philosophically disposeci. Ir permeatesall otherquestions.
necessary for political behaviour. Political actors in India have often T h e long-term problem o f soiial design a n d t h e short-run o n e o f
been t e m p t e d to destroy this m a p in search o f means t h a t will heighten political utilities are inextricable from each other. Pragmatism may
t h e insecurity o f their adversaries. Playing beyond t h e rules is a way o f m a k e politicians collectively t u r n [heir backs towards t h e former; b u t
wrongfooting others, ~ ~ p s e t t i ncalculations,
g a n d creating a surprise it does n o t g o away. It mercly inrensifies t h e paradox o f political prag-
that gives a n ineradicable advantage; b u t [here is a paradox in playing matism. Each o f its shorr-term s o l u r i o ~ l comes
s eventually to a d d to its
beyond rhe institutionally marked space. T h i s absolves orher players long-term problems.
o f all kindsPparties, primordial communiries, social forces-of pre-
c o n i m i t m e n r in equal measure. T h i s creates a m o r e fundamental dis-
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f ~ t ~ g ~ , 1.011don:I.awrc11cc~ 1 1 d
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/ L ~ T ?11.~ 1)cllii: 0 x f i ) t J L ~ I I ~ \ C I \ I I i'rc\\.
>
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-.
1-22.
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Kothari, Raini. 1970. Politics in India. Boston: Little Brown and Co.
-. 1984a.The Non-Party Political Process. EconomicandPolitical Weekly 5,
4 February: 216-24. his essay tries to see Indira Gandhi's in Indian politics
-. 1984b. Will the State Wither Away? Illustrated Weekly ofIndia 8 July: historically. It does not try to give a detailed historical account
8-14. ofits events, but to make sense ofwhat happened. Do the events,
Manor, James. 1983. Anomie in Indian Politics. Economic andPolitica1 Weekly. beyond their quotidian diversity show some pattern? Did Indira
Annual Number 18: 725-34. Gandhi's actions weaken, retard, rework, redirect the scheme of
Marx, K. (1848) 1972. The Bourgeoisie and the Counterrevolution. In Marx national reconstruction laid down by the earlier regime? What are
and Engels. Articles ffom the Neue Rhenische Zeitnng. Moscow: Progress their likely long-term consequences? I try here to ask some of these
Publishers. questions through a division of her term into four fairly obvious per-
Morris Jones, W.M. 1978. PoliticsMainlyIndian. New Delhi: Orient Longman. iods: 1966 to 1971, 1971 to 1975, 1975 to 1980, and from 1980 to
Mouffe, Chantal, ed. 1979. Gramsci andMarxist Theory. London: Routledge
her death.
and Kegan Paul.
Nandy, Ashis. 1980.Atthe Edge ofPsychology. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Seal, Anil. 1968. The Eme~~enceoflndian Nationalism. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press. Nothing was less inevitable in modern Indian politics than Indira
Sen, Asok. 1976. Bureaucracy and Social Hegemony. In EsJays Presented to
Gandhi's rise to power. Yet, as often happens in history, once it hap-
Profisso,-S.C. Sarkar, New Delhi: People's Publishing House.
pened, nothing was more decisive. It was modern Indian history's most
Sherh, D.L. 1982. Social Basis of the Political Crisis. Seminar 1, 1-9 January.
crucial and indelible accident; for, once this accident tookplace, other
-. 1983. Grassroots Stirrings and the Future of Politics. Alternatives 1,
1-24 March. political necessities were restructured according to the logic of this
- 1984. Grassroots Initiatives in India. Economic andPolitical Weekly 6 , single fact. Her coming to powerwas not dynastic, though subsequently
11 February: 259-62. it came misleadingly to appear that way. She was not prepared for
Shourie, Arun. 1978. Symptoms ofFascism. New Delhi: Vikas. premiership of India by Nehru for the simple reason that even if he
could have foreseen his own death, he could not have foreseen Shastri's.
Even after Shastri's death Indira Gandhi's election to power did not lie
in the logic of history in any sense, it was not made to happen by the
logic ofeither political support, control over par;y machinery, personal

First published in Economic and Political Weekly, 20-27 September 1986.

172 The Trajectories of the Indian State
Indira Gandhi and Indian Po'olitics 173
charisma, or personal intrigues. She was elevated to the leadership of
the Congress Party through a negative decision, in one of the most Indeed, her position was a kind of caesarism in reverse, because her
difficult periods of the party's history, in the middle of a serious crisis government seemed to be equally vulnerable to diverse forms of pres-
of the Indian state. Two rather contrary reasons contributed to this- sure. Even the mildest radical associations would have been fatal for
an impression of her weakness and ideological indistinctness, and an her fortuitous rise to power. Such associations disqualified people like
ability to metonymically extend the charisma of Jawaharlal Nehru. Krishna Menon from any importance in the post-Nehru Congress.To
Indira Gandhi came to power because she appeared to have a set of the Congress bosses she was a good candidate precisely because her
paradoxical political qualifications, most significantly of indistinct- symbolism of Nehru was in a sense false; she could, in their eyes, bene-
ness and ambiguity. To read the quality of personal decisiveness of fit from her connection with Nehru without any inheritance of his
her later years into her beginnings would be entirely wrong, because r e f ~ r m i s mPurely
.~ politically, she had come into a situation of an even
it would ironically destroy the means ofknowing the process by which balance of political and group interests in which she was very weak;
she became what she was. Evidently, the greatest qualification of Indira naturally, she wished to see a situation of even balance in which she
Gandhi at the time ofher accession was her weakness, and the fact that held the balance. Thus her initial moves were unrelated to clear policy
she was not too strongly associated with any policy line to give offence or strategic issues; they were simply devoted to working out a logic of
to any of the groups which dominated the polycentric structure of the political survival. In this respect, it is inappropriate to see parallels
Congress Party after Nehru's death.' Obviously, members of the group between Nehru and Indira Gandhi. To follow policies of any kind at
which supported her candidacy feared the decisiveness and dogmat- all, even to follow the policies ofher father, she had to survive. Initially,
ism of Morarji Desai; but they were too jealous of each other to accept this logic of survival made her act pragmatically, but eventually these
the dominance of any one among themselves. They therefore chose ad hoc and individual initiatives altered the basic structure of Ind-
Indira Gandhi because she did not represent anything too decisively. ian politics. We must however briefly turn to see what these struc-
At that moment, she was the symbol of a stalemate; and this group had tures were.
visions of enjoyment of that rarest form of political power through re- Indian politics in the Nehru period was coalitional in two sense^.^
mote control-which would have given them privileges of de'cision It was coalitional in a class sense, as Marxists claim, although there are
without its responsibilities. differences among them about which classes or groups constitute the
It was also possible for interest groups associated with the ruling dominant coalition. It appears that the most interesting and explanat-
elite to believe that she would make way after some time for someone orily successful model of this ruling group would see it as a combina-
with clearer policy preferences, or, if she survived, she could be en- tion of the bourgeoisie and the landed interests, which meant after
couraged, pressured, or cajoled into line. Sometimes Indira Gandhi's land reforms the rich peasantry, the major beneficiaries of this slow,
regime is analysed by observers in terms of a 'caesarist' model from disingenuous, and uneven legal transformation, and the professional
G r a m ~ c i but
; ~ the initial conditions of her rule were anything but e l i t e ~ . ~ Tinclude
o professional groups in the dominant coalition seems
caesarist. Hers was not a classically Bonapartist position in terms of I
I

Marxist theory, for the caesarist elite is dominant over class and group This was also largely the initial leftist picture of her, because of her role in
interests when these contending groups are too closely balanced. toppling the Communist ministry in Kerala.
* T h e idea that state power in India was coalitional was quite common
' Frankel 1978 gives a detailed account of the developments in the Congress among Marxists from the mid 1960s. In Commusist Party literature this is
at the time of Nehru's death. CFchs 6 , 7 . expressed in terms of the more conventional terminology of an alliance of
Gramsci 1971: 106ff. Buci-Glucksmann 1980 draws, in my judgement, classes. For a more academic argument using the idea of a dominant coalition,
too strong a connection between passive revolution, caesarism, and fascism, cf. Bardhan 1984: chs 6 , 7 and 9.
making it difficult to apply it to more mixed cases. Conventionally, the professional elites were not considered part of the
ruling class coalition.
 Indira Gandhi a n d Indian Politics
The Trajectories of the Indian State
for decentralization; secondly, it also made the organization sensitive
of primordial controls, and soon the former system, indirect, partly to peculiarities of local and regional politics-a fact which explains at
patriarchal, would have to be replaced by something else. least partly the far more sensitive and sensible handling ofregionalism
If the dependence of the central leadership o n the negotiating abil- during the Nehru years.
ity of the state leaders was to be dispensed with, it could be done only Under the logic of the new dispensation this sort of regional struc-
through a radically different electoral strategy, one in which the central ture was replaced by a new one. People who were pressed into political
government or its leader could set up a direct relation with the elec- service were more in the nature of political 'contractors' who were
torate. Accordingly, this change led not merely to a new style-of willing to go to any length to dragoon votes, systematically replacing
populist rhetoric instead of serious programmatic proposals; the new discursive techniques with money and subtle forms ofcoercion. Thus,
style had significant political and organizational r e s ~ l t s . ' ~ Some- out of the logic of the technique Indira Gandhi brought in, Cong-
times, one comes across the apparently plausible argument that Indira ress started becoming gradually depoliticized. Even earlier, people
Gandhi neglected to build up her party organization, which implies had regretted that arguments were being replaced by resources as the
that this was the fault of accident, and she need not have done so. She primary political asset; now the only arguments used were resources.
could, so the argument runs, have undermined and removed the indi- Although Indira Gandhi is often accused of turning Indian politics
viduals she found obstructive and put more congenial or pliable peo- ideological by conservatives, in fact what she represented was a massive
ple in their place. But this appears to me to misjudge the basic nature decline of ideology. Ideology did not mean serious disputation of the
of the new politics. It seems, in retrospect, that the systematic des- social programme underlying government policy, a debate about
truction of the party apparatus was not contingent; it was a necessary means and ends ofnational objectives. It came to a devaluation ofpoli-
part of the populistic transformation of Congress politics. This tical speech, a use ofdiscourse for purposes utterly inimical to the pur-
argument should not be interpreted to mean that the electoral process- poses of discourse.15
which is the basic discursive process linking the rulers with ordinary Such a fundamental transformation ofthe relations which constitute
voters-became more economical. Ironically, centralized systems are our political world could not happen overnight. I also d o not wish to
often more complex and less economical than more decentralized suggest that the entire change ofdesign was wholly deliberate, though
ones. Congress election campaigns were still massive operations; what they were certainly, as I argue, the results of interconnecting rational
changed was not the size ofthe apparatus or the size ofpeople involved, decisions taken ad hoc, with short-term objectives in mind. It happen-
but their relation with the top leadership. ed through two interconnected processes: first achange in the Congress
Gradually, they became utterly heteronomous and substitutable apparatus, and subsequently a change of the relation between this
instruments, and a l t h ~ u ~ h f a u t e mieux
de designated 'politicians', they apparatus and the general field of Indian politics. Indira Gandhi got
lost all contact with the essentially dialogical nature of the political the first opportunity for political restructuring after the defeat of the
process. Earlier, this enormous retinue came from within the Cong- Congress in the fourth general elections in many state assemblies, and
ress Party. There were ~oliticianswho were recruited through a stable its less than reassuring victory at the centre. O n e of the tests of a poli-
and predictable procedure, worked patterned techniques of political tical leader is the extent to which she can turn a defeat into a victory,
negotiations, and had a predictable scale of rewards. Politics, or this to avoid responsibility for a defeat and deflect it on to others. Indira
lund of discursive practice, requires a long process of acquisition of Gandhi did this with remarkable success after the fourth general elec-
skills, familiarity of the political terrain, a career that takes long to tions. She turned the consequences of Congress d3eat into a condition
build up. Mediation by a party maode up of functionaries of this kind for her own personal success. Congress defeat in the states, and the
led to two consequences in the earlier Congress system. First, it made
l5 Manor 1983.
l4 Kothari 1984 has tried to analyse the consequences of populism.
182 The Trajeectories oftbe Indian State Indira Gandbi and Indzan Politics 183
depleted majority at the centre imposed a coalitional logic on her and profitable zone in the rightish
-
middle-which allowed it to shift
and the Congress. Indeed, it intensified this logic to its limit, which its centre ofgravity convenie~ltlyas the situation demanded. From the
prepared the ground for its decisive transformation. Since she was cor- early 1960s the communists were worried by a different possibility:
nered within the party, she used the familiar technique of invoking the that this party system might, under the stress of a crisis, get split down
wider, national coalition. In trying to fight her internal opposition she the middle, and a wide arc of a right-wing coalition of Jan Sangh, Swa-
inclined towards a strategy of a wider coalition of the near left. In this, tantra, right-wing socialists and Congress conservatives might emerge
fortuitously, the group known as the CSF (Congress Socialist Forum) and revoke much of the reformist nationalist policy structure of
played acrucial role, enabling her to build a bridgeacross a longstanding Nehru's Congress. This would of course immediately bring into exist-
history of suspicion. ence a left coalition, and they thought that the future of Indian politics
As a weaker player inside the Congress she intuitively grasped an depended on the speed with which either of these possible coalitions
aspect of the political situation-that the timetable of her adversaries could get organized, because the first to appear would have an ineradi-
had to be initially her timetable too. As a weaker player she could not cable advantage over the other. Indira Gandhi too saw this logic; and,
hope to set the terms of the game, she could simply try to win it within more importantly, she saw that the CPI saw this logic; and she acted
terms set for her by others. This was simultaneously true of all ad- on the basis of this political perception when she had to tackle the crisis
versaries she faced-international forces, political opposition within within her party over the Congress presidency, thus converting a party
India, and her especially intimate enemies within the Congress parties. issue into a national one. If it had been decided simply within party
Others could think of choosing their time, of delaying a decision; she, terms, she was likely to have been defeated, but given the strategic form
because of her circumstances, could not. She could, however, have a she gave to it, she simply could not have lost.
shorter time-frame than others. It was politically rational for her to But the elections of 1967 showedanother implication for opposition
forestall others by acting quickly. Every time she did this-acting with politics. It revealed an interesting and recurrent paradox of party
decisiveness-the consequences fell more benevolently for her than politics. In a period of economic difficulties and declining legitimacy
for her enemies. After accepting the time horizon of her tormentors, of the Congress, a wide opposition coalition had a good chance of
she decided to act quickly, before others had decided what to do.Thus, success, partly ofcourse because it simply offset the usual disadvantages
within three years after the elections of 1967, she could seize the ini- of simple majorities; i.e. a united opposition meant that, to win, the
tiative and impose her terms on others. She provoked a crisis in the Congress required something close to an absolute majority. T h e ex-
Congress when the state bosses thought she would not dare. She de- perience ofthe next few years, however, showed that the coalition tech-
clared her Ieft-wing policies with deliberate suddenness and chose the nique which worked so wonderfully for the Congress did exactly the
grounds of the conflict. She took up the challenge of the Bangladesh opposite in the case ofthe opposition. Electorally, right and left parties
crisis without flinching, and forestalled other pressures by the treaty working together widened their electoral support and made winning
with the USSR. This way she could always be the giver and not the elections possible. But the same thing made any reasonable adminis-
receiver of surprise. tration by the opposition impossible. Coalitions which could win
The results of the 1967 elections had some clear implications-for elections could not govern, and coalitions which could run adminis-
those who were willing to see them. It confirmed a line of thought that trations (if they were ideologically more homogeneous, like the
communists had been developing for some time in their party docu- CPI(M)-led front in West Bengal) could not win. Consequently, most
ments. The one-party dominant model offered two planes of self states which had slipped out of Congress contrbl came to be recaptured
identification for political groups. By the constitutional criterion, they within a few years. In all this there was a certain pattern; Indira Gandhi
could be seen as government and opposition, but, more significantly, broke out of her political encirclement almost always by a similar
by use of an ideological criterion they could be stretched along a con- move. Through an arrangement of issues in a political crisis of her
tinuum from left to right with the Congress occupying the ambiguous making she wiped out the record of the earlier period; she forced not
G
 The Trajectories of the Indian State Indira Gandhi and Indian Politics 185
only the electorate but also other parties to take vital decisions episo- (e.g. education) to merely their material structures and budgets. Typi-
dically rather than in a longer-term way, i.e. not allowing them to cally, such evasions were accompanied by a rhetoric of radicalism-a
decide about her regimeon its basic record over along period oftime- particularly dangerous combination ofa bourgeois leader invokingso-
which would enable rational and less dramatic decisions, rather forc- cialist principles to evade encumbrances ofbourgeois constitutionalism.
ing them, by a break of some kind, to take sides o n an all or none sort This was reflected in Indira Gandhi's treatment of other leaders of
ofchoice. No other Indian politician had used to such effect the art of her own party after the rout of the 'syndicate', her inexplicable sensiti-
brinkmanship. vity to people who could never become in any sense serious contenders
After 1967 Indira Gandhi consistently took the initiative in the to her eminence. She seems to have always confused between the
repeated crises which punctuated her time in power. She forced the political necessity of reducing an individual and the historical folly of
issue in the case of the Congress presidency; in the case of the presi- reducing the role along with the institutional structure which supports
dential elections, in formally~. splitting the Congress; in the decisions and frames it. As a result, one finds an increasing hiatus between rwo
about the Bangladesh crisis; in the declaration ofthe Emergency; even, levels of politics which could be called its surface and deep structures.
ironically, in the case of the elections of 1977 which led to her defeat. O n the surface, after the decline of opposition coalitions, Congress
Her ascendancy was so great that the opposition could not even defeat ministries came to power in most states. Yet at bottom political instabi-
her until she invited them to do it.Til1 the Emergency, all her initiatives lity and its effects did not go away, but only changed form. Instead of
were such that she kept the opposition
.. divided, and deepened and a highly visible instability in which unstable and constantly fissile
intensified their division. Ironically, Indira Gandhi was initially more coalitions of opposition groups came and went out ofpower, there was
successful against her own party than against the opposition. But the an endless turnover of ministries within the seeming continuity of
way she accomplished her victory foreshadowed a format, a logic of Congress rule. In an atmosphere in which politics was in any case
crisis solving which had to be applied repeatedly in her regime. ~ ecall r becoming less ideological, this often meant wild shifts of populist em-
to the Congress members in the presidential elections to vote for a phasis in policies. At a deeper level, there was an even more fundamental
specific candidate showed a disregard - for institutional norms which reversal.
was essentially different from Nehru's. It is false to treat this as a matter Formerly, the legitimacy ofa politician depended on some impression
of style-as the beneficiaries of such evasions would suggest. It was a of being fair, evenhanded in the handling of interests, however dis-
failure to appreciate the requirement offormal, impersonal principles, ingenuously; because minimally, politicians glimpsed the bourgeois
of the theory of a capitalist (or perhaps in her terms a modern) social liberal view that the state was supposed to be the representative ofgene-
form.16 A bourgeois system requires, as both Marxists and Weberians ral or universal interests, and the play of particular interests should be
point out, a logic of 'rationalization', greater impersonality and pre- left to the field of 'civil society'. Increasingly now, politicians were seen
dictability of decisions, and a building of institutions to control mod- to be legitimized not by their claim or pretence to universalism, but by
ern processes. The initial evasion of institutional controls during their evident and aggressively declared affiliation to particular interests.
Indira Gandhi's rule was highly significant, for they were not always Installation of a middle-caste chief minister, for example, could open-
desperate moves to avert crises, but systematicattempts to see their use- ly mean imminent advantages for this caste, which, though perhaps
fulness. In retrospect, it was not only a personal fault of hers. During culturally understandable, goes against the logic of any viable large-
her rule, an entire political elite emerged which looked at the processes scale operation. Indian society is so heterogeneous that this meant that
of development through fatal implifications, reducing institutions, the building of legitimacy on general priikiples would become
practically impossible.
l 6 I have tried to spell out this argument about institutional decline: Kaviraj Such groups and their leaders also became correspondingly
1984. dependent on a distant, all-powerful central leadership for concessions
186 The filjectorie~of the Ivrdirzn Statt
Indira Grzvrdhi and Indian Politics 187
and mediation. Essentially, it was an extension ofthe politics ofheight-
Clearly, this unpredictability was a powerful electoral weapon, for
ened insecurity of groups, since in India every member of a majority
it made Indira Gandhi's ideological moves unpredictable: an emphasis
is a member of a minority of some kind. T h e destruction of the state- on distributive justice today could suddenly turn into a rhetoric of
level leadership intensified the need for a populist structure of poli-
productive discipline, to the chagrin and detriment of others who
tics where a central leader could appeal successfully to the electorate
suffered from the disadvantages of political consistency. But in terms
through a suitably simplified, unmistakably large-grained theme. T h e
of deeper concerns for political stability, this was destructive, for it
earlier ambiguity and complexity of electoral appeal was sacrificed for
devalued political ideas and disturbed the logical pursuit ofa consistently
a clear, if rhetorical, national platform. Earlier processes which acted
worked-out long-term policy.
as filters in recruitment were given up. T h e party became an anteroom
or a waiting room for entirely insignificant aspirants to high office. As
a political instrument the party became redundant, illustrated by the
fact that even the subtlest of political negotiations were handed over By a series of measures after her split with the Congress organization,
to officials rather than party men. Electorally, of course, Congress did Indira Gandhi relentlessly drove the logic of coalitional politics,
not win the elections for Indira Gandhi; she won them for Congress. constantly increasing her payoffs. T h e same drive, carried on through
By the time the next round of significant political events came the nationalization of banks, and the abolition of privy purses and
along, the two basic tendencies associated with Indira Gandhi's rule
related measures, won her a double victory, first against her enemies
were clearly at work: a revival of the fortunes of the Congress at the within the party; second, no less decisively, against the opposition.
surface, and a simultaneous destruction of its party structure at a Since the elections saw an extension of the logic of a 'progressive
deeper level. Despite its well-known infirmities, factionalism in the coalition', Congress continued its association with the CPI; but this
Congress-at the centre at least-had been partly ideological. Increas- was less a necessity of political arithmetic, more the production of
ingly, the programme of the Congress, over which there had been so ideological conviction. It already showed how the success of a strategy
much ideological bloodshed, came to be replaced by a platform of a made that strategy redundant.
different kind-not prepared through a debate over along period, and Indira Gandhi dissolved parliament when the trend was strongly in
in which contending interests fought to shape its idiom and its possi- her favour, a bare three months after the initiative to abolish privy
ble influence over policies. T h e internal scene in the Congress be- purses. In retrospect, the timing ofthe elections turnedoutwell for her,
came close to a situation Marxists call Bonapartism, i.e. because of the for she could face the worst international crisis of her career with the
stalemate in the strength oforganized groups, decisive decisions come elections behind her, not in front, much the safest way politically.
to be taken by a group or individuals relatively independent of them. Nonetheless, facing the crisis over Bangladesh required other resources
Although in a statistical and sociological sense organized interests are and other skills, because assets like a large majority did not translate
weightier than individuals or coteries, there could be a situation in simply into resources in foreign policy. Perhaps the most dramatic test
which such groups, despite their weight, become increasingly dependent ofher government came a t the end of 1970 when the crisis broke out,
and forced into a client relationship with a political leadership. Orga- putting her in a situation ofconsiderable pressure, a situation fraught,
nized groups require stable structures of representation to translate as most decisive situations are, with serious contradictory possibilities.
their into political programmes. With the decline of such The scale of the refugee influx from Bangladesh made its economic
institutional spaces and formats, ideology, freed in a sense from the costs heavy, but the prospect o f a war with Pakistan was in some ways
anchoring in interest lobbies within the Congress, became more equally forbidding as India was emerging from a period of threatened
irresponsible, prone to sudden and baffling shifts ofemphasis. During isolation. T h e Soviet attitude towards India had changed considerably
the Emergency, suddenly and inexplicably, fertility and not poverty after Nehru's death, and their overtures with the Ayub regime some-
became the major obstacle to Indian development. times created discernible strains with India. O n the American side, the
188 The Trajectories of the Indian State Indira Gandhi and Indian Politics 189
the electorate gave a reasoned verdict about the necessarily complex
Nixon administration tilted US policy heavily against India, in an
record of a government's performance over five years. Instead, these
accentuation of the eternal paradox of American foreign policy-its
became occasions when the electorate was asked to take sides on a high-
steadfast preference for an avowed dictatorship to a democracy. China
ly simplified, dramatic, emotive and misleadingly rhetorical question
too could be expected to favour Pakistan. Risks of isolation were con-
(i.e. questions to which there could be, barring perversity, only one
siderable and quite real. A possible war with Pakistan and the creation
answer)-such as whether they wished to see poverty removed. O f
of a friendly state in the east could, however, alter the strategic balance
course this raises some difficult problems of the culture ofpower in our
considerably, and reduce the requirement for military preparedness
country. It is astonishing how the Congress could claim ideological
and related costs-at least so it was believed at the time.
advantage by thundering against its own failures. As the government
During the Bangladesh crisis Indira Gandhi showed her qualities of
party a substantial part of the blame for our bleak performance in re-
decisiveness. The treaty with the Soviet Union was sudden and re-
lation to poverty must lie at its door; yet i t was able to claim the
markablyeffective in counter-balancingAmerican support for Pakistan.
allegiance of the poor precisely by such appeals. Turning elections into
The ineffectual brinkmanship of the Nixon government at the height
referenda ofcourse made moredecisive anddramaticvictories possible,
of the war, though calculated to confuse and undermine her government,
by making one single issue take precedence over a complex record. But,
actually worked to her distinct advantage. After the victory in the
ironically, it also made electoral results less reliable as an indicator of
Bangladesh war she reached the climax of her leadership and power.
real historical trends, or theactual configuration ofpolitical forces. For
However, there is a remarkable fact about this period of glory: it was
the basic questions of distributive justice did not go away; simply, a
intense but curisouly brief, which goes to illustrate the sense in which
curtain was drawn before it at the time ofelections. Victory in elections
Marxists use the notion ofa longterm or a general crisis. Such periodic
came to reflect less of the real balance of political forces in the country.
advantages cannot be converted into stability ofthe system as a whole.
This is why the textbook translation of electoral majority and power
But, for the time, her position seemed literally invincible, because it
to administer effectively simply breaks down in Indian politics afier
was based on the combination of radicalism and patriotism: for those
1971. The size of the majorities becomes larger; the power of the gov-
who would not support her for the promised removal ofpoverty could
ernments to administer the country becomes distinctly less effective.
d o so for the liberation of Bangladesh; and those who would not
Nehru never had majorities of the size that Indira Gandhi or Janata
support the strength of India would for the eradication of poverty. She
enjoyed; yet his governance was far more effective than theirs.
had characteristically reduced the opposition to a state of being with-
Thus it was possible for a government to be decisively victorious
out any possible slogan: promise of reform outflanked the left just as
and pitifully vulnerable at the same time.'iyhatis why, even at the times
much as patriotism outflanked the right.
of her greatest victories, Indira Gandhi remained so close to defeat.
Some aspects of the 1971 elections were extremely significant, be-
And this is at least one reason why, even after her triumphs, she herself
cause these would become permanent features of her rule. Indira
could speak of crisis, encirclement, and disaster. For the politics of
Gandhi broke the normal schedule for elections, calling a mid-term
electoral populism did not give her organized strength to pursue more
poll. Earlier, the constitutional system created an implicit symmetry
radical policies, or act for political stability or move effectively in the
between the government and the opposition, which could both pre-
direction ofgreater distributive justice. This is why, despite the rout of
pare equally for elections at a preset time. Elections, from now on,
the opposition, her regime remained permanently insecure. Opposition
would be set by the ruling party, which meant that the issues on which
politicians and her critics occasionally argue that this insecurity was a
the elections would be fougEt could be structured with a degree of
pretence, simply a technique ofgathering support by panic, by turning
deliberation unseen before. Elections under her turned into something
elections into stampedes. But this is not true. By the nature of her
very close to referenda. N o longer were these formal occasions in which
190 The Trajectories of the Z~diarzState Indira Gandhi and lndian Politics 19 1
politics, Indira Gandhi lived, in quite a literal sense, close to both in long-term statistics.17 First, ofcourse, there was the inherent danger
victory and disaster. of radicalized distributive expectations. If electoral proni ises raise peo-
All these trends, in their conjunctions, set in motion a peculiar but ple's expectations, this could lead to a real performative paradox; for
increasingly evident disjunction between electoral balance and the even a performance which was roughly equal to earlier periods would
deeper balance of political forces, the balance of satisfaction and appear poorer because of the government's own move to set higher
dissent among social classes. 'This translation broke down, reflected in performance criteria. Secondly, economic trends went against the gov-
the dramatic trend of mortality of governments in their relative in- ernment: some of the circumstances which fuelled the crisis would be
fancy. After her spectacular successes at the end of 197 1, her government, difficult to register in long-term statistics; indeed, the use oflong-term
armed with the same majority in parliament, was in deep trouble by statistics makes unnecessary and inexplicable mysteries out of the
1973-which meant that such majorities had in some sense become short-term finalities of political life. Sometimes, political resentments
'misleading', that some crucial translation in the political process was which have far-reaching consequences have purely local or regional
failing to come off. In this phase, because of a form of politics which origin in avoidable inequalities of distribution, or short-term abuse of
is similar to Bonapartism, linear expectations werecompletely falsified. administrative power. Thus, although official statistics show a relatively
Politics increasingly assumed a volatile and pulsating form, reflected minor shortfall in food production in 1972-3 and in per capita avail-
in its electoral or phenomenal form as a 'politics ofwaves', or of radical ability of foodstuff, shorter-term inelasticitles created by defect~ve
negations. distribution created serious political turmoil. Similarly, although a
What is remarkable is not theway Indira Gandhi won her legitimacy long-term rate of inflation in the Indian economy is not high byinter-
in these years, but the way she lost it. O n e of the decisive differences national standards, what affects political behaviour is precisely what
with the Nehruperiod is precisely the short-tenure nature of this legiti- hides and disappears within the average. For ordinary people perceived
macy: the new politics set up between the electors and the rulers a new the period from 1971 to 1974 as being one in which there occurred one
relationship, as long at least as the vote remained a register of political of the most serious inflationary rises in the Indian economy. Between
sentiment. It meant that support given overwhelmingly could also be these years wholesale prices of rice, wheat, and pulses went up sharply,
withdrawn with dramatic suddenness; the electorate imposed a much and although these tapered off later, this happened after its political
more short-term accounting ofthe results ofpolitical support. Electoral consequences began and developed an autonomous logic of its own.
figures show this particularly clearly, despite the objection that theper- Food shortages in Gujarat set off political trouble in December 1973,
centage of Congress votes remains more or less constant, and therefore starting a chain of events which led to the most serious rupture in
the fluctuations are simply the unintended consequence of an insuf- Indian political experience since Independence.
ficiently mastered machinery of simple majorities. But this can be Political trends after the end of 1973 showed some unprecedented
answered by the argument that this format of pluralities is itself part moves. Since the mid 1950s, after the strange decline of the socialist
of the format of choice, and therefore results could not be attributed base in North India, most mass movements were either regional pro-
to purely unintended consequences of public choice. For, after all, the tests or movements led by radical parties of the left. Regional movements
way the field is structured is one of the factors taken into account in by definition could not lead to a national coalition of threatening pro-
the electorate's deliberate strategy for voting. portions. Leftist politics had suffered a setback in the mid 1960s,
-.
partly through the nationalist backlash after the war with China and
Unprecedented Political Crisis
l 7 An analysis of such longer-term statistics can be found in Bardhan 1984;
Within two years of her greatest political ascendancy, Indira Gandhi's
one attractive feature of Bardhan's analysis is precisely his unwillingness to
government was in deep trouble, facing an unprecedented political derive or deduce explanations of political events from long-term structural
crisis. Some ofthe factors which led to this crisis would be unregistered trends.
 The Trdjectories of the lndian State lndira Gandhi and lndian Politics 193
partly through internal division. Since 1967, however, there was a In other ways too the successes of the Gujarat and Bihar agitations
resurgence of leftist opposition to the government in various forms, were related to the politics of populist referenda. As electoral results
through the UF governments and later through Naxalite insurgency. were no longer a reliable register of political assessment, people felt,
By 1971,however, thesechallenges werespent-through acombination soon after the elections were over, that their longer-term problems had
of containment and repression. Regionally, and culturally, too, these not gone away. Since elections were not due for a long time, this led
challenges could be more easily marginalized, because left movements to pressures for agitations outside the constitutional space, eventually
were never strong in the central heartland of India, the major area of to a demand for a dismissal ofthese massively supported elected minis-
Congress support. The movement in Gujarat and its spillover into the tries. It would be too simplistic to believe that those who elected these
JP movement in North India was a movement of a different kind. It governments and those who agitated for their removal were entirely
was the first serious mass movement organized by opposition groups discrete groups of people. This was a direct result of the changed char-
in which some right-wing elements were strongly represented, because acter of elections, though Congressmen did not see it. They even pre-
there is no doubt that the major organization of the JP movement in tended to find the demand outrageous, although this was a fairly
the North came from the cadres of the Jan Sangh and parties which regular occurrence within their own party, or what was left of it.
would, in August 1974, form the BKD-a combination of right-wing This hypothesis appears to be confirmed by the swing of political
chauvinistic elements and right-wing socialists. This showed a signi- crises after the Gujarat agitation. From Gujarat it spread to other states
ficant alteration of political forces in India in comparison with the where Congress had fairly comfortable majorities, and on electoral
Nehru period. Then, despite serious disproportionality of strength, showing these states should not have been found ungovernable so
the left constituted the more serious opposition to the Congress. By quickly. The government then faced another serious challenge in the
1974 it was clear in contrast that the more serious opposition to the form of the railway strike--one of the largest and longest among in-
Congress was offered by a non-left alliance; and, more significantly, it dustrial demonstrations after the Nehru era. It was put down brutally-
seemed to confirm the picture of a wide right-wing coalition which the inappropriate parallel being the truckers' strike against the Allende
might overwhelm the Congress. regime in Chile. By the end of August seven opposition parties had
In fact, the rapid g o w t h of the J P movement also stemmed from formed the BKD with the odd programme of a 'total revolution' com-
the logic of the new ~oliticswhich had come into being since the early ing incongruously from some of the most conservative Indian political
1970s; but naturally, with the inability of ~oliticiansto see historical groupings. Party politics in India seemed in 1974 to have a particularly
trends, Indira Gandhi was incensed when this logic tended to turn dim future, Indira Gandhi having destroyed her party practically, and
against her. It showed the effects of the quickening of the political J P suggesting their abolition formally. The spread of the agitation to
accounting cycle, the same redundancy of political institutions. In the central states in India must have appeared particularly alarming to
fact, what was remarkable was the similarity between the two sides in the regime. O n the other side, Indira Gandhi's apparent invincibility
the great confrontation: the same resort to populism, the same reluct- in elections must also have rendered the route of anti-government
ance to go by institutional norms, the same tendency to substitute agitations outside the electoral framework attractive to some parties.
a programme by a personality, the same shortsighted eagerness to ride The Congress response to the gathering crisis was seriously jeo-
a popular wave of negative indignation, the same confusion between pardized by Indira Gandhi'spopulism. Her initiatives hadsystematically
what was a defeat of its opponent and a victory of its own. Indira shifted functions, initiatives, and decisions f r ~ mparty to government
Gandhi's sense of encirclemenpwas heightened by her own initiatives bureaucracy; and the slogan of a 'committed bureaucracy' was explic-
earlier in destroying left bases. Fortunately for her, ideological con- able in these terms, since the unavailability of party men forced her
siderations stopped the major left groups from joining with the JP to demand increasingly explicit political work from high officials.
movement. But this worked to a point. Counteringa mass agitarion politically was
194 The Trtljectories of the Indian State Indira Gandhi and Indian Politics 195

something that officials could not perform. A technique which made Emergency-seeking a solution beyond the format of democratic
her electorally invincible made her, when faced with popular agitations, government. A party which had grown accustomed to the indis-
extremely vulnerable. Accordingly, she found herself resourceless in pensability of an individual was flung into confusion when this came
dealing with the political agitation, which required the construction to clash with the needs of constitutional form.
of an alternative political discourse-one which could communi-
cate to people another construction of political reality in line with III
their own experience. As the government party lacked an effective Curiously, although the Emergency represented a deeply significant
party machinery--it had long given up a politics using discourse phase of our political history and showed in different ways both the
for a politics using resources-the elite around Indira Gandhi had vulnerability and strength of Indian democracy, it has rarely been
two options: either to borrow a political organization and face the seriously analysed. Some amount of purely empirical and journalistic
JI' movement politically, or to respond by using the massive apparatus material is of course available, besides the enumeration of events cata-
of the state. logued by the Shah Commission. I * Still, the question ofwhat happened
Initially, the Indira Gandhi regime tried a political answer through in the individual instances of abuse of power is quite distinct from the
its collaboration with the CPI, which had a mass base in Bihar. But historical question of what something like the Emergency signified.
since it was too small and proved ineffective, the only recourse left was Obviously, one major handicap has been the inapplicability of our
eventually arepressiveand bureaucratic solution. The CPI, particularly, well-rehearsed moves of 'the scientific method' of electoral studies on
responded to Indira Gandhi's call for support, seeing a danger of fasc- this particular area, which meant that our discipline's entire training
ism arising onesidedly from the JP movement, and reading the situ- in the last fifteen years became simply and heartbreakingly redundant.
ation through allegories of the Weimar republic and Allende's Chile. It also means that scientifically inclined students of politics are
But even with in a non-analogous reading of the situation, there were perpetually condemned to a state in which we can never have scientific
deeply disquieting signs. There was something very unconvincing knowledge of the Emergency years. Scientific studies, fortunately,
about political groups which had been more concerned about the were resuscitated in 1977. But, apart from political science literature,
Hinduization of India, and the spread of Hindi or the demands of rich there is little serious study of the Emergency of any kind, probably o n
farmers, and which had never been known for their sympathy with account of the cheerhl assumption that it was an aberration unlikely
revolutionq causes, being suddenly won over to a revolution of a to be repeated.
most immoderate kind-in comparison to which even the communist Two radically different explanations are offered for the imposition
conception was merely partial. Besides, most of these parties, when in of the Emergency, both of which are exaggerated forms of what are
government, had shown a remarkable ability to tolerate corruption. basically sensible ideas. Sometimes, it is argued that the Emergency lay
Now, suddenly, they seemed resolved to stamp it out of political life, in the logic of a structural crisis in India's political economy. I am
Undoubtedly, however, the movement under Jayaprakash Nara- basically in sympathy with this view, although I consider the fatalism
yan's leadership became the most serious challenge to the Cong-
ress government in North India, and by the first quarter of 1975 Sometimes, it is argued, usingstatistics prepared by the Shah Commission,
Indira Gandhi faced her most serious crisis. O n top of this came the that the number ofarrests during the Emergency was 'not very large' considering
unexpected judicial invalidation of her election on 12 June 1975. the size of the country. This is a seriously flawed asgument on rwo counts. No
Congress, in its new form, was entirely unable to deal with t h s . amount of statistics can capture the change in political atmosphere during the
Without a clear internal line of command, without strong party insti- Emergency. For, those who were not arrested also decisively altered their political
tutions, Indira Gandhi eventually decided not to step down from behaviour. There can be statistics of arrests, but not statistics of fear. Secondly,
ir avoids the moral issues involved in denial of freedom.
premiership but escalate the problem even more by declaring the
and derern~inismimplici~in sonic torlns ot'this argunlenr ~inacccptablc. specially disingeiii~oi~s \yay After 311, the o f c o r r i ~ p ~ i oincf-
n,
Hut surely there were long-(ern1 crisis tendencicz\ i l l the 1ndi:lll s!.stem, ficicnc): a n d ro .i Ics5c.r extent intlation were all rclarcct to trans;lctions
:lnd they canle to n liead t h r o i ~ g hl ~ l d i r aGandhi's per<onL~I difficulties in \vhicIi agencies of so\rerlimellt wcrc primary actors, a n d the onli-
p r ~ i s c because
l~ of the rrcncls towards centralization 'lnd condens- nary citizens were rtcipic.nls; and sucli ;Irgilnients suegcsted the uli-
tio on of problems. A scconci \'icw holds that thc cricis let1ding lo the govcrnability of rather than of the citizenry. Yc.t much of
Emergency was contingent; irs reasons lay in Indira Gandlii's rlic early iustification of the Etiierge~lcywas given in thesc p ~ - a ~ m ; l t i c
persolial iinwillingness to give ilp power-\vhicl~ is true in quite .t terms, mixed occasionally wirh the rerrit:ving analogy of fiiscis~n.
difkrent sense-that it was after all her dift~cultieswhich created the After the initial months, when t h r political crisis was over, the
occasion for E ~ ~ i e r g e n rule.Therc
cy is n o deep incompatibility bet\r,ecn Emergency became increasingly pointless, and it bec:lnie i~lcreasingly
the t\vo theses if o n e thinks of long-term structural tendencies as nor oppressive while tryi~igto hide its pointlessness. On its own account,
producing evenrs by themselves, b u t constraining developments in a tlie government's s h o ~ r i n gin economic terms \vas not ~ n u c hbetter
pnrticulardirection, andwaitingon contingent causalities ofasecondary than in normal times, cxcepr for a discernible d r o p in sonie consumer
kind of causation of particular events a n d their exact shape. prices during thc earl!. part of the Emergency. 'l'his too was d u e to LIn-
T h e imposition of the Emergency came with tlie excuse that two founded fear? 'llnong rerailersabol~ta sudden and i ~ n ~ r o b a ball teration r
things were getting our of hand a n d the central government required i l l the ~ n o r a lbeh:l\/iour o f r h e police and the lower bureaucrat!,. ' I ' h c ~
exceptional powers to deal with them. -I'Iie first ofcourse was a threat found our rhrough experience that struiri~raltendencies were n o t so
to the unity a n d integrity of the country, dubiously equated wirh the easy to countermand, even by an aurhorirarian government; a n d the
ruling party's dominance. A second a n d perhaps more popular ration- Emergency did not e n d corruprion, it merely, d u e to the higher risks
alization of the Emergency was that it was meant also to negotiate the involved, steeply pushed up the prices charged by thc corrupt. At a
inflationary situation-an immensely popular slogan, understandably, more serious level of argiinlent, a more authoritarian government is
for the middle a n d lower cla.;ses. Actually, as happens \vith moves hardly the proper climate fLr a decline in bureaucratic corruption; you
which the regime expects to be intensely unpopular, tlie Emergency cannot make a group of people less corrupt by making them collecti\~ely
p r o m i s e d e ~ e ~ t h i ntogeverybody, setting to itselfentirely illcompatible morepowerfi~l.Indeed, had this been true, 1nost7'hirdWorldvrannies
objectives. To the bourgeoisie ir offered a perfect climate of industrial would have set examples of m o r ~ l lprobity.
discipline: to the middle classes lower prices a n d better administration; It is hardly surprising that non-accounrability made governlnenr
to the poor the abolition of poverty: to every citizen the assurance of agencies persist in their irrationalities. I'he absence of the ilsual rc-
their countr).'~inregrity. More seriously, altliough this was perhaps nor quircrnents o f public scrutiny a n d criticism meant that tendencies
d o n e dcliberately, in the rationalizations of the Emergency there was towards centralization a n d the personal concentratio11o f power could
a tendency to turn around all the allegations of the JI' movement-its grow unchecked. lnste,~dot'efforts at building the part!; (:ongrcss
,~llegationsofinefficiency, corruption, inflation. I n a piecenieal fashion iselit through a curious policy o f inducting mt,nlhers into the \'oiourh
the government and its supporters made o u t a case that there was an- Congress, providing a platform for the rise of Sanjay L a n d h i . 'I'his
other-the real-set of reaso~isfor these undoubted evilsofsocial life. not merely led to tlie well-known unconstitiirional uses of power and
Commonsensically, all thesc could be attributed to the government irrational exccsses of the family planning a n d beautification drives,
a n d its manner of functioning-its unresponsiveness to popular de- which naturally fcll most heavily on the poorest; it also carried t o its
mands. its bureaucracy, the cynical wastetul~iessof its public sector extrenic the internal reallocation of power within the Congress elite,
managerial groups, the increasi~iglyless s c r i ~ ~ ~ i l behaviour
ous of poli- leading to the gradual decline of the group of more professional ad-
tical leaders. Implicitly, if the unrestricted abusive rhetoric of the visers around Indira Gandhi. 'T'his meanr not only an increase in
Emergency coulci be euphemistically regarded as an argument, the arbitrariness but also :I loss of consistency, For midway rhrough the
gover11111elit paracloxically clccidcd to blame its f ~ ~ i l u r co sn itsclf in a c ~ ~ i t discussiilg tlie : l d ~ ; ~ ~ l [ a gofc sa
t;mcrgcnc\ the s o \ . c ~ . ~ l ~ i ls[;lrtc.d
 Indira Gandbi and Indian Politics 199
198 The Trnjectories of the Indian State
Earlier, to the politically gullible, this could have appeared as a move
more conservative form of economic policy. Under normal conditions against rising fascism, though its own ways of fighting fascism were
of democracy, political initiatives, when they show unpopular or dys- very intriguing indeed. After the opposition movement was effective-
functional consequences, make for their own abandonment. In an ly contained, the argument about political insurrection could not be
authoritarian regime such dysfunctionalities couldcontinue unchecked; sustained with the same liveliness (despite some good work by the
for it is inconceivable that any political regime would have continued Congress propaganda machinery, which printed posters showing
with the excesses of the sterilization drive or could have been so un- Indira Gandhi parting anarchy from utopia-much like Godseparating
informed or insensitive towards popular opinion. Authoritarianism light and darkness in Renaissance paintings); this deprived the regime
made the government behave more ignorantly. of the reasons it had given for its existence. The second, supposedly
In another sense, the Emergency performed a demystifying function economic, reason was belied by the performance of the government in
in the political system. After the 1969 split, after the destruction ofthe the later part of the Emergency, which was not significantly different
Congress machinery, there had been a growing tendency towards by- from any other unruly democratic year. It seemed increasingly that the
passing the regular consultative political process, and its replacement entire apparatus of authoritarian rule was preserved to secure immun-
by a bureaucratic and administrative manner of decision-making, ity from criticism against the rise ofSanjay Gandhi, and the increasing
withdrawingin effect the most significant decisions about the country's violence of the state against the unsterilized and unbeautified poor.
development from the public political process and its institutions of People were also irritated by constant sanctimonious lecturing by
formal accountability. Its cause was the massive majorities ofthe ruling an inefficient government about more work and less talk-again a
party. This had a terrible, but subtle, consequence: withdrawal from characteristically self-referring admonition. For grocers, peasants,
the regular consultative processes within party and parliament made workers, fishermen, for instance, were not exceptionally garrulous
the political process more violent. For the only way of being heard was communities; the only people who could afford such diversion during
to create a noise. Ironically, although much of the rhetoric in under- their hours of work were government employees. They were therefore
mining bourgeois democratic institutions was derived from old socialist supposed to apply these high ideals of purposeful existence to them-
arguments about the social conservatism of the judiciary, actually the selves-the paradox, again, of the government needing the Emergency
subtle eclipse of parliament went much deeper than the explicit eclipse to govern itself rather than an uncontrollably talkative country. The
of judicial institutions. This is because the judiciary is given some arguments snatched from the opposition also cut less ice, as India, as
powers ofinstitutional self-defence by the constitution, but parliament it went deeper into discipline, did not seem to become a dramatically
is helpless against its own sovereignty. Marginalizing the opposition, less corrupt, inefficient, costly, or poor country. Under such circums-
not letting it speak effectively,had unfortunate consequences for cons- tances, it could appear to everyone that the loss of bourgeois demo-
titutional politics as a whole. For this meant that grievances and cracy had been a waste.
dissent, deprived of channels of legitimate articulation and hear-
ing, would erupt more violently; and increasingly on a larger num-
ber of issues, the space for discursive politics would be given up, Signs of Irrationality
and governm,ent and dissenting groups would face each other more In 1976 two parallel developments began which were to end the
violently. Emergency eventually. With public discussioqs suspended, some of
Ironically, however, the destruction ofthe opposition also destroyed the worst features of our ancient culture began to assert themselves-
the justification for the ~ m e r g e z cIn
~ .course of time both arguments openly dynastic suggestions, gratuitous abasement of political lead-
for the Emergency faded into insignificance. Though the Emergency ers, medieval sycophancy. The 'relocation' of poor people for reasons
itself could be seen as a degeneration of ordinary democratic gov- of offending middle- or ruling-class aesthetics, and the use of massive
ernment, it turned midway into a degeneration of this degeneration.
?,
200 The Trajectories of tile Indian Stute Indira Gandhi and Indian Politics 20 1
force in sterilization campaigns all showed the state was becoming in reverse. The Emergency had also given rise to an invincible coalition
used to conditions of unaccountability-the usual insensitivity of against itself-ofthe urban and intellectual grievance at the abrogation
third world authoritarianisms. Obviously, this pursuit of sterility and of civil rights and the indignation against the terrifying form in which
beauty created intense opposi tion to itself, and madean equallyviolent this was taken to the rural poor. l 9
retribution to itself inevitable. As resistance to its policies grew, it Assessments ofthe Emergency experience must turn o n some mini-
was beset with the inefficiencies of authoritarianism. First was the mal questions. First, what was it about? Were there any long-term
paradox of censorship. By destroying press freedom, the government redistributions of power or economic benefits through that interlude?
simultaneously destroyed the credibility of its own-the only avail- For obviously, in a situation in which public debate is in abeyance,
able-media. This had some subtler consequences. Rumours of dis- such redistributionscan take place quietly, swiftly, and finally. Secondly,
turbance are more powerful than news of disturbance. Since there what were the lessons of the Emergency for Indira Gandhi: how did
was no news of disturbances in the censored press, rumours began to it affect her politics in later years?20
circulate of improbable and exagerated resistance. Censorship became I have already said that I agree with a structural explanation of the
entirely counterproductive in its political function. Only if its purpose Emergency, but I wish to modifj. this on one point. To say that the
was the simple and perverse of denying information was it Emergency was directly a result of structural strains can lead to an
successful; if the object was political, i e. to deny news to keep people embarrassing implication for this theory. For, a corollary which would
quiescent, it failed. The party structure became so ossified it could not seem to follow would be that by the end of the Emergency such struc-
mediate between any forces at all. Finally, even vital government tural strains must have eased considerably for the Emergency to be
agencies beagan to fail-for excellent structural reasons. Members of revoked. And since the ruling elements have never had to take recourse
the elite around Indira Gandhi had a purely derivative existence; they to such straightforward measures again, it would imply that, whatever
had no political base of their own, bases which they could lend to the crisis in the mid 1970s, it did not exist afierwards. I wish to suggest,
her in case of her need. Except for Devaraj Urs, all those who rose to on the contrary, that the crisis of politics has carried on. Consequent-
eminence in the new Congress turned out to be liabilities. They had ly I prefer the idea that structural tendencies are not meant to explain
no control over politics in their regions even in the odious way in individual events in history, and the Emergency had contingent
which the earlier conservative Congress leaders had. The politics of the causes. So the fact that the Emergency was revoked did not mean that
Congress had come to its logical extreme point: centralization meant the political crisis had ceased. The Emergency, in retrospect, was not
that the point ofresistance and gravity, to use a different metaphor, was deliberately meant to rework the structure or the internal weights
simply one indispensable individual. inside the dominant coalition.
Administratively too, the Emergency regime showed signs of irra- But how was the coalition doing in the meantime?The coalition of
tionality. It was of course increasingly overloaded at the top. Much ruling classes was of course internally uneven, and because of their
of the ostensible loyalty of party men who gratuitously asked Indira strategic situation and economic dominance, business and urban inte-
Gandhi to decide the most trivial of local issues, while an example of rests had a greater share of the fruits of inequality than the more poli-
abjection, concealed a gesture of political abdication. Naturally this tically quiescent rural groups. Since agriculture largelystagnated in the
led to a clogging of decisions at the top, an already overloaded centre ; Nehru years, the major beneficiaries ofdevelopment were the industrial
taking more and more decisions about things ofwhich it knew less and
less. It is rumoured that when the government called for elections, " For further details of the actual politics of the Emergency, Frankel 1978,
its own intelligence system misled it to believe that it would win these ch. 13.
elections-which is possible, since in times of authoritarianism it is 20 For an example of Indira Gandhi's response to the Emergency in
not wise to carry anything except good news. It leads to a censorship I retrospect, see Carras 1979: ch. 9. Also, chs I, 2, and 3 in Gandhi 1984.
LO?. 7Re Trzjpcturie~of'tllc' I n ~ f i ( State
~n
ho~~rgeoisie
- and the urban professionals. However, the logic ofcoalition neglected. But the growing trend of the Congress losing support of
c r e a t e a situation in which every move of every group has a dual value, rich peasants and the emergence of farmers' parties as pressure lobbies
~ O I -ic is nor only a movc agai~lst the elements outside the coalition, but is gradually replaced by a more mixed picture. But this development,
also, to 3 lrsscr extent, against those inside. As the power of the though important a n d relating to the basic class nature of politics,
;tgricultural groups increased, there were more intense demands for a could not be traced to a deliberate redistribution of power a n d influ-
renegotiation of i n e q ~ t a l ior
t ~ of payoffs inside the ruling bloc. Occa- ence through the Emergency.
sionally, disgruntled members of the ruling bloc can make temporary There was, however, another important shift during the Emergency.
alliances with groups outside the coalition, weakening the bloc. If the Although it did not change the nature of the coalition in domi-
'voice' option does not work, they can pretend to use the 'exit' option nance, it did show some signs ~ f c h a n ~ i n g g o v e r n m epolicy.
nt Midway
to force a renegotiation
- of the terms of the class coalition." I n class through the Ernergency the go.lernment began to talk about a more
terms, this is precisely what seems t o have happerled with rich peasant 'pragmatic' economic policy, diluting the earlier Nehruvian com-
groups. After the late 1950s, a sustained effluxof these groups from the mitment t o a reformist bourgeois programme and social design in
Congress is visible, beginning with Charan Singh in UP For the next favour of a different policy with less emphasis o n the public sector,
ten years or morc this trend continued in at least North Indian states. import substitution, administrative planning, and with an according-
However, bv the 1970s it was clear that their move had achieved in part ly greater reliance o n matket forces, price mechanisms, a strategy of
M hat theyhaddemandecl-a renegotiation of the termsofthe coalition, export-led economic growth. In the later stages of Indira Gandhi's
01,to put it differently, their 'fair share' ofthecoalition's benefits. Every rule, some of these measures for economic libetalization were im-
threat to leavc the coal~tionwas also an offer to remain if the bene- plemented.
fits of inequality were more equally shared. Further pursuit of rheir Whatever its general impact o n lndian society, the Emergency
objective could not happen by staying permanently o u t of the gov- experience did not change Indira Gandhi's politics. After the initial
ernment party, but by rejoining its fold at a higher price, as it were. shockof the defeat there was aslight element ofcontrition in ller assess-
During the Emergency one discerns a tendency for rich farmer inte- ments of the Emergency period, but the particular form o f the
rests t o be rearticulated within the Congress, helped now by the m u c h countermeasures that the Janata administration took removed much
greater hospitability of the ruling party to these groups. This was of the point of the Janata victory. T h e choice of Desai and Reddy as
probably due to two related circumstances. First, after a certain level prime minister and president seemed to emphasize a conflict of indi-
of secular p w t h in the economic power of this social group follow- viduals rather than principles. Through its messy and u ~ l d i s t i n ~ u i s h e d
ing the green revolution in North India, it became too i m p o r t a ~ l ta record the Janata administration let down its mandate badly a n d failed
segment to be neglected by the ruling party. Their influence spread to state with clarity the questions of principle implicit in the national
acr-ossall political parties, including the government. At thesame time, e x p e r i e ~ ~ of
c e the Emergency. Consequently, Indira Gandhi never had
the suspension o f the ordinary party system during the Emergency t o h c e squarely the necessity t o analyse, justify, or exonerate the
meant that the earlier means of exerting pressure o n the government Emergency to the national public. For the gradual slide of the Janata
bv qualified defiance would not work. Now, the only politically sens- coalition into incoherence put other questions than the Emergency
ible thing was t o get back into the Corlgress fold if they were not to be before the electorate.
left our in t h e cold. B o t h t h e Congress perception o f their
indispensabiliry and their perception o f i n d i ~ p e n s a b i l i t ~ o f t hCongress
e
IV
made for their re-entry. Sirlce this change did not take place dramati-
cally, through open politics, but through quiet adjustments, it is often If Indira Gandhi's defeat in 1977 was surprising, her victory and
return to power in just threc years was perhaps more so. Part of
this transforrnatio~lWAS of C O L I ~ S Cdue to the skill o i t h e opposition in
204 The Trajectories of the Indian State Indira Garrdhi and Indiarr Politic3
out-playingitself. Much ofits three years in power the Janata government Understandably, after the end of British rule there were demands for
spent in debating what to do with Indira Gandhi rather than what to ending such sub-imperial domination and for linguistic rationaliza-
do with the country. It was the Janata phase which actually showed the tion of the administrative machinery ofthe state. No doubt among the
extent to which Indira Gandhi dominated Indian politics. How- regional elites who led these movements cultural indignation was
ever, the manner ofher return to power showed that all the longer-term subtly and inextricably mixed with concupiscence in relation to gov-
tendencies in Indian politics we have analysed before remained; in- ernment jobs. Nehru, it appears, was presciently hesitant about grant-
deed, they had intensified. It reconfirmed the structural crisis of ing the linguistic state idea.22 O f course, the idea had two powerful
Indian politics.This revealed itselfin at least three different ways. First, arguments in its favour: it was right in an abstract moral sense, and also
the options of bourgeois politics seemed to be exhausted between the administratively convenient. Still, he had apprehensions about its
two packages offered by Janata and Congress-between incoherence long-term effects. Some of those fears have turned out to be justi-
and repression. Each package seemed to reach a limit point after a time, fied. A first difficulty was the unevenness in its applicability: in large
and set off a reaction towards its opposite strategy. Oscillation in elec- parts of the country the principle could be applied, but there were
toral fortunes seemed simply to reflect this exhaustion of alternatives. some areas where the principle made less statistical or political sense.
There was a crisis, in a second sense, in precisely the absence of a viable Besides, it left large linguistic minorities in every state, and, given the
alternative to Indira Gandhi, despite some of her obvious failures in political advantages of being a strident minority of any sort, this could
her evident indispensability under this dispensation-a form of poli- be a recipe for endless trouble. Finally, the creation of linguistic states
tics in which she was both the problem and the only available solution. increased fears of regionalism in the centre and has helped the case for
In a more fundamental sense, the crisis was reflected in the simultaneous centralization as a counterweight. Correspondingly, a stronger centre
presence ofcontradictory tendencies in the system. It failed to produce has given legitimacy to regional forces, sometimes giving a regional
the political preconditions for the Nehru model of development. complexion to what are not really regional demands.23
However, crisis tendencies could configurate differently at different The new regionalism is neither a legacy of the British nor a product
times. In 1975 they were expressed in the confrontation between two ofsomething external to the system. It is produced by inequalities cre-
large national coalitions. Afterwards they have been replaced by a more ated by the operation of our political economy. Unevennesses which
insistent form of regional confrontation. An assessment ofwhat Indira have caused regionalism during Indira Gandhi's time are structural
Gandhi has meant to Indian politics must involve an analysis of the because they are there not despite the structure, but precisely because
nature of this regionalism. the structure is what it is. Indifference to regional inequalities created
Regionalism of the recent type is different from the regionalism of by our form of capitalist development has often led to intense regional
the 1950s. This regionalism is often misrecognized as a recurrence grievances. In the short term, such difficulties are sought to be solved
of its earlier form. If that were true, then these could be solved by byeither a co-optationof theleadership or by a politics ofconcessions.24
repeating moves which were successful during the Nehru period. Co-optation naturally does nothing to solve the problem, except to
Movements for regional
- autonomy or self-assertion in the 1950s were buy a political reprieve. Ifunsolved, these grievances tend to re-emerge
really protests against the irrationalities of British administrative
arrangements, which had put together territories into administrative
22 G o p d 1979, 1984.
units with utter disregard for ligguistic
-
and cultural formations. Such
23 For instance, the conflicts between the cent; and the Left Front gov-
large administrative regions helped some regional elites to establish ernment in West Bengal are not often strictly regional contentions; still, they
their pre-eminence in the presidencies. Bengalis in eastern India, get structured that way.
and, similarly, strategically placed groups in other presidencies gained 24 Both these solutions were untidily tried out in the cases ofAndhra Pradesh,
preemptive control of occupational openings against other groups. Assarn, and Punjab.
206 The Trajectories of the Indian State Indira Gandhi and Indian Politics 207
with greater violence and are more intractable to solution, because the Most alarmingly, the events leading to Indira Gandhi's assassination
local leadership which could have figured in it is already discredited. show a reappearance in Indian politics of the power of communal
Even if one particular irruption is solved by concessions, it tends to ideology which was certainly underestimated by the evolutionist poli-
turn up elsewhere, and concessions are by definition not generalizable. tical thought that informed both our state institutions and our poli-
If everybody is given the same treatment, it ceases to be a concession tical debate.25At her death, Indira Gandhi left an extremely mixed
and loses its meaning; secondly, the resources needed for generalizing inheritance, some of the contradictions of which are yet to unfold.
such treatment usually do not exist.
Sometimes, these structural problems were compounded by
shortsighted electoral calculations. It is widely argued that the creation
of a fundamentalist faction within Punjab politics was due to Cong- What did the period of Indira Gandhi's rule mean for Indian politics,
a period she dominated so completely? Surely, a general assessment
ress encouragement, because of the obvious electoral advantage a split
would have to take into account India's political economy, and the re-
in Akali votes would give to the Congress. This shows how the at-
tempt at a short-term electoral gain can lead to deep crises in political lative successes and failures of her strategy of development, something
that I have kept out of my picture. Despite occasional deviations, like
life, crises which gradually get out of control. Thus, over the years the
the Emergency or the large IMF loan, there is no doubt that she wished
regional problem has assumed a particularly intractable form. There
are incompatibilities not merely between centre and the states, but, to continue the basic frame of policy laid down by Nehru. In com-
parative terms, the advantages of this strategy over satellite capitalist
what is often unnoticed, between the demands ofthestates themselves.
It is apparent that demands of two types of regional movements- development are easy to see. Politically, despite strains, India has re-
of which Punjab and Assam are examples-are incompatible. For tained a democratic framework of government, although it has not
spread effectively to transform political relations in the countryside.
the Punjab demands, in purely economic terms, are for retaining
the differentials of regional inequality in their favour, while the Assam India has also retained its politico-economic sovereignty, and perhaps
demands are against the policy of genuine economic neglect of the expanded its room for choice and manoeuvre in a world which is still
inhospitable to third world development. However, it could be un-
area.
Their incompatibility appears clearly if one considers hypothetical charitably said that these are all consequences of the Nehru strategy,
policies which might help meet them. The Punjab demands would which Indira Gandhi simply continued-and in some cases she show-
ed historical incomprehension of the basic theoretical design.
require a greater insulation of regions and leaving them, especially the
more prosperous ones, to the logic of their own economic operations- Although in the very long run, perhaps, Indira Gandhi's regime will
a sort of kzissez faire of regions. Satisfaction of grievances against re- seem historically indistinct from Nehru's, in the shorter term there are
some obvious differences. To put it schematically, Indira Gandhi
gional underdevelopment on the other hand, can be done only by
some redistributive effort on the part of the centre. There is hardly any retained the general framework of political economy laid down by
policy which can satisfy both demands equally, although, ironically, Nehru; but her handling of questions of power increasingly destroyed
the institutional and political preconditions for the effective pursuit
both movements see the centre as their common adversary. Effects
of the green revolution, an excessive accent on productivity increases of that strategy. The federal structure of the Congress was destroyed,
through inequality and insensitivity to its political costs, and the con- giving rise to a more centralized but less effective state apparatus-
particularly because of her equation of the stPength of the nation with
tinued neglect of outlying regons by buying out their elites-have
gtadually led to a configuration of regionalism which the political the power of the central government. Nehru perhaps had less power
system simply cannot control. The system finds it impossible to rectify
its causes because they are tied to the reproduction of the system itself. 25 Kaviraj 1984.
208 The Trajectories of the Indian State lndira Gandhi and Indian Politics 209
as a prime minister, but he presided over a political system that was the party which sets its goals. Bureaucracies in the third world are
more effective; Indira Gandhi was more powerful as an individual, so powerful precisely because many of these discrete functions are
but dominating a system which was less politically viable. Power in concentrated inside it-of setting goals and policies, the instrumental
political life is of two kinds; one is the power to deal with individuals realization of such goals, and even the monitoring of costs, outlays,
and parties; and the other, which should really be called effectiveness, and achievements. With the virtual decimation of any second-level
is the ability to attain and achieve more impersonal and longer-term group of politicians, the bureaucracy has extended its control over
goals. In Indira Gandhi's regime one finds a paradoxical split between Indian public life, increasingly suffocating society by a self-reproducing,
these two types of power. Through the initiatives she took, Indira obstructive, unproductive, and unrepresentative apparatus.
Gandhi certainly became an extraordinarily powerful individual, and Finally, the difficulties that have been left at Indira Gandhi's death
people sometimes marvel at her transformation from agentle, apparently represent a structural crisis of the capitalist strategy of development.
unspectacular, individual to such a powerful ruler. T h e solution to this We must state clearly what is meant by a structural crisis. Marxists are
minor riddle should not be sought in the hidden reserves of strength often criticized for overplaying the crisis argument. If a system is con-
in her personality, or in her traumas-which Arun Shourie is so good sidered to be always in a crisis, and the crisis apparently deepens
at finding out2"but in the nature ofthe political structure in asociety without ever coming to a head, it is said there is something wrong with
that lacks institutions. She turned from a gentle and minor politi- the idea of crisis itself. I believe that such objections are not as decisive
cian to a fearsome leader via the entirely unmysterious logic by which as they appear. Crises are of course special types of difficulties which
teenagers became builders of empires in medieval times. A highly can threaten but not necessarily result in the destruction of a system.
centralized system of decisions invest individuals, if they are there for All illnesses that become medical crises do not end in fatalities; other-
a long innings, with nearly mystic powers ofindispensability. Gradually wise, the concept of crisis would have been redundant and indistin-
people become substitutes for institutions, because they do what insti- guishable from a collapse. Crises of political systems or social forms
tutions do elsewhere. Around such personalities myths of indispens- can arise from various kinds of sources-external, contingent, struc-
ability get built, which become the conditions of their real political T h e suboptimal decisions of political leaders can be so
indispensability. As a result, after her death, for some people who had crucially wrong as to result in crises. But here we are concerned with
a strong dislike of her, she became the substitute for all serious ex- the sense in which marxists speak of struct-uralor organic crises. Marx
planation. She became the uncaused cause of all evil. speaks of crises only when difficulties show certain special attributes:
The decline ofpolitical institutions meant a corresponding growth first, it must be self-produced, i.e. related to the reproduction of the
4
in the size and power of bureaucracies. Although it is fashionable to basic dynamics of the system. These are in that sense not contingent
talk about the bureaucratization of socialist societies alone, there is or accidental things, and unless something is done to stop them they
probably equal or greater bureaucratization of society in the third go on piling up and becoming more intense. In other words, they are
world. Third world bureaucracies are larger, less accountable, and not usually cancelled out by the normal fluctuations of a system's
socially more powerful than those elsewhere; for in both socialist and performance. Secondly, a crisis of this type occurs when we find that
advanced capitalist societies there are effective countervailing orga- two processes, x and y, are equally necessary for system S, but each
nizations. In developed capitalism, the imperialist urges of the bureau- hinders and exacerbates the other and ~ r o d u c eproblems
s of resolution
cracy are contained by limitations of cost effectiveness and the market, or compatibility. This leads to a three-waygroblem: there is an in-
and partly by a culture ~ermanentlysuspicious of accretions of poli- compatibility between x and y which are equally and necessarily
tical power. In socialist societies, bureaucracies are subordinated to produced by S; if they are both indefinitely they may,

26 Shourie 1978. 27 For a theory of organic crises, see Grarnsci 1971: 210-1 8.
?
,
210 T h e Trajectories o f the Indian State Indira Gandhi a n d l n d i a n Politics 211
through their conflict, put intolerable internal strain on S and make was crucial to the last elections. It was the last election, or referendum,
its survival doubtful; it is therefore necessary for S to do something she won for the Congress-most decisively and most tragically. T h e
about this x-y incompatibility to survive; but if something radical is to first election for Rajiv Gandhi is yet to come.
be done to it, S cannot remain S. This seems to me to be the meaning
of the idea of long-term crisis tendencies in a social form. This, if References
the reading is correct, also seems to fit the present crisis of Indian
capitalism. Bardhan, Pranab. 1984. The PoliticalEconomy ofDevelopment in India. Delhi:
What is remarkable about the period of Indira Gandhi is not the Oxford University Press.
Buci-Glucksmann, Christine. 1980. Gramsci and the State. London: Lawrence
occurrence ofserious problems, but their insistence. Individual political
and Wisharc.
problems are sometimes got over, but a general crisis never seems to go
Carras, Mary C. 1979. Indira Gandhi in the Crucible of leadership. Beacon
away. From 1966 onwards, the periodization I have suggested is basi- Press, and Bombay: Jaico.
cally a sequence of crises. And every time political difficulties have Frankel, Francine. 1978. India? Political Economy 1947-1977. Princeton, NJ:
reappeared sooner and in more intense and intractable forms, and in Princeton University Press.
different ways extracted high political costs. Thus, the difficulty could Gandhi, Indira. 1984. The Tasks Ahead. New Delhi: S. Chand and Co.
be called structure-related in two senses. First, because of their sheer Gopal, S. 1979.JawaharlalNehru. Volume 11. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
persistence, because the theory that this is a case of an uninterrupted . 1984.JawaharlalNehru. Volume 111. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
run of bad luck is too thin. A more interesting idea would be to ask- Gramsci, Antonio. 1971. Selections from the Prison Notebooks. New York:
why do the difficulties not go away, or ease, or stop altogether? Are International Publishers.
these dificulties arising in spite of the system, or rather because of it? Hirschman, A.O. 1979. Exit, h i r e and loyalq. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard
Schematically, these seem to arise out of the asymmetries of backward University Press.
Kaviraj, S. 1980. Apparent Paradoxes of Jawaharlal Nehru. Mainstream,
capitalism, the inability of its weak impulse of development to rework
November-December.
the cultural and social levels of the social form, a failure to rectify
. 1984a. On Political Explanation in Marxism. Paper for Seminar on
existing inequality and prevent new distributive irrationalities of the Marx, Keynes, Schumpeter, ICSSR, New Delhi, 1984.
!growth process, anda tendencyto destroy the political and institutional . 1984b. On the Crisis of Political Institutions in India. Contributiom
preconditions which are necessary for this strategy. It is impossible to to Indian Sociology, July-December 1984.
outline a larger theoretical argument of this iund here. But its pheno- Korhari, Rajni. Politics in India. Boston: Little Brown and Co.
menal expressions are clear in the story that we have traced. It is shown . 1976.Democratic Poliq andsocial Change in India. Allied Publishers.
in the questions which were central to the referenda-in 1971 it was . 1984. Will the State Wither Away?Illustrated Weekly of India, 8 July.
whether poverty was to be removed, in 1977 whether we should have Manor, James. 1983.Anomie in Indian Politics. Economicand Political Weekly,
democracy, in 1980 a minimal basic order, in 1985 whether India Annual Number, 18.
could exist as an integral unit-surely an intriguing way of moving Miliband, Ralph. 1983. Class Power and State Power. London: Verso.
Olin Wright, Erik. 1978. Class, CrisisandtheState. London: New Left Books.
forward. Defenders of her regime would often say that, over the last
Poulantzas, Nicos. 1973. Political Power and Social Classes. London: New Lefi
years, in some ways, the economy did quite well. But it could well be
Books.
that there are limits to such relative autonomy of the economy.
Shourie, Arun. 1978. Symptoms of Fascism. New Delhi: Vikas.
There is no doubt that weare inside a period which is still domi- Therborn, Goran. 1978. WhatDoes the Ruling Class Do When It Rules?London:
nated by her initiatives and which will be known by her name. Her New Left Books.
death and the elections afterwards did not mark the end of her period, Zins, Max. 1978. La Crise Politique en Inde: 1947-1969. These de doctorat
but only showed its continuity. Despite her assassination, her image d'Etate, Universite de Paris I, 1978.
 Crisis o f t h e Nation-State in I n d i a 21 3

of one of those, which then turns into the ideology of the eventual
nation-state, is, though decisive, historically contingent. To understand
the historical trajectory of the nation-state in India, it is necessary to
set this contingency against the state's conceit of permanence and be-
gin from the ambiguities o f Indian nationalism-of its origins, its
Crisis of the Nation-State social support, its various ideological forms.'
Nationalism evidently bears a specially intimate historical connec-
in India tion with m ~ d e r n i t ybecause
,~ the national communitywas an identity
unavailable in earlier political imagination.' But modernity does not
merely add the form o f t h e nation-state to the earlier repertoireofiden-
tities, it appears to d o something fundamental to the structure a n d
nature of identities in general. Surely, before the coming of modernity
o identify the political form of a state with a nation is c o m m o n
people had identities, and if pressed may have been able to provide
in the analytic literature o n modern politics, but to ascribe a
a fairly clear picture of w h o they thought they were. Yet it is a safe
single nationalism to that nation is deeply problematic. T h e
guess that occasions would not have been very c o m m o n when they
nation-state has undoubtedly become the predominant form of mod-
would have been asked to face this mosc pressing of modern ques-
ern political identity, but this idea brings together in a historically
[ions. Philosophical schools often urged enquirers to 'know thyself',
special and unstable combination two dissimilar things-the tangibility
and there was a n instructive abundance of serious reflection o n this
of an institutional organization of force in the state which derives its
question of all philosophic questions. But such philosophic reflection
imaginative a n d moral justification from the idea o f a nation.' Besides,
was never expected to have political relevance. Politicdl life in pre-
this political imagination of the nation is rarely a n incontestably sim-
colonial Indian society was structured around a peculiar organiza-
ple a n d single idea; most actual nationalism contains within its appa-
tion of power.i First, the impersonal rules of the caste system vested
rent singularity conflicting interpretations of what it means to be
that nation and contest these for space and political expression. T h e
nation-state is thus, despite its pretence to permanence a n d its claims ' O n the intellectual llistory of Indian nationalism, see Chatterjee 1'986.
'One of the most forceful arguments on the connection between national-
to an immemorial history, a contradictory historical phenomenon: as
ism and modern practices comes from Gellner 1983; but its emphasis on the
a stateandapolitical-institutional form, it aspires to historical stability;
material side of the connection has to be supplemented by the analysis of
yet the body of ideas o n which its permanence must be based tends imagination in Anderson 1983.
to be internally contested a n d eternally contestable. It is rarely that a 'It is necessary to differentiate between the various senses in which the
clear line of causality and moral empowerment runs from a single term identity is used in political analysis. There can be a distinction between
homogeneous self-understanding of a people, called its nationalism, the identity of a group, which means a cluster of features by means of which
to thesovereign state. Behind thestateseveral configurations ofnation- they can be clearly marked off from others; and their self-identiry, the charac-
alism lie indistinctly and jostle for political realization; the dominance teristics by which they recognize themselves. Often, this is a crucial difference
for political action.
First published in PoliticalStu@s. Special Issue, vol. 42, 1994, pp. 115-29. Ifwe reserve the term 'state' for the sovereign political centres in modern
Reprinted in John Dunn, ed., Contemporary Crisisofthe Nation State?(Oxford: societies, it is difficult to apply that term to traditional political authority.
Blackwell, 1995). Political authority and control tended to be dispersed and distributed between
' For a wide-ranging discussion about the idea and its many trajectories in various levels of authority-a state of affairs that late medieval historians
have sought to capture by the concept of a 'segmentary' as distinct from a
historical practice, see Dunn 1993: 57-81.
214 The Trajectories of the Indian State Crisis of the Nation-State in India 215
some critically significant functions in an 'absent' centre ofthe system, of such featutes. It was not only individual identity which was plural
which governed boundaries and controlled transactions between so- and flexible; the structure of identities in the world itself was fuzzy in
cial groups. Royal authority was entrusted with the taskof maintaining a related sense. Although both modern and traditional societies have
and invigilating this system, without being empowered seriously to to structure social differences in a significant order, they arrange such
modify its principles. Most significantly, the state could not expand its differences in different ways. Traditional societies arrange identities
powers radically; it had to function under the rigid rules of the caste in the way colours are arranged in a spectrum, one shading off into
system;6 nor did all social demands for preferment or redistribution another, without revealing closed systems with clear demarcatable
have to be routed through the state. Political belonging to territorial boundaries. It is a world of transitions rather than of boundaries. And
states was a rather tenuous affair under traditional conditions. L n g - ifpeople live in such worlds the differentiation between the selfand the
doms and empires constantly collided and expanded at the expense other remains necessarily a fuzzy, unconcluded, and inconclusive busi-
of each other, so that a group of people stably inhabiting a particular ness. Finally, the ontology of the traditional social world, especially its
space could be part ofdifferent kingdoms in a short space oftime. The cognitive constituents, was fundamentally different. Traditional-
ease with which such political inclusion could be achieved also made ly, individuals were equipped with a fairly detailed and sometimes
such 'belonging' rather thin in contrast to modern practices. It was in astonishingly intricate system of classificatory categories by which to
that sense impossible to achieve the kind of firm identification be- distinguish the relevantly similar and different, us and them. Still,
tween people and a form of politicized space which is presupposed in they simply lacked the cognitive means to generate a global picture of
the political ontology of the modern nation-state. the spaces in which social groups lived. Individuals who could quib-
Not only was the connection between people and states tenuous, ble indefinitely about the hierarchical status of two castes in adjacent
identity itself meant a somewhat different lund of social adhesion.The areas, or define ritual purities with endlessly tedious detail, still had
logic of traditional identity appears to have been different from its the equipment merely to establish who was a Vaishnava or a Brahmin
modern counterpart in several respects. Politically, at least, premodern or when one properly belonged to one among the innumerable and
identities tended to be fuzzy in at least two ways. First, the identity of constantly fissile sects. They simply did not have the equipment to
an individual was distributed in several different social practices; know how many Vaishnavas there were in the world, and the means of
a kind of layering in which the fact of his distinctive belonging to persuading the members of this group to act together to shape politi-
his village, local community, caste group, religious sect, language, cal possibilities in their favour. Conflicts were not rare among religi-
kinship complexes, trade associations would have all figured in a ous sects, castes, or other social groups; but in the absence of the fatal
context-dependent f a ~ h i o nAn
. ~ individual was not exclusively one of knowledge of maps and numbers, they expressed themselves primarily
these things, nor under pressure to yield an undeniable lexical ordering as wars of position in the terrain of everyday life rather than as wars of
manoeuvre in the political arena. Conflicts of interest therefore did not
takg on the scale which modern violence can produce so effortlessly.
'sovereign' state. It is safer to use the concept of a power organization rather
British colonial power in India put an end to this traditional social
than a state form.
ontology, and replaced it with an ontology of a fundamentally new
'This is not to deny that the brahminical system allowed occasional liber-
ties with its rules, particularly in the case of successful ruling groups, who lund. Colonial control over India was uneven, and in its early years
always found obliging Brahmins to confirm their belonging to the Kshatriya resembled earlier empires, a thin layer sitting rather insecurely on
caste from an immemorial past. -3ut the system was understandably more top of an exceptionally resilient social order.'~ut British colonialism
principled in case of those who lacked political power.
1 have tried to explain this argument in greater detail: see Kaviraj 1992: For a brief critical discussion on the debates about the colonial state, see
1-39. Chatterjee 1993: ch. 2.
2 16 The Trajectories of the Indian State Crisis of the Nation-State i n India 217
commanded historically unprecedented resources in military, political, distinctive appeal, the decisive advantage of an Indian nation being
administrative, and cognitive terms; andsome of its political initiatives its enormous size and its shared resentment against foreign rule.
started offa comprehensivesocial transformation. British administrators It is common in modern social science to assume a dichotomous
broughtwith them an entire cognitive-pparatus from modern Europe, classification of identities between modern and primordial. This as-
especially mapping and counting, and produced an image of India as sumption is subtly fallacious: I should like to argue that the logic of
a geographic and demographic entity which far surpassed in tangibility modernity pervades the map of identities: there is no identity that it
and precision the hazier notions with which people transacted busi- leaves untouched. People were indeed Muslims or Hindus before; but,
ness in earlier times. The fundamental transformation involved a pic- under conditions of modernity, their way of being Hindus and Mus-
ture of the social world in which the organization and perception of lims changes fundamentally and acquires new, unconventional impli-
social difference was altered: irreversibly changing peoples' images of cations. First of all, from the traditional point of view these huge
their collective selves and their occupancy
- . of the social world. Ordi- blocs of Hindus and Muslims were entirely new inventions ofpoliti-
nary peasants may be entirely unable to count, but, despite this small cal agency; relevant groups for traditional religious practices were
technical infirmity, they knew exactly what it meant to be a member small self-recognizing sects.9 Modern identities are either directly or
of a majority or a minority community, and how to act appropriately potentially political.
in these social roles. The political consequences of this new ontology Despite its internal complexity, the dominant political imagina-
were decisive: this made possible a membership of individuals in tion of the Indian national movement went primarily in favour of a
- identities like Hindus and Muslims, and, by corol-
abstract religious constructed modern Indian nation, an identity in which both the prin-
lary, a new kind of impersonal and abstract violence, as people be- ciple (of modern state citizenship) and its symbolic markers were
gan to ascribe to them an untraditional capacity to have intentions modern. Yet it would be wrong to follow some hasty followers of
and undertake action. Once this new ontology ofsociallpolitical being Nehru and give to this movement a deeply anachronistic sanitized
comes into existence, it becomes impossible to escape the logic of its history that recognizes secular modernist nationalism alone as 'truly'
consequences. nationalist and in effect retrospectively derecopizes other, less ap-
Enumeration processes began in the ea~l~nineteenth century, as did pealing, exclusivist trends. To understand the full range of political
the establishment of Western-style education for producing a new, possibilities in the future, it is essential to admit the full range ofpossi-
collaborating middle class. By the middle of the century, the first un- bilities that existed in the past. In historical fact, Indian nationalism
intended consequences of this process of enumeration had become consisted of a number of competing, jostling constructs of political
apparent. Sections ofthe new incelligentsiawhichweremoredisgruntled imagination: one of these was severely modern and secular, but it was
or imaginative than others already grasped the sources of power this
enumerated space provided. By the end of the century, the idea that We can perhaps make a rough distinction between formal and practical1
350 million could not be politically helpless had gained such currency agential identities. A formal identiry is one like being a Hindu, which would
that popular patriotic songs constantly reiterated such empower- have been logically intelligible to an actor in a past sociery, but which would
ing arithmetic. Still, in the nineteenth century a curious ambiguity not have had any practical purchase; i.e. that group of people, though logi-
cally classifiable, would not be seen as a category for practical action. Agential
remained at the heart of the early sentiments of anti-colonialism. Para-
identirywould be one which is not merely formally understandable but which
doxically, the earliest writers to create an anti-colonial sensibility
forms part of the generally accepted range of strategies of social life. Thus,
had only resolved to defy colo~ialpower, but had not yet chosen their
worshippers of a particular Vaishnava sect would have their temples, their
nation. Among the first Bengali 'nationalist' writers one detects a religious centres, and occasionally their distinct system of donation collec-
strange ambivalence about whether the nation that they belonged to tions, etc.: the group of Hindus would have none of these and would thus be
was a nation of Bengalis, of Hindus, or of Indians. Each one had its politically inert.
218 The Trdjectories of the Indian State Crisis of the Nation-Stute in I~idia 219
surrounded by others which had much more ambiguous attitudes Translating this humanisticcomplex imagination ofa political conl-
towards democracy, secularism, social justice, and the entire programme munity into legal rules was a difficult task, but it was achieved by the
of modernity. heroic labours of a constituent assembly which produced a document
Most nationalist politicians were in lovewith the narratives ofWest- that was among the longest and most complex in the world. T h e
ern modernity, especially its dominant hegemonic form which saw enormous intricacies of legal rules which this elaborate construction
the nation-state as an agency of collectively intended social change. required, because it did not wish to hurt any sensibility and tried to
Although this narrative made the achievement of a free national state mediate between different partially conflicting pictures of justice,"
intensely desirable, some aspects of the trajectory of European nation- made the constitution a technical rather than a popular document.
alism could not be replicated under Indian conditions. If the nation- Thus there was a mixed, complex, ambiguous imagination of nation-
state had to be culturally homogeneous by definition, i t did not fit alism standing behind the new state. It appeared in 1947 that the secu-
the cultural reality of the Indian subcontinent: and one of the central lar, pluralist, version had won a final victory; but this history always
divisions within nationalist ideology was between a homogenizing pursued its uneasy career, empowering the secular pluralist option but
and a pluralist trend. Nationhood, the first view held, gave strength also menacing it. It was not wholly surprising if the Nehruvian form
because it was the great force of homogeneity and identity. But the of nationalism failed, its other forms, sent into hiding by its triumph,
more dominant and persuasive strands in Indian nationalism opposed would reappear and contest its claims.
this construction, and interestingly Gandhi and Nehru were one in After Independence, the nation-state followed, broadly, three major
upholding a distinctively pluralist idea of the Indian nation, though goals.'The first and minimal one was to maintain its own integrity, but
their detailed constructions were vastly different. All cultures in India the principle of democracy added an implicit rider that this securing
were of a similar family, and the responsibility of the new state would '
of territoriality must imply some exercise of consent.] In the context
be, on this view, to provide a political template which could accommo- of the post-war political economy the second, equally significant ob-
date this enormous diversity, turning this diversity precisely, econo- jective was to defend political sovereignty, preventing a drain of real
mically, and culturally into the maln strength of the future nation. decision-making authority through absorption Into themilitdry systems
Eventually, i t was this political imagination which was translated into of the Cold War. Nehru was particularly convinced, against the shared
the founding institutions of the Indian state with several parallel and common sense of the Soviets and Americans, that the world appeared
mutually reinforcing principles of pluralism. Secularism provided for more bipolar than it actually was, and acting as if it was not bipolar
a pluralism ofreligious practices; federalism encompassed the pluralism
of regional cultures, and democracy allowed the expression of plural ' " O n e of the major conflicts was berween the right to equality and the
political ideals. T h e constitutional form of this nationalism was civic, right of some groups to escape from traditional disabilities, a question that has
based on a secular, republican citizenship rather than belongingness to repearedly erupted into political turmoil, the most recent being the distur-
bances following the declaration by the central government that the recom-
any mystical cultural or ethnic essence; at the same time, with charac-
mendations of the h4anddl Commission would be implemented. Bur there
teristic prudence, it provided for an expression ofmore ethnic identities
were other conflicts as well: for instance, some of [he rights were conferred
within limits. Interestingly, there was no way, in this political arrange- and conferrable only on individuals; some others, especially those relating to
ment, for any person to be only Indian and nothing else; indeed, one minorities, could be enjoyed by individuals only by virtue of their being mem-
could not be an Indian without being some other things at the same bers of particular communities. This can lead ro.,difficult problems ar rimes.
time. Being a Bengali or Tam?i or Punjabi, or Hindu, or Muslim, or " T h e f:~ctthat Indid practised a form of democratic governance added to
agnostic was not contradictory with being an Indian. Indianness was her problems in retaining territorial control over disaffected areas. This was
a complex and multilayered identity which encompassed other such reflected in the rccenr attempts by the Indian government to hold elections in
identities without cancelling them. the disturbed srarc of Punjal,.
220 The Trnjectories oj'the Indian State Crisis of the Nation-Stdte in Ir~di/z 12 1

would in fact make it less so.'"rhe third objective of the nation-state, reorganization of the federal strucrure in 1956.Upper-class professionals
generally termed economic development, had a c o n ~ p l e xconnection often grumbled privately against the reverse discrimination practised
with its explicitly political goals; and its economic aims themselves in favour of socially backward groups; but hardly anyone questioned
were c o n ~ p l e xand involved internal trade-offs. Adependence o n more the principles behind these policies.
advanced nations for capital a n d technology was seen to be the major Apart from overtly political events, several more silent a n d less
reason for depletion ofsovereignty; and the tjrst strand ofdevelopment, newsworthy processes provided the foundation for the stability of the
therefore, was to be industrial self-reliance through a strong drive to nation state. During the colonial period, the British administration
develop capital goods industries. T h e an~eliorationof extreme econo- had, for their own interests, created three major structures for the sup-
mic inequality and destitution was immediately necessary as well for port of the subcontinental empire. Foremost among these was the
the political stability of the new regime. Happily, a strategy of stace-led British Indian army, a highly disciplined force recruited from all parts
industrialization could answer both needs: the state was the indis- of the country, and permeated by an all-India rather than a provin-
pensable centre of planning for capital goods industrialization; it was cial character. It was complemented by the celebrated bureaucracy
also the primary agency for redistributive policies. For the first gene- of the British Raj which, by the time of Independence, was largely
ration o f nationalist rulers, the nation-state they had established manned by well-trained Indian officers. Finally, and not least significant,
could acquire legitimacy in two different ways: its political legitimacy the British had patronized the enterprise of indigenous enthusiasts in
depended o n its constitutional structure being considered fair by most developing an educational system which worked with a common cur-
social groups; but its legitimacy would also depend, it was widely ack- riculum all over the country. T h e elite produced by this educational
nowledged, o n how it performed o n the economic indices of import- structure was essentially bilingual, using English for comn~unication
substit~ltingindustrialization, increasing production, a n d supporting acrossvernacular boundaries. More than its formal curricular structure,
redistributive processes. this system produced acomrnon culture ofeducated manners a n d taste
T h e Indian nation-state did rernarkablywell in the first twenty years which was appreciated a n d intelligible across the country. Nationalists
in terms of the objectives it had decided t o pursue. Although India's under Nehru's leadership in a sense nationalized these British institu-
economic performance is routinely derided, compared to the size of tions, now using their non-parochial (i.e. pan-Indian) character ef-
the problem of poverty, a n d the considerable con~plexityof the goals, fectively t o nationalist purposes. T h e army remained instrumentally
its p e r f o r m a n ~ e d u r i n ~ t Nehruerawas
he impressive by any standards.I3 effective, despite humiliating defeats in the border war with China,
T h e constitutional structure absorbed some initial shocks from region- and coped quite successfully with initial military skirmishes with
alist movements against the ruling Congress Party; but these were not Pakistan. More significantly, i t maintained, despite its effectiveness
so much against its policies as its forgetf~~lness about past promises of a n d prestige among certain circles, a scrupulous loyalty to the civil
the lingiiistic reorganization ofstates, which was not pursued energeti- political leadership. T h e structure of the colonial bureaucracy was
cally. But these problems were largely settled by a general territorial altered o n crucial points by the constitution, which carefully retained
a n d strengthened its national character, systematically insulating it
l 2 Nehru showed the greatest political astuteness in his analysis of interna-
from temptations of regionalism.I4 Higher education was expanded
tional relations. This is borne out by the initial difficulties but eventual success by massive investments in the teaching of high science and technology,
of the non-aligned movement. Ultimately the non-aligned idea was a victim
of its own success, when inclusion of all third world states, from Pakistan to '"ecruitment to the Indian Administrative Service is ;hrough a national
Cuba, made it politically formless. examination; and administrative careers consist of transfers to posts across the
l 3 For a generally sympathetic account of the achievements of Indian eco- country and occasional secondments to serve at the centre. This is meant to
nomic planning, see Chakravarry 1987; for d more critical and more recent provide officers with both the equipment and the incentive to decide on the
assessment, sce Bhapari 1993. basis of national rather than regional considerations.
222 The Eajectories of the Indian State Crisis of the Nation-State in India 223

producing both an educational and a labour market for modern pro- role of engineering economic growth and redistribution. In European
fessional skills. Transformed by deliberate nationalist engineering, history-the paradoxical paradigmatic text that the leaders' imagina-
these structures of erstwhile colonialism performed efficiently for the tion wished to re-enact-these processes did not happen at the same
endurance and legitimacy of the national state in the first twenty years. time: the winning of modern state sovereignty, the slow wrenching of
But the nation-state inherited the teeming expectations of the universal suffrage from reluctant aristocracies, and the -preparation of
nationalist movement. 'To wipe every tear from every eye', even when the welfare state through the conversion of the principles of democracy
restricted to socially relevant tears, is not a very practical programme from the political to the social realm happened in sequence, not in
for a new state. Nationalist rhetoric endlessly repeated the idea that simultaneity. Logically, at least, it could be argued
- that these proces-
colonialism was to blame for economic backwardness and social in- ses were not entirely symmetrical or self-evidently consistent with
justice. The amorphousness and ambiguity of nationalist ideology each other; ifhappening simultaneously, one might in fact impede the
meant that the state it created had to strive simultaneously to meet progress of others. It is not at all apparent that the logic of seculariza-
several types of expectations, not any single consistent set to the exclu- tion and of democracy, or of democracy and primitive accumulation
sion of everything else.I5 At least three types of state functions which for capitalism, are effortlessly consistent and compatible with each
now emerged were condensed into the new nation-state. It had to other.The pursuit of such complex objectives evidently made the Ind-
perform with almost unconscious fluency the sovereignty functions ian state's success more difficult by its own acknowledged criteria of
that absolutist regimes in Europe took two centuries to outline and politico-economic .judgement.
-
learn how to perform. This involved, because of the very different Nevertheless, the record of the Indian nation-state in the first three
organizing principles of the caste system, a massive transfer of social decades was fairly respectable, if not impressive. Political sovereignty,
practices from the province of social regulation to state contr01.'~ as Nehru believed, was successfully defended through difficult times
Simultaneously, it had to take on the expectations arising out of a of hard bipolarity through a non-aligned foreign and its intel-
democratic process, much like the ones described by Tocqueville for ligent connection within development strategy. The basic format of
nineteenth-century Europe. l 7 Finally, it was also a conscious emulator development planning in the Nehru years was fairly internally consis-
of the social democratic strategies of the Keynesian state of modern tent. Planning was organized by the state, which allocated certain
Europe, which added to its political responsibilities the unprecedented spheres of industrial production exclusively to state control but allow-
ed ample room for free enterprise to India's commercial and indus-
' 5 It appears in the light of research in comparative political economy that trial bourgeoisie, assisted by generous protectionist laws.I8 The state
democracy might impede fast capitalist growth; and certainly the countries of monopolized capital goods industries like steel, heavy engineering,
East Asia have done better than India economically, at least in part because petrochemicals, and military equipment production, while private
their search for economic rationalization was not hampered by the demo- enterprise expanded energetically in production of consumer goods
cratic rights of their populations. It is of course a different matter that, after and small producers' industries. In the first three five year plans, India
achieving growth, these countries might be forced to democratize politically. achieved a rate of growth which was unspectacular in gross terms, but
16The most remarkable instance of the assumption of this new, historically
unprecedented, power was the legislation abolishing untouchability. This was
not merely an unprecedented social policy; this could be attempted only "It is often forgotten in debates about liberalization of the economy that
through an utterly different conceptJon of the state. indigenous enterprise benefited from state control . isome
~ ways and lost in
"The most relevant Tocqueville text for Indian democracy appears to others. Licence controls by the state obstructed its entrepreneurial spirit cer-
be the Recollections, which describes the ferment produced by democratic tainly, but protectionism shielded businessmen from external competition.
aspirations in a highly unequal society. For a perceptive analysis of India's The indigenous bourgeoisie's admiration for the free market and trade is not
democratic experiment, see Khilnani 1993. wholly consistent.
 The Trajectories of the Indian State Crisis of the Nation-State in India 22 5
this was offset by its impressive differentiation of industrial production, nation-state and produced paroxysms of patriotism at difficult times;
especially self-reliance in heavy industries. Unfortunately, the struc- but probably such sentimental intensity was based on the fact that
ture of the world economy changed rapidly from the 1970s, creating these occasions of crisis called forth an exceptional mobilization of
opportunities which India's self-reliant industrialization made resources of precisely these professional groups in society and their
inaccessible. Since the state performed three vital functions relating to various skills: the army, the bureaucracy, the press, the intelligentsia,
the economy: setting out general targets through its powers ofplanning and the managerial elites. Thus the nation-state in India during the
fiscal controls to exercise supervision over free market operations of Nehru years experienced a general consolidation, although its career
the private sector, and physical production of critical capital goods, was never free of trouble. The two types . -
of trends which have im-
this led to a constant expansion ofthe state bureaucracy. The expansion perilled the health of nation-states recently-the internationalization
of the state sector in turn impelled greater demand for the produc- of production and control, pressing from above as well as local resent-
tion of personnel who could fill these roles through an education ments undermining it from below, were not absent; but they did not
system which had to be comparable and equal across different regions, produce the kind of fatal corrosion evident in later years.
a recruitment which spanned the whole territory, and their final inte- It was a mark of the solidity of the nation-state that it could easily
gration into an appropriately nationalist bureaucratic culture." absorb the effects of low-level political instability and discontent. The
The forces of the market, ironically, pulled remarkably in the same electoral hegemony of the Congress in all parts of India provided
direction of a greater and deeper integration of Indian society into the an important source of political stability and order, since the federal
organizational structures of the nation-state.20Indian capitalism had character of the party allowed some dissatisfactions to seek recourse
enjoyed remarkable growth during the last years ofcolonial rule, partly inside the party ;ather than through external opposition. But there
due to the difficulties ofinternational commerce during the prosecution were intimations of a new kind of impermanence in this political
ofwar. And the years after Independence saw a sharp growth in capital- world in the bitter conflicts of succession after Nehru's death, and in
ist industrialization, leading again to the growth and integration ofthe more aggravated form afier Shastri's. Although Indira Gandhi's accession
vast territory into a more meaningful national market for goods and to power provided an appearance of continuity, in fact she inherited
for professional and sliilled labour. The logic of economic modernity a political world of very different c o n s t r ~ c t i o n . ~ ~
in both its forms, the market and the developmental state, contributed -Ironically, serious difficulties for the Nehruvian system ensued
to a greater integration ofthe national structure ofstate and economy.21 from its successes, not from its inability to achieve the targets it set for
Occasional crises in foreign relations, especially wars with China and itself. Indeed, what happened in Indian political economy is an espe-
Pakistan, and serious conflicts with the United States over econo- cially emphatic example of the recursive requirements of political
mic and political questions, reinforced this sense of national integra- rationality. A scheme of policies presupposes a world within which it
tion instead of undermining it. Crises created a sense of danger to the is calculated to succeed. But the historical successes of those policies
themselves alter, sometimes quite fundamentally, the structure of that
''1 use the term 'nationalist' in such cases not to indicate an access of in- world and its conditions. Strategies, consequently, begin to offer dimi-
cense patriotic emotion, but to note the much less dramatic fact chat they nishing returns, not because they were misconceived in the first place,
thought and acted in pan-Indian (i.e. national) rather than regional terms.
but because of the more ironical paradox of the necessary obsolescence
Usually, this i s the sense in which everyday political discourse in India differ-
ofsuccess. Politicians and policy-makers can, and usually do, maintain
entiates benveen national/nationalist and regional political parties.
20 Indian industrialists appreciated the importance of the nation-state for
plausibly that it would be extremely odd to change policies which have
their own purposes quite early in their historical career. See Chandra 1977,
and Bagchi 1972. bureaucracies are porous; and they collectively constitute a single occupational
2' Although their economic functions are dissimilar, the sociological bound- culture.
aries between the occupational groups serving in the stare and managerial 22 I have analysed Indira Gandhi's regime in Kaviraj 1986: 1697-1 708.
226 The F4ectories of the lndiun State Crisis of the Nation-State in India 227
been successful; yet watchful scepticism is the condition of long-term which was riven by more intense contradictions precisely because of
successes in the constantly reforming world of modernity. the demands that the modern capitalist sector insistently made on
In its own historical world, Nehru's regime registered some signal its resources. Also, this interior world of middle-class comfort was
successes. Within a relatively short time, it accomplished a kind of surrounded by processes of modern destitution and squalor, anger and
forced march of heavy industrialization, and the complementarity resentment, symbolized by cities increasingly submerged by slums.
of the state and market brought into secure existence a new, modern Besides the classical terms of trade disputes between the two sectors,
burgeoning economy which, because of its close connection, both cultural resentment gadually surfaced. Large parts of the submerged
structural and personal, with the decision-making bureaucracy, could population in the rural economy learnt to make demands on the state
bring the rest of the sprawlingly diverse economy under its regulative through the continued u s e ~ f d e m o c r a candexpressed
~, their resentment
control. Secondly, this economic change was brought in within the against the fact that the benefits of development were monopolized
frameworkofademocraticstructure ofgovernance, admittedly limited almost entirely by urban, modern bourgeois classes to their total exclu-
in its reach, depth, and dependability, yet remarkable in the context of sion. The only rural g o u p which secured benefits out of the development
the high rates of infant mortality among democracies in the South. process was the large farmers whose compliance was bought by heavy
Again, remarkably, the Nehru regime was able to receive its legitimacy subsidies, the absence of income tax, and their slow co-optation into
through periodic elections, without becoming obliged to scatter scarce governmental power. The ruling coalition of the bourgeoisie, high
resources in short-term populist policies. Its legitimacy was sufficient- managerial elites, state bureaucracy, and agrarian magnates came
ly deep to allow it to make decisions which required long gestation under serious strain as capitalism in agriculture spread unevenly and
periods-something that a government could undertake only if it was produced a class of rich farmers who controlled substantial resour-
under no immediate pressure to distribute imminent financial benefits ces and felt unjustly cheated out of their fair share of the privileges of
in exchange for electoral support. Yet the dominance that modernist political power.23 From the mid 1960s, electoral politics in India
processes of economy and politics achieved over other sectors of so- showed a rearrangement of the political coalition of dominance, the
ciety was flawed and insecure in several crucial ways. The dominance rich peasants defecting from the Congress and leading a resentful
of state or market capitalism was primarily a regulative one. It did not coalition of rural interests under the flag of peasant parties.
generate sufficient momentum to transform the rest of the primitive Within twenty years after Nehru's death, the central conflicts of
agrarian and artisanal economy into capitalist production; it mere- Indian politics and the discourses expressing them changed unrecog-
ly succeeded in imposing the demands of capitalist accumula- nizably. Politics in the Nehru years appeared a tolerable imitation of
tion on other sectors which remained, in their productive logics, large- Western political styles, in which the main disputes occurred between
ly untransformed. Capitalist transformation of the whole economy ideological groups of the left, right, and centre. In the 1980s, it ap-
homogenizes the economy and society after a period ofsocial turbulence; peared that these were unsubstantial differences within a modernist
capitalist subsumption, which captures more truthfullywhat happened blocofprivilege which was opposed with increasing energy, vehemence,
in India, fails to homogenize the economy's structure, and social tur- irritation, and insolence by a bloc of social groups who were outsid-
bulence simmers on instead of coming to a forcible solution. Eventu- ers to the etiquettes of Westernized modernity. Politicians of this
ally, a situation of this kind comes to combine the disadvantages of bloc spoke derisively of English-speaking modernists in a truculent
modernity with those of the society it has disturbed without supplant- vernacular, wore indigenous costumes; and they understood, tolerated,
ing. In its size, depth, and scale the modern economy in India was an and at times revelled in premodern rituals of political power.24They
enormous organization, a world in itself; inside its secure, comfortable
interior space India's social elites and their supporting professional
23 For a discussion about the ruling coalition, see Bardhan 1985.
classes could live out their existence; but in fact it sat uneasily poised
over a statistically vaster, backward, populous, agrarian economy
"I n recent years, successful politicians were honoured by their caste groups
o r constiruencies by being weighed against money. Sometimes they used a
228 The Trajectories of the Indian State Crisis of the Nation-State in India
created politically innovative coalitions which defied description in capitalist, gadually came to represent an economic sphere whose
terms of either modern or traditional alphabets of politics to bring function slipped unnoticed from a predominantly economic to a poli-
to bear the pressure of numbers on their adversaries and intended tical one: from distribution of welfare by producing low-cost inputs
victims. Electoral instability played an important part in this change. for industries, these became producers of unaccountable funds used by
Politicians like Indira Gandhi, who felt electorally insecure after the politicians and pliable bureaucrats. Ideologically, this made it appear
1967 defeats of the Congress Party, invited these forces onto the poli- that it was the welfare function of the state which was bound to pro-
tical plane; but once they came inside it was hard to banish them again duce corruption, and its excesses could be rectified only by the harsh,
to the margins of democratic politics. They came in through a typically if purifying, sanctions of an unrestricted market.
opportunistic welcome which was not meant to be permanent; but A second success of the Nehruvian development design also started
once inside they were too powerful numerically to beextruded. O n the turning sour. Industrialization after Independence helped strengthen
contrary, they tended to rewrite not merely the agenda but also the the national economy, but at the cost of intensifying regional inequali-
language of democratic politics in India. ties. With the opportunity provided by democratic institutions, re-
Ironically, the logic of democracy has often worked against the sentment against regional unevenness tended to find quick translation
stability of the nation-state in recent Indian history; though both into regionalist movements. T h e response of the central government
nationalism and democracy speak in the name of the people, they to these demands fluctuated from uncomprehending repression to at-
invoke it in different ways, with widely different implications. In the tempts at co-optation.25Although the central government was occa-
period after the Emergency, 1975-7, what initially appeared a crisis of sionally successful in transforming guerrilla leaders into instant chief
government has slowly spread to become a crisis of the Indian nation- ministers, such transactions inevitably tried to head off widespread
state, at least in its current institutional form. A crisis is a kind of social resentment by private satisfaction, often leading to a quick
persistent difficulty of self-maintenance produced by the operation of isolation of the leaders who defected into a dishonest constitution-
the system itself, from which the system cannot come out untrans- alism-to the disapproval of their militant followers. Anyway, this
formed. T h e crisis of the Indian nation-state has several dimensions. pattern did nothing to produce long-term political stability. To most
Planning, in its early stages, simply got remarkable results by rational- cases of threat to political stability the standard answer of the nation-
izing resource utilization and giving some direction to the economy. state has been a stern centralizing response. Yet political democracy
But once that plateau was reached, traditional forms of physical meant that political troubles arising out of regional resentments had
planning, based o n direct state production, failed t o produce growth. to be provided a consultative solution. Given India's great regional
O n the contrary, the entrenchment of vested interests among both diversity, which is bound to express itself politically in an increasing
public sector managers and a relatively privileged labour force made differentiation of interests, only a transformation towards more
these industries indefensibly wasteful. Bureaucratic shielding of their decentralization can, in principle, produce a political order based o n
performance and government protection made them immune to democratic consent.
criticism, and they gradually became expensive white elephants which
undermined not merely the balanced budget but, more significant-
2 5 In a large number ofcases, one comes across [he same sequence ofcencral
ly, the moral authority of the state sector. T h e state sector, origin-
response: starting with repression, moving to reluctant concessions, finally an
ally fashioned to counterbalance the mercenariness of the private attempt to co-opt the leadership by offering the allurement ofpolitical power.
Such 'solutions' usually bring short-term reprieves at the cost of long-term
problems. Democratic politics tends sometimes to encourage such shortsight-
symbolism particularly paradoxical in a republican state-presenting success- edness, since the incumbent parv can enjoy the brief glory of the reprieve,
ful parliamentarians with crowns. expecting others to come later and count the costs.
230 The Trajectories of the Indian State Crisis of the Nation-State in India 23 1
Unfortunately, however, the politics of the parties who have con- intensified anger against a modernist elite. The loyalty of this elite to
trolled the central regime has inclined in a different direction. Due to its own acclaimed values of democracy, secularism, and equity may
India's great size, it is always in principle possible for a party or an have been suspect and ~ r a c t i c a linconsistent;
l~ yet it is not its disinge-
interest coalition to gain an absolute majority in the central legislature nuousness that is attacked, but the values themselves. Democratic gov-
by winning the support of a major part of the country, leaving some ernance made it possible for the enormous grievance against such
enclaves permanently incapable of channelling their grievances into of the benefits to express itself. Democracy also encouraged
the significant spaces of decision-making. Indira Gandhi successfully the slow rise of a new idiom of politics which constantly invokes majo-
pursued policies of isolating resentment in Assam and Punjab, out- rities of various kinds to justify a bending of benefits towards some
manoeuvring regional opposition through a formal democratic process. large groups which can hope permanently to outnumber others. Three
But such operation of formal democracy strengthens the government majority arguments have broken out with great violence in Indian
while weakening the state. Disaffected groups enjoying large regional political discourse recently: the majority of Hindus, of backward caste
support become gradually convinced that their interests will remain groups, and the less evident one of Hindi speakers: in all of these there
permanently outplayed and marginalized through the democratic is an implied belief that majority can sanction the sacrifice of equity.
electoral process itself, and they will be reduced to a permanent enclave If a majority legislates rules which are evidently harmful to others,
of helpless resentment. T h e operation of elective democracy can thus democratic ~rinciplesof governance can legitimize them; and all of
be seen not as a process of representation, but a means by which re- these trends wish to turn the level plane of rights ofcitizens into slopes
presentation is craftily taken away. It is not impossible to convince which favour their own constituent members. Naturally, the response
people in those regions to turn away from formal processes of electoral to such threatening language of majoritarianism is an instant reflex
democracy because for them, plausibly, these mean permanent dis- to seek spaces where the groups whose seclusion is sought can find a
franchisement. Consequently, the festering of regional sores of this sanctuary in an answering majority. If some linguistic, religious, or
kind in Punjab, Assam, and Kashmir have tended to make politics in social groups believe that in a united India the rules of political game
those states reach a level ofvolatilitywhich is impossible for democratic and economic distribution will be skewed permanently against them,
norms of restraint and conversation to contain. What is remarkable is they will naturally try to create political spaces where they can consti-
the rapidity with which the curve of regional resentment rises from tute similar majorities and practise, in retribution, similar iniquity
electoral defeats straight to armed militancy, instead of the trend com- towards others. Under the pressure of these contending majoritarian-
mon in the 1950s and 1960s of spilling over into large street de- isms, and the possibility of a convex majority which might combine
monstrations and popular movements. T h e rise of armed militancy of principles from all these, the original political imagination of
course does not increase participation; it reduces its scope still further. independent India is in danger of disruption. These are not proposals
Punjab offers the best example of a situation where the people of the for abandoning the nationalist imagination altogether, but for replac-
state were reduced to a state of utter redundancy between two ing the Nehrcvian imagination of nationalism with other forms.
combatants speaking in the name of contrary nationalisms: Indian Thus the central contradiction of the history of the Indian nation-
armed forces preserving the Indian nation-state and armed militants state seems to be, at this point at least, between the logic of economic
trying to create a new Punjabi state of Khalistan. development and the logic of political identities. Economic change
It is possible to combine the main lines ofcausality in the trajectory through the centralizing state and the homogenizing market works
ofIndian politics, the silent, ihsistent movements ofpolitical economy, towards large entities like the commodities and labour market.
the logic of capitalism working through the state and the market, and Associated institutions ofthe modern, highly technically sophisticated
the voluble, visible turbulence at the level of cultural expression. T h e armed forces, the large and powerful bureaucracy, a massive manager-
fundamental process at work appears to have been a form of capitalist ial and professional middle class the size of the population of big
development which intensified both class and regional inequality and 6 European nations, can understand the advantages of scale; they enjoy
232 The Trajectorie of the Zr~dianState Crisis of the Nution-State i n India 233

the surpluses that only India's scale makes possible. But the processes more homogeneous, less democratic states with their own insecure
which produce this coalition of modernist groups and their advantages of being a nation from immemorial antiquity. How-
aIso produce, in their dark underside, equally constant processes of ever threatened the future of the Indian nation-state, the age of the
exclusion, resentment, and hostility to undeserved privilege. Since this nationalist imagination is far from over. T h e world of political possi-
elite speaks the language of national integration and unity, the latter bilities in India seems to be simplibing into the frightening choice
speaks the negative language of localism, regional autonomy, small- before most of the modern world's political communities: to try to
scale nationalism, in dystopias of ethnicity-small, xenophobic, craft imperfect democratic rules by which increasingly mixed groups
homogeneous politicalcommunities.This does violence to the political of people can carry on together an unheroic everyday existence, or the
imagination of the Indian nation-state, which emphasixd diversity as illusion of a permanent and homogeneous, unmixed, single nation, a
a great asset and enjoined principles of tolerance and mixing as the single collective self without any trace of a defiling otherness.
special gift of Indian civilization. That narrative of Indian history may
have been romantic, but its politics was certainly praiseworthy and it References
produced the most noteworthy spell of democratic governance for Anderson, Benedicc. 1983. Imagined Communities. London: Verso.
about a fifth of mankind for close to half a century. T h e present stage Bagchi, A.K. 1972. Private Investment in India 1300-1939. Cambridge: Cam-
marks a crisis in the life of the Indian nation-state in both senses of bridge University Press.
the term. It is brought on by the unfoldingof its own inner tendencies, Bardhan, Pranab. 1985. Political Economy of Development in India. Delhi:
and therefore it cannot escape from the crisis by a policy of masterly Oxford University Press.
negligence, precisely because this is not a result of policy failures, but Bhagwaci, Jagdish. 1993. India in Transition. Oxford: Clarendon.
rather of its limited successes. Chakravarty, Sukhamoy. 1987. Development Planning: The Indian Experience.
Secondly, it cannot, it appears, emerge out of it untransformed; a Oxford: Clarendon.
simply singleminded pursuit of centralization is apt to make its strains Chandra, Bipan. 1977. The Rise and Growth of Economic Nationalism in
India. Delhi: People's Publishing House.
only worse; its apparent suppression at one point would make it erupt
Chatterjee, Partha. 1986. Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World Delhi:
elsewhere. T h e nation-state as it emerged through the Nehruvian
Oxford University Press.
design of the 1950s can survive only if it allows its dominant imagi-
. 1993. The Nation and Its Fragments. Princeton, NJ: Princeton Uni-
nation to admit amendments, and strive to achieve greater equity versity Press.
between classes and regions; and try to surmount and heal the great Dunn, John. 1993. Western Political Theory in the Face of the Future. Cam-
cleavage of dispossession caused by processes of the cognitively arro- bridge: Cambridge University Press.
gant, socially uncaring, brutal form of modernity. Gellner, Ernest. 1983. Nations and Nationalism. Oxford: Blackwell.
But the crisis of the Indian nation-state as it is imagined at present Kaviraj, Sudipra. 1986. Indira Gandhi and Indian Politics. Economic and
does not of course indicate a depletion of the attraction of the abstract Political Weekly, XXI: 1697- 1708.
idea of nationalism. T h e structure of the international system forces . 1992. The Imaginary Institution of India. In I? Chatterjee and
all dissatisfaction to seek articulation, however inappropriate, through G. Pandey, eds, Subaltern Studies VII. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
the obligatory pretence that each minority, each disgruntled group of Khilnani, Sunil. 1993. India's Democratic Career. In John Dunn, ed., Demo-
cracy: The UnfinishedJourney Oxford: Clarendon.
people, are a nation-in-waiting that must break away from one erst-
,
while nation only to createvanother. With heroic unreasonableness
they also believe, in the face of history, that their nation will not repeat
the tragedies of others. If the present Indian state suffers disintegra-
tion, its space will most likely be occupied by a number of smaller,
 The Politics of Liberalization in India 235
opposed to this model were the economies offormer communist states
in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, which were run by state plan-
ning. In these economies, the state not merely assumed overall direc-
tion of the economic activities as a whole, but also engaged in the direct
The Politics of Liberalization management of production. Thus, the vast majority of people were
direct employees of the state, and the state was the primary producer
in India of !goods and services. It was also the provider of a comprehensive
system of welfare. European states of the late twentieth century deve-
loped a deliberately complex form which admitted structures from
both of these models, without surrendering the entire functioning of

L
iberalization is an excellent subject for the study of political eco- the economy to either the unrestrained logic of the market or the total
nomy, the necessary entanglement of economic policies with control of the state. These were characterized as 'mixed economies'.
political conflict. Liberalization, strictly speaking, refers to a Despite considerable divergence in the exact mix of the two elements,
set of internally interconnected economic policies. But the introduction and the precise fashioning of the institutional structures, these
of these ~oliciesis, in most cases, an intensely contentious political represented a recognizable third form.
process. Liberalization of an economy never happens in isolation, but However, despite their disproportionate influence, the world system
always against the background of some already settled ways of ongoing consists not merely of Western states, but also a vast number of non-
economic life. The changes collectively called 'liberalization' happen Western state forms. In economic terms, non-Western states would
in the context ofprevious conventional, settled habits ofpolicy formu- seem to belong to a fourth category. In these contexts, the states or
lation by governments and the general economic conduct of ordinary political regimes simply did not develop capacities to regulate economic
people. life in any comprehensive sense. Economic activities-ordinary peoples'
There are a great variety ofstates in the modern world, and different livelihood, mercantile exchange, market organizations-all proceeded
kinds of states follow significantly different orientations towards the without much reference to the state. Usually, the state exacteda certain
economy. Thus, what liberalization would actually mean for citizens revenue from the society's economic activities, where it could; but in
of a particular state would depend to a large extent on the kind of premodern economies its taxing and regulatory capacities were extreme-
relation that already exists between the state and the economic sphere. ly limited. In our analysis, one particular distinction is of crucial im-
In economic terms; states in the modern worid could be classified into portance. Both in the first and the fourth types, the state leaves much
four groups. In some cases, like the United States, the society con- of the economic activity alone; but these should not be confused. In
ventionally worked on the basis of a very limited conception of the the first case, the state has the capacity to interfere; and it occasionally
state's economic role. The state usually provided law and order, the does-for instance, in cases of war or emergency. In the second case,
enforcement of contracts, and minimal conditions for the efficient the state simply lacks the capacity itself.
operation of a capitalist economy. State intervention in economic life
was deeply disapproved of as inefficient, bureaucratic, and also as
inducing an economic culture opposed to self-reliance. Diametrically 'Meanings' of Liberalization
.
w Given this diversity among states, and their divergent relations with
First published in Simon Brornley, et al., eds, Making the Internationai: the sphere ofeconomic activity, liberalization can mean quite different
Economic Interdependence and the Political Order (London: Open Universiry things. (i) First, liberalization can occur in economies that are already
and Pluto, 2004), pp. 133-72. following liberal free enterprise policies as a settled habit of economic
236 The P~ljectorirsoj'the Indim State Thr Politics of liberxtlization in / n d i ~ ~ 237
practice. Such societies are already organized on 'libemlizing' princi- In the last two types of contexts, liberalization of the economy means
ples. These either do not require 'liberalizing' policies or feel minimal nothing less than an alteration of the settled forms of economic
disturbance in their experience of economic life when they are intro- practice.
duced. But in a11 other types of states, the experiential impact of Often economic liberalizers seek to insulate such changes from
liberalization can be radical. (ii) Secondly, liberalizing policies can political conflict by claiming that these changes are 'technical' econo-
be introduced in socialist/con~munisteconomies in which ordinary mic questions, a matter of simple determination of the most effective
people's economic life was entirely controlled by the state, and centred means for achieving narrowly economic objectives. However, i t is, in
on its institutions. The effects of liberalization in such contexts mean fact, never so simple, or so clearly a-political. These changes affect the
nothing less than a total reorganization of economic life. Historically, life-chances and life-structures of major social groups who are bound
however, the conversion of communist societies to markets have led to respond powerfully tosuch reforms: and this means that liberalization
to very different trajectories of social change. This process affected is always serious politics. Liberalization might appear to be 'freeing the
completely state-planned economies like the former Soviet Union the spirit of enterprise' of economic individuals and groups, but, contrary
hardest, taking away secure jobs, destroying social security, creating to ideological images of the process, there is nothing spontaneous
highly unstable quasi-markets which often collapsed into open law- or natural about it. Treating people as 'economic individuals' with
lessness. However, there were other examples of more successful and atomistic self-interested inclinations is not a natural human trait but
orderly transitions, in cases like Hungary and Poland. T h e most intri- a cultural construct. In the second and the fourth kind of economies,
guing and paradoxical example came in China where a secure, un- it means serious reorganization of economic life, which only the state
challenged communist regime has supervised a phased introduction of has the legal ability and the sheer social power to carrv through. This
a booming market economy. (iii) Third, liberalization occurred in leads to the first paradox of liberalization: though the eventual and
economies where the habits ofpolicy were relatively non-liberal, where ideal objective ofliberalization is to reduce the state's role in economic
the people expected large economic benefits from the stare's activity, life, ironically, it is only the state which can reduce the functions ofthe
and consequently the state habitually intervened substantially in state. Or, to put it less paradoxically, economic liberalization in most
economic life either by regulatory structures or by direct management cases requires a significant use of political power.
of economic enterprises. In Western Europe, where mixed economies Since we shall be concerned primarily with liberalization of the
flourished in the 196Os, this meant cutbacks in welfare spending by the Indian economy, let us see where in this typology we can place the
state, a reduction of the political power oftrade unions, and large-scale Indian case. T h e Indian economy is extremely diverse and internally
privatization of state-managed companies poviding public utilities. complex, but its segments are a mix of the second, third, and fourth
(iv) Finally, liberalization can happen in societies that had a large, pre- types. In a case like India, liberalization could not be anything but a
modern economic sector unacquainted with modern controls of eco- deeply contested political affair. This essay cannot go into the details
nomic life, where economic and activities took place in of the economic policies through which liberalization of the Indian
unregulatedsponraneity, with the state being indifferent and irrelevant economy was carried on, starting from 199 I ; it will discuss thepolitics
to much ofordinary economic life. This is very different from the two that went before liberalization and prevented its happening earlier;
dominant forms of modern economic life: in the liberal version the that went on around it and made it feasible; and the politics of its like-
stateleaves enterprise free but enforces contracts, prevents and punishes ly future. Liberalization will be seen not as aneconomic but a political
malpractice, and provides the legal framework for capitalist industries; process.
in the socialist version it regulates economic life, ensures substan- T h e process of liberalization of the Indian economy has to be un-
tial redistribution, and at times manages direct economic production. derstood in terms of two contexts. First, the impulse towards
238 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Politics of Liberalization in India 239
liberalization came, in part, from outside the country-from inter- modern world economy. This process was clearly discerned by the
national agencies and a strand of highly influential contemporary more historically perceptive theorists of the nineteenth century, like
economic thinking' Secondly, it is essential to ask two questions speci- mar^.^ This general process, however, went through several distinct
fic to Indian political economy: (i) what kind of economic structure stages, keeping pace with the development of productive technology
did India have earlier, which liberalization was meant to dismantle and and the evolution of new techniques of political organization, which
transform? and (ii) why were those earlier policies adopted? What were theorists like Michel Foucault characterize as 'disciplinary power'.4
the arguments for their justification?" Both technology and disciplines of bureaucratic control vastly expand-
ed the capacities of economies and states to affect the lives of social
T h e Global Context groups, sometimes at great distances. Undoubtedly, this long-term
historical process has recently gone through a qualitatively new phase
It is a commonplace today to link changes of any large magnitude in of acceleration, in which such interdependence and capacity to pro-
national economies with the process ~ f ~ l o b a l i z a t i oBut
n . how revealing duce reciprocal effects has gone further than ever before. Narrowly,
or analytically useful this statement is depends o n the exact meaning this is called 'globalization' since the 1980s. This has been caused by
placed on the term. At times, the contemporary trends ofglobalization the growth of new technology, based on digital communication, and
are presented as historically unprecedented; but clearly, on a longer corresponding developments of political and economic institutions,
view, the present phase of globalization is an accelerated process of a which can at least encourage andmonitor, ifnot regulate, the networks
historical tendency continuing for two centuries, at least since the rise created by these technological leaps. For a historical understanding of
of modern industrial capitalism in the West. Globalization as a con- what is happening to our world, it is essential to p a r d against two
cept can be construed narrowly or broadly. In the broad sense, it refers common errors-the first is to believe that nothing like this ever
to the process of intensifying interdependence and emergence of happened before, the second to think there is nothing new in the pre-
networks of regular transaction between economies and states across sent stage. From the 1970s, there was wide realization that the struc-
the world that began with European colonization and the rise of the ture of the world economy was changing, and intensive trade practices
had fundamentally altered the structure of the world economy that
This directly implies that this strand ofthinking was not influential before. emerged from the world wars. States veered round to the view that
Indeed, the study of how and why individual economic doctrines become greater, more intensive economic exchange between societies was in-
dominant and begin to shape government policies is an intriguing but evitable, and each state had t o find a way of turning it to its benefit.
neglected field of academic research. At the time of Indian Independence, im-
From the late 1970s, another unexpected development accentuat-
mediately after the Second World War, economic thinking was dominated by
ed this trend. It became increasingly clear that the Soviet system in
theories-like socialist or Keynesian ideas-that were critical of the market
mechanism. Russia and Eastern Europe was in serious economic difficulty T h e
Of these two questions, obviously, the first is descriptive, and the second utter collapse of these states removed the imaginative attraction of an
set is evaluative. The second set of questions raises further ones, by implication: alternative economic model. It became possible to simplify this
were earlier political economic policies wrong from the start, when they were historical trend as 'the end of history', when only one single economic
adopted? Or were these superseded by historical changes in the Indian and and political model was left standing. Widespread reforms towards
the international economy? Did the early Indian elite adopt these policies
for purely economic reasons, or f a a combination of economic and political
Marx's Capital, vol. 111, contains a sketchy but powerful analysis of the
objectives?For discussions about some of these crucial issues in India's political emergence of a world system through capitalist development in the West.
economy, see Chakravarty 1984, and Bardhan 1984. Some of the political
implications are analysed in Kaviraj 1994.
* Particularly useful is Foucault's discussion of the idea of
ity'. See Foucault 1991.
240 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Politics of Liberalization in Indirt 24 1

liberalization of economies occurred in this international setting. But about what is regarded as desirable and possible. The more mundane
to understand liberalization in India we have to ask: what was the politics of interest-pursuing actors occurs in the context of such
structure of the Indian economy before the reforms began, and why possibilities already shaped by discourse.
was it the way it was?What were the intellectual justifications, in other After Independence in 1947, the Congress Party ruled India un-
words, of Nehruvian political economy? interruptedly for nearly forty years. This long period of Congress rule
can be divided into two phases. In the first, Congress followed a re-
formist (some would call it socialist) programme of industrial deve-
T h e Indian Context
lopment devised by a relatively radical elite around Nehru; but in the
The complex of policy changes collectively called liberalization re- period after his death, when leadership of the party passed to Indira
present, without doubt, the most radical change in overall policy Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi, Congress policies changed in significant
orientation in the Indian economy since Independence. These policies ways. In the period of Jawaharlal Nehru's leadership, from 1946 to
were brought in explicitly to transform, alter, and reorder very dif- 1964, a fairly coherent and well-reasoned structure ofpolicies was put
ferent policies the Indian state had followed for over four decades. The in place through a discourse of political economy that achieved al-
earlier set of policies can be seen at two levels: the first is the level of most complete intellectual hegemony and which became a kind of
intellectual discourses of political economy, i.e. the arguments put social 'common sense'. Over the next two decades, these policies subtly
forward by economists and public intellectuals; and second, at the changed
- their character, leading -
to serious unintended and undetect-
level of governmental policy-making-the attitudes and decisions of ed consequences which eventually undermined those policies. By the
major political actors, the bureaucracy, political parties, pressure early 1980s, that old, reformist, redistributive, state-centred intellectual
groups. In the first case, we should analyse how economists formulate consensus had lost its persuasiveness. A vague- but distinctly discernible
policy directions on the basis of more technical considerations about new kind of 'common sense' emerged in economic circles, and began
economic objectives, and how these technical ideas are taken up by to circulate in the political public sphere through academic discussion,
political groups who derive their support from particular social consti- journalism, media debates, and the unceasing flow of political gos-
tuencies. To have serious political effect, those 'technical' economic sip which often plays an important role in opinion-making. Initially
ideas must go through a popular translation. Political parties give those through the decade of the 1980s, this remained a subtle change in the
ideas a more accessible, less technical form, so that these then become climate of elite opinion, without achieving much tangible policy con-
part of political discourse reflected in public meetings, parliamentary sequence. But in 1991, due to some dramatic turns in political life, a
debates, and journalistic arguments. At the second level, we must new government took ofice that decided to introduce policies of eco-
study opinions and interests inside the bureaucracy the formation of nomic reform.
party policies, and pressures brought on the government by organized
interests.These constitute the non-electoral side ofdemocratic politics,
T h e Legacy of Economic Nationalism
which is sometimes neglected by an exclusive focus on elections and
government responses to their verdicts. Actual political events are de- The nationalist movement that brought Independence to India was a
termined by both discourses and interests. It is wrong to believe that wide, broad-based coalition of social groups, economic interests, and
individuals or social groups have some kind of immediate, pre-theore- ideologies. The Congress Party, which formed <he centre ofthis mobil-
tical understanding of their ouril interests, that they can understand ization in its final stages, represented this large, coalitional, ambiguous
their interests the way persons feel pain. Rather, persons and groups nature of Indian nationalism. Although we speak of Indian national-
'perceive' what is in their interest through the languages of political ism in the singular,
- in fact several strands inside this broad movement
discourse. These discourses shape the horizons ofpopular imagination entertained strikingly dissimilar views on what to do with state power
242 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Politics of Liberalimtion i n h d i a 243

once it was won from the British. Since the late nineteenth century a of the capitalist class, which promoted an incipient political consensus
group of political economists had advocated a 'drain theory' about in favour of an interventionist state. True, leftist forces and capitalist
Indian poverty.5 It claimed that British dominion led to an econo- groups supported the state on the basis ofradically different principles,
mic impoverishment of Indian society.They were particularly scathing and expected rather different things from its intervention; but they
about what they saw as a process of de-industrialization in which did support the idea of an active state. Such discursive facts often play
British industrial goods slowly ruined Indian artisanal crafts, and ex- a very significant role in political life. In India, this consensus gotwrit-
traction of revenues from the Indian colony fuelled British economic ten into the founding political institutions of the state, and shaped the
growth. There existed highly significant differences between various political imagination ofelites and ordinary people, structuring political
nationalist strands on economic policy; but until Independence be- life in particular ways.
came aserious prospect, these remained primarily theoretical disputes. In countries with a democratic political set-up, the movement of
From the late 1930s, however, economic policies were discussed with ideas and the formation of public opinion are crucial in the
a new seriousness. Interestingly, Congress always had strong relations determination of long-term policy, though in the Indian case, due to
with political leaders of the Indian business community. A few years widespread illiteracy, this effective 'public' was highly restricted. The
before Independence, a group of politically minded industrialists pub- Gandhian national movement had mobilized huge masses of the
lished an outline of the kind of economic policy they thought the state people on large general issues like the right of self-determination; but
should follow after Independence. It was popularly known as the illiteracy reduced ordinary voters' ability to influence more specific
'Bombay Plan'. Although primarily a platform supported by indus- questions of policy. In the first two decades of democratic pblitics,
trialists, it advocated policies derived from the tradition of economic ordinary voters were mainly politically quiescent, leaving unusually
nationalism and advocated two key ideas-surprising for a capitalist large room for initiatives by political elites and intellectuals. In India's
group. Not surprisingly, the Bombay Plan initiators advocated a post-Independence history, there were broadly four stages of deve-
strong protectionist policy for the development ofindigenous industries, lopment of politico-economic ideas. In 1947, gaining freedom from
shielding them from competition from more p o w e h l Western business. the British empire seemed a magnificent political achievement. It was
They wanted this policy to apply to industries not merely located in hardly surprising that, immediately after decolonization, the overriding
India, but actually controlled by Indian business. Indian business, as concern for the new nationalist elite was the protection of this newly
a social class, saw clearly that while the nationalization of industries won political sovereignty. Indian nationalists had since the early twen-
could go against their interests, protection against foreign competition tieth century contributed to a strong sense of economic nationalism.
required a large role for the state; and a weak state could not pursue They were convinced that Indian poverty and British affluence were
economic nationalist policies. They also supported the idea that the both based incontrovertibly on thecolonial 'drain ofwealth. From the
state should play a significant role in running industries which capital- mid- 1930s, this tradition of economic thinking, developed by giving
ists could not support, and ~ r o v i d eeconomic infrastructure. Leftist an ingenious
-
nationalist twist to Scottish political-economic doctrine^,^
nationalists, influenced by Marxist and Fabian ideas, had already pres- was increasingly linked to analytical frames drawn from Marxist criti-
sed for such ~olicies.Thus, there was an interesting convergence ques of imperialism. Jawaharlal Nehru's own economic understanding
between discursive advocacy of leftist opinion and the hard interests played a significant part in producing a form of 'common sense of

The major authors of this sch:ol were Dadabhai Naoroji, the author of The major writers on the drain theory drew most of their main principles
Poverty and Un-British Rule in India, and a member of the British Parliament from British political economy, the works of Adam Smith, Ricardo, and later
for a time; and R.C. Dutt, a high civil servant who wrote a more academic, but John Stuart Mill. But these texts were regularly and widely read by Indian
no less critical, Economic History ofIndia, vols I and 11. intellectuals from the early nineteenth century.
 7 %Politics
~ of Liber~zlizutioniiz Indicz 245

the state'-an underlying strand of thought which helped shape economic role, it was also fundamentally different from Soviet-style
state policies at a fundamental level. Nehru was critical of the politi- planning India was seen as a 'mixed economy', with cconomic activitv
cal practices of the Soviet Union, but he applied a primarily Marxist left largely to private enterprise, though. because of the theoretical
framework to the understanding of international politics. In contrast mistrust of private enterprise in socialist economics, the state was also
to the standard 'realist' view that relations between states could be given large regulatory powers.' The econon~icideal of the Nehru re-
explained in terms of their single-minded search for power, the Marxisr gime could be called 'socialist' in a broad sense, because i t used an
theory believed there was a deeper underlying field of causality related eclectic mix of various leftist ideas; i t certainly included a Marxist
to productive and economic forces. Power came out of the institu- understanding of the working of the capitalist world system, and a
tional organization of economic capacities. The protection of political Fabian concern with redistribution ofincome, but within ademocratic
sovereignty was thus not just a narrowly political question. It depended political framework. Its economic ideal was the creation ofan economy
heavily on India's place in the complexstructure of the world capitalist that was self-reliant, not autarkic8 In early public debates, there was
system. This was a highly plausible theory, which saw the industrial- considerable voluble discussion about the state's role in income re-
ization ofthe West as the real source ofits colonial power; it argued that distribution and social justice. Nehru recognized that the new state's
if ex-colonial societies were to move out of their crippling dependence resources and tax base were just too small to attempt serious redistri-
on the West, they had to industrialize themselves, rather than agree bution, or sufficient provision ofwelfare." In fact, welfare in the strict
to the disingenuous ideas of comparative advantage. Continued spe- sense was limitedin Nehru's times to programmes intended to help the
cialization in agricultural production, which had been their conventional urban poor by providinglowfixed-price food through state distribution
strength, would lead to a perpetuation of economic backwardness channels called ration shops. By the time the Nehru regime had work-
because of the adverse international terms of trade between industrial ed out its economic growth model in some detail, by the mid-1 950s,
and agricultural goods. Significantly, even simple industrialization in the state had established a large role in the economy in two ways-its
consumer goods was not likely to dispel Western economic domination, ability to impose regulatory controls through bureaucratic institutions,
as this would continue the dependence on Western technology and and its role in directly running crucial productive industries, which
machinery. Nehru and nationalists feared, like elites in other post- provided infrastructure or essential inputs into other industries."'
colonial societies, that the West might use its economic leverage to
reduce political sovereignty, and turn them, despite formal Independ- T h e idea was very widespread that capitalist enterprise, left to itself, led to
ence, into effective satellites. Sovereignry depended on economic inde- 'anarchy of production', crises o f overproduction, large-scale u n e m p l o y n ~ e n t ,
pendence. True economic independence could emerge only if India and increased social inequality. N o t merely Marxists, socialists, a n d cornmun-
ists believed in these argunlents-so did many liberals.
could develop her own heavy industries.
This was a major difference benveen Nehruvian thinking from communist
Stvrrai major policy directions followed from this theoretical
economic ideals of either the Soviet or the Chinese variety. It was always
perspective. Since indigenous Indian capitalists simply did not have
seen to be functioning primarily within the structure of the capitalist world
the kind of capital required to establish these large industries, this economy, n o t a separate o r oppositional nlodcl.
could be done only by the state. Following this line of reasoning the Even in his most romantic moments, for example, when he was devising
state in independent India assumed a large role in direct economic a programme for long-term economic dcvelopmenr and social jusrice, in [he
production in certain sectors, particularly in steel, heavy engineering, Avadhi session of [he Congress Party, Nehru p r o p q c d cautiously a 'socialistic
petrochemicals, power generaion, and distribution-all lines of eco- pattern o f society' instead of a socialist one.
nomic production regarded as essential for the development of other, "' T h e railways had been a wholly stare-run indusrry since colonial times.
consumer-oriented industries. Although this model of economic New industries ser up as public corporations included stcel-makirlg, heavy
growth gave the state in India a large and in some ways determining elecrricals, and petrochemicals.
 The Politics of Liberttlization in India 247
246 The Ec~jectoriesofthe I n d i m Stfite
question, which simply increased his suspicion that they wished to
This was the overarching intellectual hame for economic policies,
compromise India's political freedom of decision-making.
but the actual pursuit of these objectives in the real world contained
O n the econonlic side, Western governments, especially American
surprising, unintended developments. Interestingly, there was little
ruling circles, looked upon his statist policies with deep suspicion and
serious intellectual opposition to this basic policy from any organized
feared that they could be a prelude to a comprehensive nationalization
social group. Organized labour, under the influence ofcommunists or
of foreign and private industries. When Nehru's government sought
left wing Congressmen, welcomed them in any case. T h e middle clas-
technology and capital to develop his primarily state-led industrial-
ses were large intellectually persuaded by the cogencyofthese arguments
ization plan, American response, from government and business
and a realistic expectation that this policy of industrial growth would
circles, was hostile and negative. But this led to a mutual misunder-
materially benefit them by the creation of management and technical
standing of motives. T h e West thought it had enough reasons to treat
jobs: engineering education became a great favourite of ambiti-
Nehru as little better than a comn~unist;Nehru thought the West was
ous middle-class families. Bureaucracy was enticed by its nationalism
little better than imperialist.
and the prospect of immense increases in its own size and powers of
control. Even business, as we saw earlier, supported this brave protec-
tionist vision of industrial development, resulting in something like a Foreign Policy and Development Strategy
rare economic consensus. But the actual pursuit of these objectives led Nehru's regime had two options-either to abandon its ambitious
to surprising events. plans for industrialization, or to lookelsewhere.The change ofregime
Nehru was always a socialist, but never, after the 1930s, an admirer and fundamental shifts in Soviet policy after Stalin made this possible.
of its Stalinist model. He admired the Soviet Union's astonishing The end of the Stalin era led to not merely some internal changes in
industrial growth but was repulsed by the methods of terror used to the Soviet system, but also to a comprehensive revaluation of Soviet
achieve it. Under Stalin, the Soviets heartily returned his dislike, policies towards the world. The Khrushchev regime slowly began to
calling him, at times openly, 'an agent of Western imperialism'. Des- change its attitude towards newly decolonized states, and made cauti-
pite his very early, but short-lived, admiration of Soviet society (which ous overtures towards them. In part, this was also driven by a cru-
was incidentally shared by many Western socialists in the 1920s) a cial and more realistic assessment of the structure ofworld power. The
convergence of policies between independent lndia and post-War inflated ideological discourse of bipolarity often confused the real
USSRwas highly unlikely. In spite ofsharp criticisms of Western socie- condition of the world. It stated correctly that there were only two
ties for their colonial past, and continuedgentleness towards European superpowers who dominated the world, but often went on to imply
colonialism, in Nehru's thinking Western states like the UK and the incorrectly that their powers were broadly equal. In fact, the bipolarity
USA were the most likely allies of independent India. Realities of the of the post-War world was marked by an asymmetry between the West
post-War political world soon altered this perception. Serious friction and the Communist world in terms ofeconomic strength and political
began between India and the Western powers on both political and influence. Only in military power was there something like an equal-
economic issues. Inlmediately after the war, the US-led Western coali- ity of conventional arms and nuclear deterrence. But the asymmetry
tion began a frenetic search for allies across the third world for con- meant that the objectives of the two sides were determined very dif-
taining communism, by establishing a ring of interconnected military ferently. The West generally expected its allies to give full support to
alliances around the perimeter of the communist bloc. Nehru thought its military and political objectives. The cofimunist system, as the
these treaties contributed to increased tension, and decided to follow weaker player, would have been content if countries like India did not
a policy of non-alignment, a strategy condemned initially by both the follow the lead of the West, and the post-Stalin regimes recognized this
superpowers as a devious way of siding with the other camp. Western in their ~olicies.In other words, the Soviet objectives were lower than
powers also used their econon~icleverage to pressurize Nehru on this
248 The Trajectories of tl~eIndian State The Politics of Liberalization in India 249
the Western; and therefore this created a possibility of a convergence was encouraging: first, they successfullyestablished these industries in
between Soviet and Indian objectives, without ideological agreement. the Indian economy and reduced dependence on external sources of
A combination of this kind of economic thinking and short-term heavy industrial goods; and secondly,even their economic performance
political moves eventually shaped the outline of the political economic in terms of productivity and costs was fairly respectable. As a whole,
structure Indiawas to follow for nearly three decades after Independence. the policy generated industrial growth, though at a relatively modest
It was undoubtedly a mixed economy, with a sprawling private sector, rate; it created an economy with a large and versatile production base.
loosely or insufficiently regulated, but dominated by a highly visible Most significantly, from the Nehruvian point of view, it helped India,
public sector in crucial industries like steel, mining, heavy engineering, in the thick of the Cold War, to remain impervious to pressures from
petrochemicals, oil exploration. Much of the technology and some of outside to alter its political policies. India remained more independent
the capital needed for this drive towards heavy industrialization came of international, particularly ofwestern, pressure, compared to coun-
from the USSR. The coincidence of Soviet and Indian policy towards tries like South Vietnam or South Korea which were seen derisively as
Kashmir and other international disputes sometimes made this con- Western satellites. For three crucial foundational decades Indian
vergence of interest look far worse in Western eyes, and among some political economy followed this fundamental design.
panicky bourgeois groups inside India. Equally, Western hostility to
legitimate ambitions of industrial g o w t h and the mysterious ways
Assessments of Nehru's Policies
of Western foreign policy made Indians increasingly mistrustful of
'
Western declarations.' What Indians found particularly strange was Historical assessments of Nehru's policies diverge widely. There are
how the Americans, who were in theory fighting for the free world, in two main lines ofevaluation. Some economists have argued forcefully,
practice preferred army regimes in Pakistan over elected ones in India. since the 1970s, that the state-led heavy industrialization policies were
The creation ofthenew public-sector industries led to the elaboration flawed from the inception, in their very design, and not surprisingly
of a system of public administration, which classified industries, they delivered a sluggish long-term gowth.12 Raj Krishna, a leading
somewhat in the line of British thinking at the time, into four kinds. economist, famously derided it as the 'Hindu rate of gowth', though
There were private enterprises wholly owned by capitalists; but besides what this rate of g o w t h has to do intimately or causally with Hindu-
these there were, legally, three types of government involvement in in- ism is unclear. This line of thought believes typically that the criteria
dustries. 'Joint enterprises' had shared private and state control, usu- for assessment should be exclusively economic, in fact narrowly
ally with a majority share with the state. 'Public enterprises' were income-oriented and based on stringently narrow calculations of 'eco-
funded by the state, but their managements were supposed to enjoy nomic growth'. Other economists who support less narrow conceptions
managerial autonomy ofdecision-making.Thesewere, in administrative of economic development, and advocate wider and more complex
theory at least, sharply distinguished from 'ministerial departments' criteria like 'quality of life', judge Nehru's policies rather more posit-
like the railways or the post office which were entirely controlled by ively.13 Another line ofthought still asserts the correctness of Nehruvian
state ministries, and were regulated by ordinary rules of bureaucratic policies, and blames its two main disappointments-widespread pov-
management. In the Nehru period at least, public-sector industries en- erty and slow growth-on failures of implementation. Interestingly,
joyed some serious autonomy of managerial decisions from the from a theoretical point of view both these judgements depend cru-
bureaucracy. And the initial performance of public-sector industries
w
,.
cially on comparison between actualstates ofaffairs and counterfactuals.

' Western foreign policies seemed from the Indian poinr ofview marked by IZ One of the best, andcertainly most influential, arguments, is in Bhagwati
an inconsistency between principles and practice. Western governments claimed 1993.
to be fighting a war for the safery of the free world, but seemed unaccountably l 3 Among the most well-known analyses of India's political economy are
attracted towards openly dictatorial regimes. Bardhan 1992, and Dreze and Sen 1998.
250 The 7i.ajertories o f the Indiat~State
Consequently, these judgements always leave a certain margin of un- was not entirely an economic phenomenon. I'olitical processes were
certainty. It is possible to suggest a third, more mixed, judgement. If' equally to bIame. After Nehru, the adrninistrative distinctions in man-
the criteria used are mixed-co~iibined economic and political ones- agement
- styles andstruct~~res between ministerially controlled industries
and assess growth objectives, some of which can be decomposed like the railways and post office and relatively autonomous public cor-
individually and others which are indivisible public goods, then the porations producing steel were slowly eroded by political interference.
historical judgement on the first stage of policies is bound to be more Indira Gandhi's attempts to centralize government
- resulted in in-
complicated, at least less pessimistic. Collective and non-economic creasingly direct bureaucratic and ministerial interference in their
goods like political freedom of decision-making and political non- affairs. By the mid-1970s, there was hardly any discernible difference
dependence would show the performance of Nehru's policies in benveen the rwo rypes of enterprise: public sector industries were run
far better light. But even those who advocate this historical line of as bureaucratically as ministerial departments. Everyday political
judgement must admit that in its two main functions in the economic commentary and popular gossip was full ofspeculation about politicians
sphere the state's involvement began to yield diminishing and eventually surreptitiously using the resources of state enterprises for their own
counter-optimal returns over the longer term. Even after decades of political purposes or for straightforward financial malpractice. Thus
Nehruvian planning, the Indian economy remained plagued by the the degeneration of the 'public sector' was a somewllat complicated
two problems of slow growth and large-scale poverty. affair. There was no doubt that the public sector had degenerated; but
T h e problems with the Nehruvian economic design were probably it was, equally truly, not the same kind of public sector. This had two
twofold, again some economic and others political. First, as some eco- highly significant results: fi rst, the economic performance o f t h e pub-
nomists suggested, planning itself went through a first, relatively easy, lic industries became uniformly poor, and began to be universally
phase in which the initial effort of inventorying resources and their derided, not merely by economists preferring thc rilarket, but also by
direct use by the state brought some quick and impressive results. But ordinary commentators. Secondly, it became increasingly clear that
once this period of 'easy planning' based on more rational use of the Nehruvian discursive justifications fbr the sector, for its contribution
physical resources was over. there was a need for the political-economic to the econonlic strength of the country and preventing concentra-
design to change. In fact, the relative success of this kind of planning tion ofeconomic power, had ceased to apply. Some larger international
- -

was altering the structure of the economic world in which it was taking developments contributed to the decline of intellectual support for
place, making its continued success more difficult. Paradoxical- this economic T h e USSR collapsed with its model of rational
ly, precisely because state policies were 'successful' in the short run, cc~m~rehensivc state control over econoniic life, leading to a serious
and their objectives realized, these policies should have been changed. philosophical decline in the general credibility ofsocialist arguments.
However, it is clear that from the point ofview of politics and bureau- Finally. and perhaps most significantly, the structures of the world eco-
cratic decision-making this would appear odd, to say the least. It was nomy and the international state system changed sufficiently to make
implausible to ask politicians and bureaucrats to change policies the 1950s' fears of neo-colonial subjugation appear outdated. 'I'his
which had been successful. By the mid-1970s there was widespread altered political and econornic context made 'liberalization' a realistic
perception in the political public sphere, in journalistic debates, and agenda which could be taken up by political actors.
in the popular mind, that state-run industries were running
uneconomically and inefficiently, running up huge losses which even- T h e Short-Term Context of Liberalization
tually fell on the state. T h e second aspect of state intervention, its in India
system of regulatory controls, increased bureaucratic power and too
easily degenerated into corrupt practices. Yet, interestingly, it needed a serious foreign exchange crisis to start
B ~ lthe
t degeneration of the public sector and its growing disrepute serious policy change. By the early 1990s economic arguments for
 The Politics o f liber~zlizt~tion
i n Z~ldz~z 253
liberaliz.ation were not new or ~ ~ n c o n v e n t i o n aIn
l . the 1960s, to argue
against the state sector and in favour o f large-scale privatization re- way was left open for a class of richer Farmers to emerge-to replace
quired some courage, because it was t o go against a political con- them as the dominant class in the countryside. They benefited from
sensus about the economy. By the mid-1970s that consensus had the startling absence of agricultural income tax, and the general non-
lost conviction and was becoming decrepit as an ideology. Some existence of regulatory legislation. By the mid- 196Os, rich farmers had
other significant changes had also taken place in the lndian economy. become a major political interest group in some parts of the country.
Nehruvian political-economic thinking had regarded agriculture In the 1960s, government policy too began to turn in their favour.
Agricultural productivity remained stubbornly low despite the land-
primarily as a sector t o be used to encourage industrial growth-by
reform legislations in the Nehru years. After Indira Gandhi became
encouraging productivity increases and enabling a transfer o f surplus
labour from agrarian t o industrial occupations. Government policy prime minister, the government decided that the land-reform strategy
had failed, and changed over dramatically to a new 'green revolution'
therefore treated agriculture differently. Industrial production benefited
from government activity, agriculture from non-action. Nehru's gov- policy ofsupporting technological change in agriculcure.This required
ernment had, in accordance with its socialist convictions, been con- preferential treatment t o farmers through a raft ofnleasures-subsidiz-
ed farming inputs, assured prices for agricultural produce, the provi-
vinced chat agricultural productivity cc~uldbe boosted dramatically by
land reforms, rather than by technological fixes. Instead of relying on sion of energy at low prices. These reforms led to an increase in socio-
economic i n q u a l i t y in the countryside, but accompanied by a general
technological improvements in agriculture, which were likely to in-
rise in productivity. T h e success of the grecn revolution in the wheat-
crease inequality a m o n g the peasantry, Nehru's regime enacted
legislation which helped the state to fixceilingson land l4 producingareas released the government from its cripplingdependence
T h e excess land held by rural magnates was to be redistributed by o n food aid and import. and increased its range o f freedom ofdecision-
making. Sociologically, Indian society had undergone significant
the state to land-hungry poor peasants. It was generally believed that
poorer peasants or agricultural labourers, when given land to own, changes: while industries were more widespread and stronger, and
despite their small farm sizes, would raise production enthusiastically. spawned a larger, ambitious, politically voluble professional class, a
new class of rich farmers had come to dominate rural society with
From the mid-195Os, the Congress Party, under Nehru's pressure, en-
much greater wealth and consecluently political ambition.
acted land reform legislation.
In relrospect, the causes that liberalization in the lC)90s
In the long term, this policy was a mixed success: it both succeeded
were not new. Dissatisfaction with Nehruvian policies, o r their ~ n i s -
and failed. In the short run it seemed a failure, because richer farmers
implemented form, became increasingly widespread after the mid-
managed to retain most of their land by a creative use of legal provi-
1960s. Bureaucratic impositions were criticized increasingly by a
sions. Onlyaninsignifi cant amount ofland waseventuallyredistributed.
minor section of the intelligentsia, capitalist entrepreneurs, private
Over the long term, however, agricultural policies were seen to
prod~lcean enormous social transformation in the countryside. Nehru's managers, aspiring small businessmen, and ordinary people who had
legislation expropriated the zamindars, a class of absentee colonial to deal with bureaucraticdelays because ofthe constant overelaboration
of Byzantine procedures. Large social groups, w h o had great electoral
landlords w h o had flourished under British rule and stifled the agrar-
ian economy by their high rent demands. After their rapid demise, the leverage, and influential and strategically placed elites w h o commanded
wealth and c o n n c c t i o ~ ~increasingly
s, saw bureaucratic controls ovrr
the economy as serious obstacles to their growth. But the old policies
'"n the Indian constitution, yriculrure falls under the legal jurisdiction of
retained solid support from other social groups-the bureaucracy
scare governments, not of rhe centre. Nehru's governrnenr ar the centre did not
which enjoyed immense powers from these regulations; the political
enact land reform legirlarion. The Congress Parry asked irs state governments
class, which indirectly or corruptly benefited from its assets; and orga-
to introduce land ceiling legislation, which they obediently did.
nized labour, which ~ r o f i t e dfrom vastly improved working conditions.
 7 % Politics
~ o f Liberalization it/ il~diltilr 255

T h e interest convet-gence, which had led to the Nehruvi'tn policies purposively. Planning slowly became a process ofsetting down rargets
without n1~1chs e r i o ~ opposition,
~s starred fragmenting. 7'he politics of and largc-scale objectives, and the vast apparatus of planning ltept
discourse also began to change, but Inore slowly and more subtly. itself busy in statistical exercises.
Intellectually, a major part of the intelligentsia still defend- During the short period o f r h c Emergency (1 '974-G),in an intcrest-
ed astatc sector that functioned very differently from Nehru's times 1,y ing interlude, a section of the Congress leadership encouraged by
wholly anachronistic reference to high-minded Nehruvian cconornic Mrs Gandhi's second son Sanjay Ciandhi, hegan ro suggest hereti-
ideals. Rut both politicians and cortimon people recognized rhat the cally rhat India should abandon planned development and adopt 'the
state sector represented a large vested interest rather than a \velcome Brazilian path', a transparent code for more liberalized economic
counterweight t o the powcr of capitalists. -The genuine policy policies. With the gradual decline of Nehruvian econonlic thinking
consensus o f t h e 1950s and 1960s was thus already in jeopardy. Early behind real contro! regimes, these policies lost their ideological resili-
suggestions towards liberali7,ation mainly stressed two polic!, enceand crumbled morally from inside. As a result, the control system
recommendations: reducing state controls over the licensing of new did not collapse, but it became a gigantic, arbitrary, Byzantine mass of
- ~

industries, and [,ringing market fi~rcesinto sluggish sectors of thc rules capriciously implemented, more to extract bribes or inconvenience
economy, thereby ending state monopoly. '17he climate of opinion adversaries than realize defensible policy objectives. -Tl~econtl-ol
changed slowly: t h 0 ~ 1 ~ ;I1 1largcr section of economists hegan to argue system became more repressive and less iustifiable at the same rimc.
f b r c ~ f u l for
l ~ reduction of state control and grearcr treedon1 of thc Already, a certain change in economic thinkingwas discernible in gov-
market, they met with a stodgy dismissal. ernmenr circles in the last years of [ndira Gandhi's rule. Econo~nists
with pronounced liberalizing views were appointed to highly intluen-
Hut therc were discernible changes in pracrical orientations of eco-
nomic policy. In any case, Indira Gandhi showed, From the start of her tial and visible advisory. .positions in the economic ministries. 'l'hei~
prime ministerial career, a more flexible and pragmatic approach to presence indicated i~ncipientrethinking in political circles and the high
macro-economic policies than her father, cerrainlv less constrained by bureaucracy. These economists also made strong attacks o n the in-
ideological convictions abour development o r redistrib~~tion. T h c first efficiencv of the conventional state sector a n d licensing controls,
major change in economic policy she initiated, the shift to the slowly altering the intellect~~al climare in which governmenr ecorio~nic
policy was formulated."
technical fix in agriculture througll green revolution strategies, showed
how easily she could abandon the egalitarian conviction behind the Arguments for liberalization and market-friendly reforms did 11ot
earlier policies ot land reform and institutional charlge." For the re-emerge in serious public political debares until Kajiv Gandhi came
-
t o power. Rajiv <;andhi had a shotter term in power, but his economic
benefit ofsharp rises in producriviry, she was prepared to acccpt large-
tendencies were even more eclectic than his morher's. H e clearly push-
scale inequalities. More subtly 1 ) ~ 1 tfundamentally, Mrs C;,1ndhi1s at-
tirude towards planning was very difkrenr from Nehr~l's. Under ed for an incorporation of high technology in sectors o f t h e
her leadership economic planning changed in characrer. T h o u g h thc Indian economy, especially telecon~munications and compurers.
Nehruvia11 thetorii of planned developlnenr was retained, f r o n ~ Although general policies were not radically revised, government at-
the Fourth F ~ v eYear l'l'tn onwards the government, In impercepr- titudes were seen to be friendlier towards risk-taking entrepreneur-
it~ledegrees, Save up rhe inrenrlon of directing economic growth ial initiarive. Since high technology could not easily come into rhc
Indian economy without market-friendly reforms, this was seer1 as a
w
natural entailment of his policies. Rut Kajiv Gandhi was assassinated
Ii o n agriculrur;~Ipolicy changes, c c Frankcl 1971 .
For der;lilcct diac~~csions
and Mcllor 1'166. For a n cxccllcnr accounr of rtlc polirical sidc otaFriculrur.~l
" For a view of this kind, see Ahluwali~1999.
l,olic-y,scc V;/;lr\hney1998.
 The Trajectories of the lndian State The Politics of Liberalization it2 lndia
before his initiatives could form into seriously worked out gene- beneficiaries of the absence ofagricultural income tax, and some of the
ral policies. ofsubsidies.The professional middle classes, initially the prime
beneficiaries of industrial growth, because they monopolized the new
Liberalization of the 1990s
job opportunities in both private- and public-sector industries, and
The latter half of the 1980s were highly significant for Indian politics. the bureaucracies that supervised them, in~reasingl~felt their economic
Though analysts and commentators generally remember them for a life had reached a point of stagnation. Until the 1960s, these upper-
period ofmessy, infructuous government, in fact, the political universe class groups were entirely dominant in the political world; but from
of Indian democracy was moving from one historical stage to a very the 1970s their exclusive control of the political field was successfully
dissimilar one. The central government was always controlled securely challenged by politicians coming from rich-farmer and lower-caste
by a majority party, the Congress. In 199 1, for the first time, Indian backgrounds. As this class became less dominant in the political pro-
society faced the startling fact that no party could secure a majority cess due to growing democratic participation, they became more
at the centre. In the elections of 1989, after Raiiv Gandhi's death, receptive to liberalizing ideas, expecting new opportunities of income
Congress, riven by internal factional fights, failed to get a majority. Yet growth from global economic changes. A highly skilled section of the
there was no party which could replace it on a stable basis. Congress Indian professional classes gradually got access to the international
had declined, but not enough to disappear electorally; the BJP had economy, and developed much greater aspiration for wealth than the
emerged strongly but not enough to form a government. Historically, earlier structure of policies allowed. Secondly, the structure of the
this was an interregnum between strong central governments by bal economy and the nature of economic relations had changed radi-
powerful, all-India political parties and much weaker ones based on cally. These changes seemed to make fears of neo-colonial control by
coalitions between regionally powerful forces which were obliged by ex-colonial powers unrealistic, and therefore policies meant to guard
the electoral arithmetic to seek support from others. political sovereignty unnecessary. In addition, countries that were
Full-scale liberalization, when it arrived, was full of paradoxes. The deridedassatellitesshowed through their prosperity thegreat economic
government that PV. Narasimha Rao formed was the weakest central advantages of intensified trade and a policy which opened economies
government in modern Indian history. In parliament the government out to the world rather than closed it in the name of self-reliance. The
did not command a majority. Its survival depended on voting support spectacular economic growth of the East Asian economies was analysed
from some opposition groups, mainly leftist and lower-caste parties. by Indian observers, and this fuelled speculation that, given proper
Rao was not secure inside his own party, with a major section of poli- government policies, Indian business could emulate their prosperity.
tical leaders openly declaring their loyalty to Rajiv Gandhi's widow, Ideologically, the global collapse of communist systems seemed to
Sonia Gandhi, and obstructing his policies. Rao was the weakest prime undermine the philosophical legitima~~ofsocialist economic thinking
minister both in parliament and inside his own party. Yet his govern- in general, and thus nationalistic arguments that relied on those
ment undertook what was undoubtedly the most radical reform of the concepts carried a fading power of persuasion. Even without a con-
Indian economy since Nehru's times. How was this possible? How certed intellectual campaign to open up the Indian economy, the slow
could the most radical reforms be carried out by the weakest regime dispersal ofthe Nehruvian consensus in favour of import-substitution,
since Independence? state interference in the economy, and redistributive policies led to
Four types of reasons could be advanced to explain this paradox. the emergence of a new, weaker consensus in+ur of liberalization.
First, economic changes from the 1950s had led to a slow, impercept- Curiously, no one argued strenuously for the market, except for a small
ible recomposition of social classes, altering the balance of economic group, but mistrust of the state grew so immense that it amounted to
power in society. The most significant change was the rise of new the growth of a new economic 'common sense' which even the leftist
capitalist farmers in the green revolution areas who were the main parties could not resist with conviction.
258 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Politics of Liberalization in India 259
However, this kind of consensus by default, which exists as a back- nationalist BJP and the leftist parties criticized the Congress and warn-
ground common sense among economic and political elites, cannot ed about the effects ofliberalization, no political group opposed it hard
translate into economic policy without some political agents to carry enough.
it through. Although it is sometimes casually asserted that political There was also an entirely non-economic but politically compelling
democracy and economic liberalism have an elective affinity as both reason. Although the debateabout liberalization was a mainly economic
are based on principles of unrestricted choice, in actual historical one, it did not happen in a vacuum. Academic analysis separates out
-.
contexts this relation does not hold so simply. The mere existence of single problems-like liberalization in our case, and seeks explanatory
democracy is no guarantee that voters will choose liberalizing poli- accounts. People do not live in the comparative luxury of such single
cies. It is more likely that voters will reflect on the possible effects of issues in real political life; they live within tangledwebs of interconnected
liberalization on their own economic interests, and that large social exasperations. What political actors decide to do about one issue is
groups which rely on benefit from state action will vote against liberal- sometimes determined not by what they think about that problem
ization initiatives. In India, despite this widespread feeling of the but what they think about &hers. ~imilarly,the actual decision of
inefficiency and ~npo~ularityofstate-centred policies, pushing through Indian political parties in 1991 was determined, ironically, not by
liberalizing reforms was widely seen as a hazardous, unpopular business. their thinking on the economic consequences of liberalization, but the
Liberalization, if fully implemented, would help some groups and in- possible effects of a takeover by the BJP, the Hindu nationalist party
jure others, and consequently large political parties shrank from taking which began to emerge into prominence from the 1980s: this cast
the first step. Organized political groups would have agreed to allow its shadow on all other questions in Indian political life, including-
liberalization policies to go through only if others enacted them, and liberalization.
they could avoid the responsibility. Here an extraneous, non-economic Briefly, as a party the BJP is both old and new. After Independence,
factor intervened. The Rao government came to power without an the Jana Sangh was the major party of Hindu nationalism which
absolute majority, and it used its position of relative weakness with wanted ~ n d i a t obecome a Gindu rather than a secular state. Its poli-
masterly political skill. In 1991 the balance of payment situation tical campaigns have always been strongly anti-Muslim. Interestingly,
came to such a crisis that radical decisions could not be avoided. Rao's the Jana Sangh never had a clearly defined economic programme,
finance minister, Manmohan Singh was a distinguished economist though its major political support came from lower government em-
who became a bureaucrat and eventually a minister, but not a career ployees and small businessmen in northern India. But the Jana Sangh
politician who had to cultivate an electoral constituency. H e fashion-
-
was never able to go beyond modest gains in electoral terms. In 1977
ed a powerful, cogent, and eloquent intellectual justification for these it decided to join the coalition of opposition forces against Indira
reforms, bringing the vague drift of opinion among elites to a clear Gandhi and merged into the Janata Party. Ideological rifts soon began
focus. Liberalizing reforms were unpopular to a large section of the in the Janata Party, and when it broke away it assumed a new name,
Congress Party itself. But they could not produce a counter-strategy Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP),presumably to emphasize its 'Indianness'
to deal with the immediate crisis. Rao, as prime minister, resolutely and indigenism. In the elections of 1984 the -party's
- . fortunes fell to a
protected his finance minister from pressures from inside his party and record low of two seats in parliament. It began a highly visible and
from the opposition in parliament. Ironically, other parties had, in divisive campaign over the destruction ofthe Babri mosque at Ayodhya
their own way, come round to similar conclusions about the long-term and the building of a temple in its place, alwgside a broader campaign
economic strategy, though they were unwilling to admit it publicly. for rebuilding many other temples after destroying mosques. The cam-
For them, it was in fact advantageous that Congress was forced to take paign was surprisingly successful and rebuilt the BJP's electoral base.
the initiative, and would take the blame. It is remarkable that although By the time of the liberalization initiatives by the Congress, it had
-
in the intense debates in the political public sphere both the Hindu started to threaten to launch a bid for power at the centre.
 The Politics of Liberalization in India 26 1
260 The Eajectories uf the Indian State
other parts. Segments of this policy structure could succeed up to a
From the mid-1980s the BJP enjoyed a startling electoral revival: in point, but not entirely. Just as Nehruvian planners slowly realized that
successive general elections it stormed to ever-larger share of seats, and the structure had an indispensable internal coherence, liberalizers
by the time Narasimha Rao became prime minister, Congress domi- understood thecoherence ofthis alternative set ofpolicies. Liberalization
nance had been more seriously eroded than ever before. Narasimha meant several radical changes in the received structure of the economy,
Rao was not a strong politician, but a wily one. With long political and consequently in the settled forms of economic practices in every-
experience, he knew how to calculate on the weakness of his enemies. day life. All observers saw some constituents of liberalization as crucial:
He played the interconnection of the two issues with masterful poli- reducing the labyrinthine regime of industrial licensing, reducing
tical adroitness. All political combatants realized that if the BJP was tariffs, particularly on import goods, reducing subsidies, the creation
able to form a government at the centre, it would probably re-structure of a flexible labour market giving greater power to managements, and
Indian politics in a fundamental way, changing both the constitutional finally, in cases where state-sector industries were running at a loss,
thrust of secularism and the common sense of everyday politics. For privatizing them. Obviously, each one of these measures went directly
opposition parties, therefore, the choice was invidious. They could against the settled policies of the Nehruvian design of political eco-
seriously threaten Rao's reforms only by letting the BJP into power. nomy; therefore, their adoption would have meant, irrespective of the
The left parties disliked liberalization, but they disliked the prospect tact or skill with which they were handled politically, a radical change
of a communal takeover at the centre even more. Rao gambled, as it in the overall character of economic life for all social groups.
turned out quite rightly, that ifhe pursued liberalization policies force- We need to understand how eachcomponent policy of liberalization
fully, the left would merely criticize him, but not topple his government. reforms was likely to affect large social interest groups. Social groups
By enacting legislation for liberalization, he dared them to dismiss his have complex and not always predictable relations with political
ministry. Understandably, the leftists and other opposition parties parties. Thus the translation ofgroup interests into political sentiments
thought liberalization was a lesser disaster than the BJP's accession to is a complex affair, as is the further transfer of these into party policies.
power. Predictably, they stopped short ofvoting Rao's government out
of office.
Social Groups and Liberalization

T h e Content of Liberalization: T h e Fixing of Indian liberalization, it is generally acknowledged, proceeded slowly,

Sequences and Priorities compared to China and some cases in Africa. Accordingly, its economic
and political results were also quite different. This slow progress was
In politics vagueness is often an unanswerable strength. Liberalization not merely because of obstacles, but for deliberate political reasons.
went through successfully partly because of the ambiguity of its mean- The Congress Party was itself divided about liberalizing reforms, and
ing and the great variety of expectations. Different groups meant a large segment opposed it-out of habit, if not conviction. The part
different things by liberalization. At least some interested social groups of the leadership which had to push them through therefore had to
or political parties believed that they would allow some aspects of conciliate not merely the opposition, but sections of opinion in their
liberalization to take place and delay or stop others. There was also own party. Secondly, the reforms progressed slowly out of deliberate
another underlying irony. Seen from any angle, liberalization sought political calculation. Some more acute observers of the Indian liberal-
to reduce the role of the state in the economy; but it was only the state ization programme have noticed that in effe'ct the decision-makers
which could reduce the power ~f the state. made deliberate distinctions along two separate axes: some policies
Intellectually, those who advocated liberalization, the Congress could have effects only in the long term, others almost instantly."
government and its general supporters, understood its internal logic
clearly. Liberalization meant the adoption of a structured set of inter- l7 Sridharan 1993.
connected policies, the success of each part ofwhich depended on the r.
262 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Politics of liberalization in India
Predictably, liberalization policies did not affect all social groups groups. O f course, because of the nature of the Indian economy, this
equally, or equally quickly. There are some paradoxes here. Liberalizing group was divided. Private managers were always in favour of market-
economists tend to assume casually that business interests unequivocally friendly policies; bureaucrats and public-sector management in favour
favour opening the market; but that, evidently, is not true under of controls. But it is important to recognize that sociologically they
all circumstances; it depends on whether business expects to do well constitute a single social group. Although divided by their specific in-
because of the market opening. While for international business terests, they are tied together intimately by familial and social relations,
corporations the opening up of the immense Indian market was a and the common climate ofopinion in classes earning similar incomes.
tempting prospect, for Indian business it meant, crucially, an end to As a result of liberalization, bureaucrats as a special group may face a
protection. Competition by international business could drive some relative loss of their regulatory or discretionary power. But general
indigenous industries to the ground. Thus, the business response was group opinion often transcends calculations of narrow individual self-
mixed. O n the whole, entrepreneurs welcomed the opportunities for interest. Often, bureaucrats would have family or kin in private man-
cheaper imports, fewer licensing controls, lower or more rationalized agement or other professional occupations likely to benefit dispropor-
taxes, and openings for easier collaboration with large international tionately from these reforms. Professional-managerial classes could
corporations that had capital and the latest technology. But they had realistically expect a long-term expansion of their economic prospects
reason to fear unrestricted competition as well as the great volatility as a social class, ifnot as individuals or families. However, what bureau-
of the international capital markets, which soon afterwards led to the crats would lose was often an illegitimate penumbra of power, not
crash of the East Asian economies. Some specific industries, like soft- legitimate authority, and certainly not their jobs. The bureaucracy thus
ware manufacture, which were knowledge-intensive and unhampered did not have either strong motivations of group interest or the
by the constraints ofbad infrastructure, quickly turned these openings ideological conviction to resist liberalizing policies.
to best use. But the success of these industries was partly because of However, the initial impact of liberalization affected this group in
their peculiar nature, their ability to exploit India's social and economic a specific fashion, by opening up utterly unprecedented income dif-
strengths, and the specific conditions of the world market. Other in- ferentials within the upper middle classes. Salaries in private man-
dustries could not emulate them so easily. Old-style industries, used to agement always tended to be higher than government salaries. Now,
protectionist laws, comfortable with outdated technology, selling to the more fortunate section that got access to international companies
undemanding captive markets, had less reason to rejoice at this im- got a vertiginous rise in their incomes, with no chance of bureaucratic
pending triumph of the market. salaries catching up-leading to some envy. But social opinion of the
The Indian business world is highly fragmented and stratified. group could come to the entirely rational conclusion that what one
Small businesses formed a different social group and a distinctive poli- section lost could be more than compensated by what others gained,
tical constituency, with ahistoryofsupportfor right-leaning opposition and the expectations of long-term gains for the class as a whole.
to the Congress. In North India, they had conventionally supported The likely impact of liberalization on the livelihood of farmers was
the Jana Sangh and the BJPThese groups, which had complained most equally complex, again partly because of the internal differentiation of
bitterly against small-time bureaucratic controls leading to extortionate the Indian peasantry. Farmers who benefited from the !greenrevolution
practices and corruption, stood to gain moderately, or at least to lose often invested their surplus income into small local or regional busi-
nothing.At
" least in the foreseeablefuture, big international corporations nesses. This fraction of their interests was to coincide with those of
were not going to swamp thei~businesses. other small- or medium-scale business intere's;s. But there were two
Professional managerial groups, which play such a significant role central elements of liberalization which went directly against them. In
both in directing decisions and opinion in Indian society, were also all liberalization packages, there is a reduction and eventual removal of
likely to approve, due to a peculiarity of opinion-formation in social subsidies. This would have meant a serious reduction of state support
264 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Politics o f Liberalization i n India 265
for the entire rural sector, particularly its wealthier sections. Apart redundancies and new labour rules entailing much greater uncertainty
from conventional arguments against subsidies and their effects on for workers. An additional factor is the great reduction of trade union
government finances, there was an added problem in India. Since power which is bound to follow. In India, as elsewhere, the opinion of
agriculture constituted a much larger sector of the economy than the the working class is sometimes confused with the opinion of trade
industrial and service sectors, this meant that a smaller sector of the union leaders, to the benefit ofthe latter. Not surprisingly, liberalization
economy was subsidizing a vastly larger one. This was very different policies were most strenuously opposed by the representatives of the
from the European case, where a larger and powerful industrial sec- organized working class, and by the political parties which ran the big-
tor subsidized the agricultural. In the second, European kind of case, gest trade unions. But the conventional left parties, communists and
subsidies could continue; but in the reverse case, i.e. India, such poli- socialists, have steadily declined as a force of effective opposition since
cies simply could not go on indefinitely.The elimination ofsubsidies- the 1960s. Now they simply lack the political strength to stall liberal-
of the large government subsidies in agro-inputs and energy-threatens izing reforms; in addition, their overriding anxiety about the Hindu
a major source of their prosperity. Any proposal for rationalization of nationalists capturing power through an electoral opening has
the tax structure was also likely to raise the spectre of an agricultural constrained them to give their grudging consent to Manmohan Singh's
income tax. If the wages of labour in agricultural jobs went up, as initiatives. Even in the states where leftist parties control power, and
liberalizers expected, agriculturists, as net users of hired labour for do not face an immediate threat from the BJP, the parlous state of
their farming (especially during the harvest season), were going to lose government finances has forced them to ask for assistance from inter-
very heavily. So, liberalization was bound to get a mixed reception national agencies and invite industrial capital, all ofwhich is contrary
from the farming interests. Recently, the scene has become muddied to their deepest ideological beliefs.
by competitive bargaining among political parties for the rural vote; But this is a very incomplete political sociology, because the
some parties in a recent election in Punjab have promised to provide majority ofcitizens in Indiaare not businessmen, managers, bureaucrats,
farmers electricity entirely free of charge. There is an enormous para- rich farmers, and organized 1abourers.They are mostly poor unorganized
dox/contradiction here. Economically, reducing subsidies is a funda- labourers in the cities and the countryside, or poor peasantry, small
mental part of liberalization. But because farm lobbies influence votes craftsmen, and artisans. Women in very large numbers are housewives,
in the countryside, it is the hardest measure to implement politically. and are affected by policies through the changing economic fortunes
In this case, liberalizing policies were difficult to implement precisely of their families. This vast mass of people, who are not organized
because the political process was democratic: and the state has to find through professional interest-articulating institutions, have no regular
a way of expropriating people with their consent. or uninterrupted contact with policy-makers. Their only opportunity
Organized labour, a social group that is powerful because of its for letting governments know what they think of their reforms is
numbers, organization, and strategic location in the industrial economy, during elections. Both political parties and organized groups therefore
looked at liberalization with the greatest anxiety. They expect to be the try to couch their own demands in such a form that they can appeal
most serious losers in a comprehensive liberalization of the economy. to a vast number of these unorganized people. But exactly how these
Due to labour legislation influenced by socialist thinking, employment people have reacted to liberalization is hard to analyse, since the only
in the organized sector is permanently secure, irrespective ofproducti- data collected is through secondary questions at election surveys.
vity. Reform of the labour market, in line with liberalization policies,
will certainly entail retrenchment and prospective unemployment on
Liberalization and Political Parties
a fairly large scale. Liberalization will affect the working conditions of
workers in the state sector in particular, where labourers have enjoyed Policy-makers who introduced the reforms based their moves on poli-
large social benefits, not to mention permanent employment. Disin- tical calculations derived from such perceptions of group interest.
vestment in public-sector industries is bound to end in large-scale , How the parties moved depended on their sociological support-base
266 The Trajectories of the Indian State The Politics ofLiberalimtion in India
and institutional structure. Both Congress and the BJP (which had by and cover its costs by making financial economies, instead of simply
the 1990s emerged as the major opposition party) were socially covering the deficit by printing money and pushing up inflation. But
universalist, i.e. they wanted to attract support from all social groups, such subsidy-reduction policies would have serious adverse effects for
not just some powerful sectional interests, as the communist and agricultural groups, and if the agricultural sector acted as a single poli-
peasant parties did. Thus, they had to make sure that the introduction tical interest, instead of breaking up into class fractions, they had the
of liberalization did not inadvertently a grand coalition of immense power of numbers on their side. The only way of avoiding a
social interests against them and destroy their chances of winning grand overwhelming coalition of political forces against liberalization
elections. They chose their priorities and the sequencing of policies was thus to select and sequence its constituent policies-to make sure
wirh the greatest care. that these groups were not antagonized by adverse policies at the same
Observers have pointed out how the liberalizers selected some time. However, economists advocating liberalization pointed out that
policies for early implementation and pushed others down in their the success of liberalization depended on an implementation of the
priority. As the economic crisis thar brought liberalization on was w h d e package. Breahng up and sequencing the various parts were
mainly due to a foreign exchange shortage in July 199 1, the first moves bound to make the changes less effective. This was another paradox for
were to stabilize the economy. Stringent restrictions on foreign ex- politicians: to succeed economically, the policies had to work together;
change were lifted, and tariff regimes were relaxed in the early phase. to succeed politically they had to be pursued separately and in parts.
The actual implementation seemed to separare out policies which were The actual progress ofliberalization in India has been very interesting.
likely to yield short-term results from those which required a long While economists have often deplored the fact that the whole package
period to succeed. Politically more significant was a distinction be- of policies has not been implemented, and therefore that their full
tween policies, which brought immediate benefits for some groups beneficial effects have not been realized, others point to their remarkable
without affecting others adversely, and those which would mean seri- success given the unpromisirig initial conditions. In fact, the ~olitical
ous costs to large organized social constituencies. This explains why history of the period immediately following liberalization was highly
economic reforms in India have not merely been slow, but selective, or volatile. Four successive governments have come into office, run by
rather why their slow progress has been due to their selectivity and parties of very different character. The Congress government, which
deliberate sequencing. The easing of foreign exchange regulations im- began the reforms, was followed by a coalition of assorted 'leftist'
mediately benefited businesses and the upper classes. The import of groups.18 It drew its main support from parties which had been sharp-
capital goods and technology became easier and made export-oriented ly critical of liberalization; but when they came to office did little
industries and upper-class consumers happy. Relaxing licensing rules to obstruct or reverse them. After a brief and ineffectual period, the
dealt with a longterm complaint of entrepreneurs. It also helped small coalition went out of office.
entrepreneurs whose main capital was technological skills; its best This led to the most serious ideological change in Indian politics
example was the burgeoning software industry in South India. These since Independence, as the BJP finally found a way to power at the
changes, though quite radical against the context of past policies, centre, even ifas the major constituent within acoalition. This was not
mainly allowed new developments without negatively affecting others. an insignificant replacement of one coalition by another. The BJP
Some liberalization policies were politically different, because they
I
would cause serious pain to economic groups. If the government al- l8 The coalition was composed of the Janata D$, a centrist conglomerate,
lows more flexible labour m>rkets, permanent employment in the lower-caste parties which supported radical changes in caste-based reservations,
public sector will have to be sacrificed. The closure of loss-making and the Communist parties. It was led by I.K. Gujral a veteran politician
public sector firms will lead to unemployment. Reduction in subsidies long associated with the Congress. These groups were strongly opposed to the
was urgently required ifthe government had to impose fiscal discipline Hindu nationalist ideology of the BJP.
t.
 The Trajectories of the Indian State I The Po'olitics of Liberalization in India

had always challenged the hegemonic vision of secular nationalism a free hand, as none of the coalition parties were strongly opposed to
advocated by the Congress; and its electoral success was built directly liberalization. In fact, some of its coalition partners, like the dynamic
on the campaign around the demolition of the mosque at Ayodhya.19 chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, Chandrababu Naidu, used the op-
Oddly, however, it had continued the economic indistinctness of its portunities created by liberalizing policies to produce an economic
precursor, the Jana Sangh. But as its role changed, and it transformed interpretation of federalism and press for faster regional development.
from a regional North Indian party into a serious contender for central The BJP's own formal attitude towards liberalizing policies was
power, it was forced to define its economic policy more clearly. In the surprisingly conciliatory. Although it criticized the Congress at the
event, it developed two somewhat contradictory lines ofargument. In time of their adoption, it kept its own position vague. After the eco-
line with its general ideological indigenism, it began to appropriate the nomic situation started to show remarkable improvement on several
traditional Gandhian economic ideals of swadeshi-a policy which counts-overall G D P growth, the reduction of inflation, an improve-
supported cottage industries, the voluntary restriction of consump- ment in export earnings, etc.-others sought to steal some of the
tion, a simple rural lifestyle, and above all the rejection of foreign-made credit. Not surprisingly, in character with its general expertise in
goods. This was incongruous for a party which was directly linked chauvinism, the BJP, or some sections of it, have kept up a fierce
to the RSS organization-one of whose members had assassinated rhetoric of economic nationalism against ' foreign interests', generally
Gandhi. Yet, the strand of indigenism was quite strong in some unspecified.
sections of the Hindu nationalists, and they increasingly made more But the rhetoric has not threatened to invade actual poiicy-making.
assertive claims for swadeshi policies. But the BJP, crucially, wanted to Internally, Hindu nationalists have always been friendly to business,
entice the upper and middle classes from their traditional habits of especially small business groups which were their loyal constituency in
supporting the Congress because ofits policy ofeconomic modernism; the first three decades. Big business did not traditionally support them,
and the BJP has strenuously sought to dispel the idea that it was a preferring the more comprehensive modernism of the Congress. But
backward-looking fundamentalist force, opposed to modernity. A instead ofalienating big business or the professional classes when it was
I
large section of its social supporters and leadership advocated strongly making electoral strides towards power, the BJP sought to woo them
modernist economic policies, and claimed that under their leader- 1 by promising greater efficiency, less corruption, and by making it clear
ship the economy would come out of mismanagement and stagna- that it was not advocating a comprehensive re-traditionalization of
tion. Ideologically, therefore, the BJP did not have a clear line towards Indian society. This had two reciprocal effects. As its electoral strength
liberalization. grew, and the prospects of its power improved, upper-middle-class and
Both the left parties and the BJP fiercely criticized the Congress for I big business interests became more interested in it; and reciprocally,
initiating liberalizing reforms; but when they came to power they did the party put into more prominent roles its more modernizing leaders.
nothing to stop or reverse them. After the 1998 elections, the BJP ruled Now the party often fronts individual leaders who try to cultivate a
at the centre with fluctuating and at times unruly coalition partners in highly modernist image, suggesting a politics which is knowledgeable
a strange mixture of broad stability alongside small instability-be- about international trends, friendly to business and markets, and inte-
cause it was never certain about its allies. Predictably, to keep the coali- rested in high technology This is a partial makeover of its indigenist
tion together, the BJP had to tone down its ideological stance alongside image, and avery real strand of its quotidian politics. The BJP has also
its deeply anti-Muslim agenda. O n economic issues, however, it had come to realize that international economic pressures demand a conti-
v
I nuation of liberalization: it appointed a committee for disinvestment,
I followed by a special ministry to look after the necessarily contentious
'Vn December 1992 activists from Hindu nationalist groups demolished
process of dismantling government enterprises. And even leftist
the structure of the Babri mosque a t Ayodhya leading to widespread rioting in
the whole subcontinent. governments like the CPI(M) in West Bengal have admitted that loss-
r.
making state indusrrie have to bc closed. As the finances ofstate gov- from conrrol b!, rhc~srateand thc ~~ncc.rt;tintic.s ot'clcctoriil ;ln~t

ernments near collapse, the central authorities can use the situation to t o render this enrirr. process i s r e ~ c r s i b l I~i .appcarurhL~r in I n d i , ~~ic,s-
.
force through liberalization. pitc large and r~npredicr~lhlc complesiries in this proctss, st;~rchas
But rhe emergence of the BIP and its stable control of the central gone some way in freeing the economy from itsclf.
government also led ro other significant shifts. O n e of the most signi-
ficant was the slow redefinition of India's national interest. Nehru, a n d References
Congress under his influence, thought of foreign policy as primarily
Ahl~iu.;alia,M o n r e k Singh. l'lc)'l. Indi'l's E c o n o m i c licforms: A n ;4~1pi-ai,al.In
an instrument for protectingsovereignty and securingeconon~ic deve-
Icfh.cy Sachs ~t (21. ELL. I i ~ d l iw
f ~ rhc, Evil c~'LiOeiulii,ltioii.L ~ c l h i :0 x t i ) r d
lopment. India's influence in the world was expected ro come from the ,rj~~i\.c-r-siry
. I'rcss.
persuasiveness of its suggestions and the moral validity of its position !3'ir<!1ic1n, Prarialx 1'1:; ?. Po/i~ir~li !:t.o~iov<j~( f D r ~ e / ( y ) ~ 111! i it?
t i i ~ t l i [lcl ~ ~ .Ili:
o n issues like arms control, apartheid, imperialism, etc. Already, in O x f o r d Univcrsir! I'ress.
Indira Ciandhi's rimes, this had changed significanrly towards a clearer -. . I 0 9 2 . rhe Pu/itjcg/ k.i.~tzor)~~/ ( ~ ~ ' L ) ~ ~ I J ~ ~i n/ //II//,[I.
I ~ I P I jc!li ~ ~ ) i:I ~ )xf-oc~l
orientation towards power; and Indian policies clearly sought regional U n ivr rsi ry I'rcs~.
hegemony. T h e BJ1"s orientation towards the international society RhaFvciti. Jngc!isli. 1 '?O.i. lndcfi iv 7;iiilsitloii: F'rerii~;;r l ~ iE.oiioi)i:. ~ ()sforti:
continued and intensified those tendencies. Nehru did not seek nu- Clarendc)n I'rrs<.
clear weapons; [he BJP dramatized its acquisition of new nuclear oy. I ) ~ I J P / O ~ ~
( I h ~ ~ k r a v a r tSy~, ~ k l i : ~ m 19X-i. I I /t ~
1)cIlii: ) ~ f~i , ~I-L~
c i; ~/i i~
\ /~~I
cr\itv
weapons. (;iven its ideolohv it naturally emphasized the ideaofsovere- I'ress.
ignry, but interpreted i t utterly differently. Its understanding of Ilrcze, J r , ~ nanti , S e n , Ain:ir~yn.10')H. f?~t/in: h n r ~ n w ii)ri~t,/f!j)rriml
~~. c~ndSr~i.icii
sovereignty implies a more assertive stance based on increased military O,/),/)ortu)7ity.NC\v 101.k: O x f o ~ c il.~~ii\;e~-siry l'rc5s.
t:o~lcaulr,h4icht.l. 19')!. (;o\.c~rnrncnr:tlir~, 111 7 7 1Foirc.(ririi
~ k/',h.1: 5 r l r ~ i i in ~;
power, and. Inore dangerously, an inrernal connection of sovereignty
(;oi~ernn:t~1it~r/it~. ttds. (;r.~linrii Ilurclrc.Il, (:din ( ; o ~ - d , ) nilnd , 1'c.lc.r hfliIlc.~-.
with a n euclusivist Hindu definition of Indian narionalism whereby
(:hicngo: L:nivcrsiry o f C:Iiic.~go I'rc\\.
the power of this redefined 'Hindu' nation is used to threaten internal FKi~ikcl,F I . ~ I C ~1I0- I ~I .. li~difz.;.
(Yrt>t'~i
R P I I O / I ~ Ll ' ~r iO~ i)cI c. ~ ~Io' i~- ii:r ~ ~ ~ ~ L,'rii\'c~.\i~~,
~roti
minorities. Some of the BlI' government's foreign-policy initiatives I'rcss.
strengthened the drive towards economic liberalization. Its attempts Ka\rir;~j.Sudipr;~.19'14. Ijilcnlni,l\ ot l k ~ n o c r . l r i c .I ) c ~ c ~ l o p r i iil ~: ~Incii;~. ~ i In
to improve political relations with the United States, for instance, A~iriiln L,c.frwicIi. E:,d. / ) c i ~ / o ~ ~!1)1/1 r ~ l c/ ~~ ~~ I Y , / ~ ~ ) ()~I 'ILP~ nI ~I Il ).r i ( llg' ocl, i: ~ \ '
accelerated libcrnlization. If foreign investment into India's economy Prrss.
is ro he radically increased. its first condition is greater liberalization Mcllor, l o l i ~ i 1906.
. 7 - b F~ ~ ~ o ~ ~ uo fm2 i~c~~~ i ~ ~ ~ ~ / c 1 o ; i / / )I et ti:lc;~: ~ ~ ~ (/ :01~11cll
opt~it~~1
of e c o n o n ~ i ccontrols. But the strand of swadeshi cannot be dismissed IJnivcrsiry I'rrss.
entirely. Although rhe supporters of economic swadeshi are not in Sridhar:un, F.. 190.5. E c o ~ i o ~ iKct;)i-ma ~ic in Indi,~. ]~~ro~n~~l~~f'(~'o))~r~
dominant positions, thcy remain a major part o f t h e H i n d u nationalist (:u)izp'zr~7tiucpoll tic^^.
L/:~rshnr):A \ h u r o s h . 1 908. I)e~?al:inry,/ ) e l (~lupn~etlr
[ii~dr/)L,
( . b ~ , r ~ / ) y i(~:JIII-
/(,.
tbrmation. Advancing liberalization is bound t o exacerbate internal
conflict within the BJI' o n this question. bbridgc: C a l n h r i d g r Uni\.ri-sir? I'rc\s.
Ir appears then that the logic of liberalization has developed a life
of its own. Irrespective of which political party comes t o office, a n d
whar they say rhetoric,llly, t h e i r ~ c o n o m i cadn~inistrationsare cons-
trained to enact legislation5 which carry forward into the logical next
step the 'logic' of' l i b e r a l i z i ~ lreforms.
~ T h a t , after all, is thc central
objective of the liberalizing policies-to en~ancipatethe economy
 -
Index

1 agriculturelagrarian 114, 120, 178, bourgeois class, Indian 9, 52,70, 80,

244,252 93, 96, 107, 108, 118, 135,
economy 2 2 6 7 151, 154,204
groups, powers of 202 dynamics of 103,105
policy of Congress 123, 133 power of 104, 106
Althusser, Louis 10, 146 Brahmanical social order, movements
Arnbedkar, B.R. 33,36,74n against 47,48
Aristotle 50 Brahmo Samaj 28
I armed militancy, rise of 230 British
Artbusustru 4 5, 47 administration 20,26, 55
Asoka 45n colonialism 20,21, 23, 62, 68,
Assam agitationlmovement 141, 150-1,215,222
206,230 entry into India 3
Ayub regime, in Pakistan 187 and early modern state 50-8
Indianarmy 221
Babri mosque, destruction of 259, and local religious response 23
268 missionaries 55
Bahuguna, H.N. 130n and the state 19-25
balance of payments 258 Buddhism 45n, 48,64,86
Bangladesh crisis 182, 187, 188 bureaucracy 70,72,74, 89n, 107,
Belchi event 94 108, 116, 117,131, 149-50,
Bell report 178 155,174,224
Bengal, British administration in 20 colonial 92, 221,246, 253
educational system in 16 on liberalization 263
Bhakti movements 48 salaries of 263
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) 256, in Third World 208, 209
259450,265,270 Burke, Edmund 53
business groups' support to 262 business groups, Indian 242
on liberalization 2 6 6 9 respony to liberalization 262-3
Bharatiya Kranti Dal (BKD) 193 support to BJP in the North 262
Bhoodan movement 92
Bihar agitation 193 capital goods, import of 266
'Bombay Plan' 242 state-controlled 115,220, 223
274 Index Index
capitalism 17, 100-2, 142, 146-8, decline of 256 and tolerance 85-6 Emergency of 1975 97,98, 128,
167,223,224,230 and elections 132, 163, 180-2, see also Indian democracy 133, 134, 164, 184, 195-8,
capitalist 225,228 Desai, Morarji 172, 203 228,255
class, in India 106, 256-7 factionalism in 186 development 117, 139 authoritarian regimes under 198,
commodity production 15, 17, under Indira Gandhi 125, 128. foreign policy and strategy 199,200
62,145 130, 133, 138 in 247-9 justification of 197-8
development 18, 102, 113, 115, government of 5, 11 1-13,241 dewani of Bengal 2 1 and political crisis 134-5
121, 132, 139. 140,226 institutional 'legacy1of 153 Dharnrnapada 65 English language 22 1
caste 7-14, 24, 34, 72, 85 leaders of 128-9, 157, 180 disciplinary techniques 21,22, Enlightenment 23,33
-based social order 19, 47-8 under Nehru and 162-3 25 enumeration process 2 16
conflicts 165-6 policy of 89, 92-3 disillusionment, discourse of 58, equality 28, 87,97
hierarchy 6 politics of 172, 179, 200 64-7 Europe/European 4, 10, 52,60, 103,
system 20, 71, 85, 213, 214,222 issue in 183, 184 disinvestment 264 153,155
censorship, Emergency and 200 socialist group in 112, 113 distributive justice 71, 115, 189 absolutism in 25
Chanakya 45n split in 184 divide and rule 28 capitalism in 103
Chandragupta Maurya 45n support from rich farmers 202-3 I Drain theory 242-3 colonialism 23,60,238
Chattopadhyay, Bankimchandra 57n Syndicate 185 Dutt, R.C. 242n democracy in 35, 153
China, India's border war with 177, system 73, 137, 180 Dutt, Rajni Palme 79n modernity 35,37,61,63,64,65
221,224,236 see aLso Indian National Congress nationalism 30,218
and Pakistan 188 Congress Socialist Forum (CSF) 182 East Asian economies 257,262 societies in 59, 60
Christianity 24,33n consciousness 7-14 East India Company 2 1, 53, 55 wolutionism 154
citizenship 7 1 , 218 consensual politics 162 economy/economic 5 , 7 , 8,26,69, experimentation, of 1950-6 114-18
civil rights, during the consolidation (195664) 118-24 102,140,224 export-led economic gowth 203
Emergency 201 Constituent Assembly 91, 93, 219 development 23 1,270
civil society 60, 105 Constitution of India 34, 37, 7 1, growth 6, 167,244 Fabian 69, 89
class 7-14, 106-10, 176 104, 105,219 liberalization 74,203 farmers 121-3,253, 264
coalition politics 1 10, 174-5, 178, constitutionalism 118, 160-2 nationalism 241-7 see also agricultural groups
183, 187,201-2 Cornwallis, Lord 23 planning 254-5 Fascism 199
Cold War 70,219 corruption 118, 194, 197 policies 234, 254 federalism 84, 21 8
communalism 29,86, 140 counting, introduction of 2 16 and process of liberalization feudal power relations 94,98
Communist Party of India 124, 183 crisis, constitutional 142, 160 237-8 Five Year Plan
and Congress Party 132, 187, over 1975-87 1 3 4 4 2 reforms 24 1,266 Second 70, 119, 120, 123, 138
194,269-70 culture 1, 37, 4311,84, 155-6, see also liberalization Fourth 254
communist states 235-6, 257 218 education system 216 food 97,19 1
community, concept of 60 elections 132,226 foreign exchange crisis 178,25I , 266
conflict 60,91, 165-6, 215 danda 45,46 of 1967 182,183 foreign policy issues 123, 247-9
Congress Party 36,74, 91, 115, 123, decision-making 129, 162 of1971 188 Foucault, Michel 5 , 10, 11, 12, 1811,
127, 136, 150-1, 154, 156, decolonization 148 of1977 184 54,58,239
176,192,207,261,266,2@ democracy 1 1 , 1 2 , 1 7 , 1 8 , 2 1 , 7 9 , fourth Indian 125, 181 French democracy 92n, 93
and Communist Party 187, 194 134,218,219,228,231 electoral democracy 32, 34, 35,
consensus policy of 90, 93 evolution in India 32-7 36, 72, 133, 227-8, Gandhi, Indira 5, 9,73, 92n, 95n,
crisis in 176, 177 and modernity in India 32-7 230 I l l n , 112, 118, 120,12In,
276 Index Index 277
126, 131, 150, 159, 182, Guizot 52 nationalist movement 30,2 17, Kothari, Rajni 78.79, 80, 81,82,
1934,207,218,225,228, Gujarat 133, 191, 192, 193 222,24 1 83, 85, 86, 88, 90, 91,93, 95,
230,241,251,259,270 Indic religion/civilization 65,74 96, 97,98
and Bangladesh crisis 187-8 Hadith 49 industrialization 38, 115, 119, 123, Krishna, Raj 249
and Congress Party 125, 127, hegemony, concept of 56n 157,224,226,229 Kshatriyas 47
130, 138, 163 birnsa (violence) 64 import-substituting 117 Kurukshetra 3
and crisis of 1969 176 Hindi language 30 state-led 220, 247, 249
defeat in 1977 elections 203 HinduIHinduism 24,30 indu~tr~lindustrial 120, 138 labour markets 264
economic planning under 254-5 Christianity and 24 development of 69,223,241 land
and imposition of Emergency 195, communalism 140 government control over 70 redistribution 252
201,203 Islam and 49 policy on Congress 121-2 reforms 108, 114, 120, 173,252,
and Indian politics 171ff nationalism 259,269, 270 protectionist policy for 242, 246 253
land reforms of 253 reformers 24 inequalities 12-1 3,71,220 struggle 92
and Nehru era 130-1 religious rituals 85 regional 137, 164,205, 230 landlords/landed magnates 9, 106,
policies of 178 rate of growth 249 inflation 120, 191, 196, 197,267 107
power of 207-8 social order 59 institutions 158-9, 165-7,2 18 see also agricultural groups
return to power 132, 1 3 6 7 society 46-7, 85 international law 6 1 Latin America, Spanish conquest
and victory in Bangladesh War Hobbes 52,60 irrationality, signs of 199-203 of 24
188 Islam 24,48-50 law 46, 102, 118,219
Gandhi, M.K. 19n, 24,31,42n identity 29,213-15,217 Italian politics 10 Lenin 152
and critique of modernity 64-5 illiteracy 243 liberal democracy 13, 80
discourse on disillusionment 64-7 import-substituting Jacobinism 32 Liberal political theory 12
historical conservatism of 66-7 industrialization 117, 203, 220 Jainism 48,64 liberalization
and national movement 68,243 Independence, Indian 67,69,70 Jan Sangh 182, 192,259 in India 41,223n, 234& 256-60,
swaraj of 65 India business groups in North India 263
Gandhi, Rajiv 118, 126, 141n, 241, and China war 22 1,224 and 262 meaning of 235-8
255,256 democracy in 79,80, 134, 195 Janata government 9511, 132, 135, and political parties 265-71
Gandhi, Sanjay 197, 198, 255 democracy and modernity in 203,204 licensing rules, relaxation of 266
Gandhi, Sonia 256 32-7 1 Janata Party 136, 259 linguistic reorganization of
Germany, liberal democracy in 38 instability from 1965 75, 124-34 JP movement, against Indira states 139,205,220
Ghosh, Atulya 128 liberal policies in 138, 236 Gandhi 95n, 192, 194,196 Locke, John 52
Gita 65 and Pakistan war 224 judiciary/judicial system 25, 149, Lohia, Ram Manohar 113
globalization 238,239 treaty with Soviet Union 182, 198 lower castes 7 1
Gorkhaland 14 1 188 justice 27,219
government institutions 14 and US relations 224, 270 1 Mababbarata 45n, 47
governmentality 10, 11,54, 58 and Western powers 2 4 6 7 Kashmir 230,248 mabalwari system 4
Gramsci, Antonio 9, 10, 105, 106, Indian I Keynesian 222 Mandal Commission 2 19n
142, 146, 147, 148, 174 Administrative Service 22 1n Khalistan 230 Manu, theory of kingship of 44-6
w
Gramdan movement 92 National Congress 29; see also Khrushchev, N. 247 Manusrnriti 44-8
Grassroots movement 165 Congress Party king, Manusrnriti on powers of Maratha state 4
Green Revolution 138,263 nationalism/nationalists 25-32, 45-6 market economy, development of 7 1
growth rate 223,249-50 51, 58,68, 217, 218,243 Koran 49 market forces/rnechanism 120,224
r, I
278 Index Index
Marx, Karl 5, 10, 11, 15, 93, 102, during Nehru years 220-5 Orientalism 22, 25,26 structural analysis of Indian
145,209,239 objectives of 219-20 101-2,204
on democracy 104 nationalism 12, 21, 26, 161,212, Pakistan popular mobilization 112, 179
Marxism 8, 13, 17 219,228 creation of 30, 3 1 Poulantzas, Nicos 105
Marxist analysis 7-8, 69, 100, and modernity 2 13 and India war 224 poverty 118,242,243,249
106-7 see also Indian nationalism parliamentary democracy 117, 148, pre-modern Indian state 44-8
Marxist political theory 9, 12, 174, Naxalite insurgency 192 153 President's Rule, in states 160
244 Nazi regime 1 1 Partition 36 Press freedom 200
Menon, V.K. Krishna 173 Nehru, Jawaharlal 5, 9,31,33, 36, 'passive revolution', and India 1OOff, pressure groups 28, 114
middle class 7 1, 216, 227, 246, 67, 73,74n, 95n, 1 13, 153, 146, 147 princes 91
257 171, 173, 177, 192,205,217, Patel, Sardar 153, 177 privy purses, abolition of 187
military technology 61 218,219,221,223,226, 243, Jawaharlal Nehru and 112, 179 professional middle class 257
Mill, J.S. 79 244,270 Patil, S.K. 129 electoral power of 35
Mithila 6 agrarian policy of government Permanent Settlement 1793 23 Protestant missionaries 24
mixed economy 7 1,235,245 of 114-1 5 planning, in India 105, 115, 116, Protestantism 33n
modern state 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 42 Congress under 1 12 117, 125,223,224,228 provincialism 4, 86
colonialism and early 50-8 consensus 257,258 under Nehru 250 public sector 70, 203, 248
in the West 51 democratic politics under 34 see also Five Year Plans degeneration of 250-1
modernity 18, 30, 31, 37, 50,63 economic growth model of 229, pluralism/pluralist 82, 85, 218 disinvestments in 264
democracy and India 32-7 245,254 and tolerance 8 1,82-4,86 Punjab
nationalism and 2 13 foreign policy of 177-8 political agitation in 230
and politics 15ff gowth model under 120, 126 articulation 43, 86, 138 fundamentalist faction in 206
theories of 15- 19, 97 and India-China war 177 crisis 8, 124, 143-4 168, 190-5 regionalism in 14 1, 206
Montesquieu 52 policy of 12 1, 124,249-5 1 culture 78ff., 96 see also Khalistan
Mughal empireldynasty 3, 6, 19, 20, political economy during years development, theories of 96
49,50 of 118,240,241 economy 35, 61,64, 118,225, railway(s) 245n
Mukhopadhyay, Bhudev 42n, 5 politics during 173,227 240,24 1 strike (195 1) 97
8-64 reforms under 114, 158,252 imagination 1, 6 7 , 2 18 Ramayana 48
Muslim(s) and Sardar Patel 112, 179 institutions 33, 8 1, 159, 180, 208 Rao, PV. Narasimha 256,258,260
minorities, constitution on 37 as a socialist 246 mass movements 66 Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh
separate electorates for 28 on Soviet mode of development parties 165,265-71 (RSS) 268
separatism 112 245-6 realignment 110-14, 122-3 rationalismlrationality 17, 18, 24
Mysore state 4 strategy of 207 sovereignty 26, 69, 223, 243, Reddy, Sanjeeva 203
Nehruvian state 71, 73 244 redistributive policy 220,223
Naidu, Chandrababu 269 Nijalingappa (Congress politician) theory 4 I , 73 reforms, politics of 27-9; see also
Namboodiripad, E.M.S. 95n 129 politics economic reforms
Naoroji, Dadabhai 242n Nixon administration 188 in India 2, 13, 32, 78, 90, 121, regional/regionalism 5-7,29, 139,
Nara~an,Ja~aprakash 193, 194 Non-Alignment policy 223 129, 156, 159-60, 168 140,159,204-6
1
see also J P movement nuclear weapons 270 Indira Gandhi and 171ff kingdoms 3 , 5
nation-states in Nehru period 173 movements 139, 191,220,229
in India 4 , 3 0 open economy 64 participatory 72-3 religionlreligious
crisis of 2 12ff organized labour 246,264,265 and politicians 72 identity 22
 Index
Index
Telengana 92,97
question of 159 and liberalization 26 1-5 Third World 96, 119
tolerance 37 justice 245 Tipu Sultan 58 -Vaishnava 6 , 6 4
reservations, for lower castes 7 1 reforms 26,48,71, 156 Tocqueville, Alexis de 17, 66, 222 Vaishyas 47
resource allocations 116,225 stratification 2 1.82 tolerance 86,94 uarna order 47, 85
restraint, ideals of 65 totality, Marxian concept of 145 tradition 33,81-3 vernacular
revenue system 4, 20, 21 socialism 73, 128n, 112-14, 158 cultures 3
Revolt of 1857 20,55 software industry 262,266 ulema 49 discourse on 63
right(s) South Asia, Islamic empires in 49 United Arab Emirates 84 electoral ~oliticsand 72
to equality 21 9n sovereignty 11,20,43-58,71,213, United Front government 192 languages 29
to property 75, 1 18 2 19,220,270 United States violence 165-6
Roy, Ram Mohan 56, 57n see also state sovereignty democracy and federalism in Vivekananda 24
royal power 44-5,214 Soviet Union 1 1, 244,247 84 vote banks 98
rupee devaluation 178 collapse of 239,25 1 economic role state in 8, 234
rural elites 88 and India treaty 182, 188 foreign policy of 188 Weber, Max 5, 15,44
ruling blocs 106- 10, 227 military supplies to India 178 and India relations 1 19, 224, welfare 21, 109, 245
rulership, brahmanical theory of 48 see also USSR 270 Western
ryotwari system 4 state and Pakistan 248 civilization 24
as a bourgeois state 103-5 universal suffrage 79 modernity 19, 24, 6 2 , 2 18
Said, Edward 22, 25 centralization of 127 untouchability 71,22211 secularization of 22
Sathe, Vasant 1 16n colonialism and the 19-25 Urs, Devraj 200 societies, democratic institutions
sati, abolition of 56-7 concept of 42-4 USSR in 34-5
Scheduled Castes 34 enchantment of 67-74 India's relation with 1 19
science functions of 222 policy of 120 Youth Congress 197
growth of modern 6 1 Hindu reflections on 46 stance on India-China war 177
and technology 64 intervention 250 technology and capital assistance zamindarslzamindari system 4
Western 27 and modernity 40 to India 248 decline of 12 1
secularism 18, 32, 36, 38, 140, 16 1, powers of 66 Uttar Pradesh 6 expropriation and 252
218 role of 4 0 f f
self-determination, right of 243 sector 228-9
Shah Commission 128, 195 and society 1 1, 12, 69
Shankara 86 sovereignty 20
Shastri, La1 Bahadur 171,225 Stalin, Joseph 246,247
Shourie, Arun 208 sterilization, forced 136
Singh, Charan 122,202 structuralism, of Marx 145-6
Singh, Manmohan 258,265 subsidies, removal of 263-4, 267
Singh, Rao Birendra 122 swarajlswarajya 57,65
Smith, Adam 23 Swatantra Party 122, 123, 176, 182
social
change 88, 137, 154, 163,516, Tagore, Rabindranath 19n, 2 4 , 3 1,
218 64,66
design 146, 152, 153,203 technology, impact of 255,266
groups, dominance of 9 telecommunications 255