By Valson Thampu
The paradigm that governs politics in Tamil Nadu is “Amma” or mother. If Amma goes, it will be Chinnamma. But it has to be Amma, not Appa. No Amma, no authority, no stability. Sadly for OPS, he cannot be Amma. He suffers from a congenital disability.
Succession by ‘Amma-ship’ is assumed to be basic to the ‘discipline’ and coherence of AIDMK. A major derivative of this paradigm is that the party cannot afford two power-centers. Plurality is anathema to domesticity: one can have only one mother.
Anything less than absolute concentration of power in one hand is assumed to be a source of weakness and vulnerability. But wherefrom does this doctrine derive its legitimacy? To what extent is it in tune with the genius of democracy?
“Amma” is a domestic fountainhead of authority. Family is the embodiment of absolute and dictatorial authority. That authority is secured by keeping the rest infantile. The head of the household is not answerable to the members. They may be informed, but are not entitled to be consulted. Consultation dilutes authority. It is Amma’s right to dictate. Not falling in line is heretical.
It also means that succession will be a private affair. If the household head ceases to exist, someone strictly from within the domestic unit must succeed. The only antidote to internecine power struggle is proximity, the core domestic principle. So, it suffices that Sasikala has been closely associated with Amma for a long time. The more private it is, the better.
Historically, the political sphere emerged at the expense of the domestic. Between the Athenian polis (the city) and ‘family’ there was an impassable gulf. The rules and considerations that governed politics –or, the art of managing the affairs of the polis- had to be different from domestic norms and practices. But that was Athens.
We must note the affinity between Sasikala’s elevation and the popular clamor for restoring Jallikattu. The main argument advanced for the latter was its antiquity. Jallikattu boasts of an unbroken continuity spanning centuries. Whether or not that justifies its continuation in the modern world was a question that simply did not matter.
Antiquity suffices to sanctify family traditions. The same, if absolutized in the public sphere, could romanticize stagnation and regression. Stability per se is a value vis-à-vis family; it need not be so in the public domain. As Schelling states in Philosophical Investigations into the Essence of Human Freedom, “Where there is no struggle, there is no life.”
Modi is now up against this reality. He hails from the Parivar ethos. Parivar is tradition-bound. But the sway of tradition, as Hannah Arendt argues in her classic essay on Authority, is now a thing of the past. So Modi has to sell development, which is anything but tradition. How will Modi balance the forward-moving impetus of progress with the regressive pull of Parivar?
This tension does not exist for AIDMK, insofar as it is rooted wholly in Parivar dynamics. Its insignia is not politics of progress but politics of charity.
Amma will run kitchens for you. Amma will take care of your health needs. Amma will get your girls married off, and so on. It is not yet State as the agent of welfare. It is Amma as the fountainhead of charity. In governance it is regressive to mistake welfare for charity, no matter how popular or benevolent it proves.
This brings us to the crown that, now descended, could henceforth sit uncomfortably on Sasikala’s head. As Machiavelli pointed out a long time ago, crowns may descend smoothly on fortunate heads. But the sway of luck could prove short-lived; unless it is redeemed by commensurate political and administrative acumen. Fortune’s minions do come under stern tests.
How soon that happens, and what challenges it throws up, are variables not easy to predict. They depend on the principles, norms and forces active in the given political matrix. There is logic, hence, to BJP and DMK –contrary poles of the TN political spectrum- being perturbed by Sasikala’s enthronement.
This is important because Modi appears to be now chasing this model, though at a distance. Budget 2017-2018 is Modi “doing an Amma”. It is Modi all the way: a shift that he is now showcasing with strategic utterances on the campaign trail. He wants to help, he said in Meerut, the marooned people of UP by sending relief from Delhi. But Akhilesh, sitting in Lucknow, is blocking his charitable intentions. A perverse teenager in the neighborhood is hindering the Patriarch.
If Sasikala succeeds in redeeming her pre-modern elevation, India could end up emulating TN. What will then happen to the mantra of development, of going forward to the Promised Land led by Modi, is anybody’s guess. After all, nothing succeeds like success, especially in politics.
(Valson Thampu is a former principal of St Stephen’s College, Delhi)