With him, that species more or less goes extinct now. And the greatest tribute to him was the collection of leaders from all shades of politics and ideologies at his cremation. Photographers captured that moment in a way that says more for Indian politics than the proverbial thousand words. It shows a grave and grim Sonia walking in and a whole collection of her bitter rivals, Chandrababu Naidu and Mulayam included, half-rising in spontaneous greeting. Some justice, even if in death, for a man who had fretted so much over the loss of old culture and grace in our politics when alive.

This loss of communication across ideological and personal prejudices is now a reality. In the past, you always felt so proud seeing leaders from across the political spectrum turn up at state banquets for visiting heads of state. Right through the NDA years, you found senior Congress leaders, notably Sonia, Manmohan Singh or Pranab Mukherjee, attend state banquets and take pride of place in the middle. Of late, however, you’d be struck by the sheer absence of NDA leaders, even from official banquets. I haven’t yet checked as to what is the reason behind this — whether they are not being invited, or are choosing not to attend. Either way, it marks a new low in our politics. And the way the presidential campaign has gone, it’s going to get worse.

While the NDA may be guilty of being too “oppositionist” and for not being able to shake off their frustration at their unexpected defeat in 2004, the UPA is equally to blame, if not even more, for this breakdown. This government is theirs to run, and five years is a long enough period to build a decent legacy in governance and make a mark for the future. A combination of global, regional and domestic factors, political and economic, has also created an environment where the government of the day has a historic opportunity to resolve India’s most serious problems, from settling its border disputes to cementing its place in the new architecture of the global balance of power. From progress with Musharraf and the Chinese to the nuclear deal, it also made a good beginning. But in its desperation to pander to the Left, and equally its vain hope of winning back the Muslim vote banks, it is blighting its own political prospects. The nuclear deal does not require parliamentary approval and will go through. But to expect any settlement with China or Pakistan to happen without the NDA’s concurrence is fantasy. There are unanimous resolutions of Parliament for both those borders and if people think they can rail-road any settlement through a numerical majority in a divided Parliament, it would be a dangerous fantasy. At the same time, can the leaders of the Congress reach out to exchange notes on these issues with the BJP when they are even forbidden from seeking their votes to pass the pension bill, which had been proposed by the NDA and is now endorsed by the UPA? In the NCMP, the Congress may have signed its own Treaty of Versailles with the Left. But by allowing the Left to force it into this exclusionist politics, it is only having its own government hamstrung and knee-capped.

... contd.