REWIND

New Delhi, 27 November 2025

PM’s Strategy for Bigger War

By Inder Jit

(Released on 1 February 1972) 

India’s bigger war on poverty and backwardness is again at the top of Mrs Gandhi's agenda. Broad outlines of her strategy appear to have been finalised. The “enemy” is to be attacked on three fronts: economic, political and administrative. Above all, the mood of self-confidence and buoyancy created by the magnificent victory over Pakistan is to be exploited to full national advantage. Such moods do not come often, even among a people as emotional as Indians. One experienced something similar in 1947 when India won its freedom through non-violence and the world acclaimed a new star on the horizon. The mood, however, was not adequately exploited. 

Mrs Gandhi is anxious not to let this opportunity slip by. In fact, her decision to hold the Assembly elections in various States, more or less, according to schedule and to advance the poll in some other States is part of the overall strategy. She has already cleared the roadblocks to her radical policies at the Centre through a break with the Old Guard and the mid-term poll to Parliament. Now she hopes to eliminate the hurdles in the States also. Contrary to a popular impression, the Prime Minister cannot do very much to usher in socialism at the grassroots even if she has a two-thirds majority in Parliament. Our Constitution is federal in character and New Delhi can do little except make recommendations to the States, as for instance in regard to health, education and land reforms. 

The Prime Minister is thus making an all-out hid to cash in on the prestige she enjoys today to get State assemblies which would be forward-looking and in tune with the thinking and approach of the Centre. This, however, is not to say what she seeks merely a majority for the Congress (N) in various Assemblies. Indeed, she seems to be seeking much more: a qualitative change in the composition of her party and the calibre of its members. In the process, Mrs Gandhi, aided ably by her advisors, has virtually launched on her own brand of a “cultural revolution” (minus the Red Guards) to put the Congress (N) actively on its toes, purge it of “reactionaries, opportunists and deviationists” and forge it into an effective instrument of national policies. 

Party tickets are being carefully distributed in an atmosphere where, it is claimed, “selection has become more important than election.” Mrs Gandhi has been taking personal interest in the matter, from laying down broad principles for the benefit of the Pradesh Election Committees to guiding the Central Election Committee. Since the Prime Minister desires the Assemblies and the State Governments also to be dynamic and efficient, merit and youth have received overriding preference. Traditionalism and bossism have been at a discount as also claims on the basis of “past services to the Congress” and one’s capacity to win a particular seat. Equally unacceptable have been vested interests in one form or another. 

A case in point is the Maharashtra P.C.C. list of 242 names, excluding those from Bombay who come under the jurisdiction of the B.P.C.C. Of these 110 will be fighting an election for the first time; 14 are below 30 years of age, 33 between 30 and 35 years and 12 between 35 and 40. In a significant case from Wardha district, the CSC decided in favour of a young women, adjudged by the A.I.C.C. observers as “the most outstanding person among all now aspirants”, in preference to a sitting member of the PEC, who was allotted another constituency. In another case, the CEC set aside the unanimous recommendation of the PEC in favour of the chairman of a cooperative sugar factory – a sitting M.L.A. for two terms -- of his son or nephew! Instead, it decided to give the ticket to a brilliant young man, an MA LL.B, son of a worker in the same factory. 

Tickets have also been denied to the chairmen of other cooperative ventures in the state and similar vested interests, including financiers and racketeers and persons with landholdings above the ceiling or are “unduly rich.” Of interest in this context are three significant cases, symbolic of the CEC’s broad approach and outlook. In one case, the CEC rejected the unanimous nomination by the PEC of a consultant of one of India’s big business houses. In the second, it rejected an influential former ruler known to be “holding land in different names far above the ceiling.” In the third case, the CEC turned down another affluent sitting MLA who had opposed nationalization of transport in the State and had gone up to the Supreme Court in a bid to thwart it. 

Even more significant is the interest Mrs. Gandhi and her close colleagues have been taking in the list of ministers from various States seeking fresh party nominations. Mrs Gandhi has decided to apply a stiffer test in their cases since the image of Government depends mainly on the way ministers conduct themselves in public and, equally important, in private. Ministers known to be corrupt or believed to be so have been (and will be) dropped on the basis of the healthy British convention that those (genuinely) under a cloud should be made to bow out of public life since corruption charges cannot always be roved easily. The axe has also fallen on those known to be guilty of conduct unworthy of persons occupying high public offices, especially when they unfortunately set the pace for others. 

A State Government’s cooperation vis-a-vis the Centre depends on the quality and outlook of the Chief Minister. Mrs Gandhi is, therefore, choosing future incumbents of this office from among those in whom she has full confidence. Where such individuals are not available from among the sitting or aspiring M.L.A.s, she has decided to depute trusted colleagues from the Centre, as for instance, Mr Siddharta Shankar Ray and Mr P.C. Sethi. (A couple of other States are also likely to get their future Chief Ministers from New Delhi.) In a case like that of Gujarat, Mrs Gandhi has preferred not to disclose her mind to prevent a situation in which the others might combine to sabotage the election of her nominee. This happened some years ago in Gujarat when the late Balvantray Mehta, hand-picked by the High Command, was unexpectedly defeated. 

On the economic and administrative fronts, Mrs Gandhi has decided to introduce two key but long-forgotten words: accountability and common sense. Both Ministers and officials are proposed to be made answerable hereafter in regard to specific targets. Accountability is expected to induce greater efficiency in the public sector undertakings and, in the bargain, help provide resources. The Prime Minister has, for instance, asked the Union Minister of Steel to let her know by when the steel plants will be able to step up utilisation of installed capacity from 60 per cent to 85 per cent. This alone is estimated to help cut down India's steel import bill from about Rs 200 crores to some 40 crores. Similar requests have boon made to other Ministers in charge of projects with underutilized capacity. 

Simultaneously, the Planning Commission, which the World Bank Chief, Mr. McNamara, found “greatly transformed as though from night to day,” is now gearing itself up to give a major thrust to the development of science and technology with a view to quickening the pace of self-reliance and promoting fresh avenues of employment. Some 200 groups and sub-groups have been set up by the National Committee on Science and Technology to study the present state of science and technology in various sectors and suggest plans for future development. The experience of the last war has given fresh confidence to both our scientists and technologists. They were able to produce for use during the war certain non-ferrous alloys whose import was stopped during the war. 

Measures are now on the anvil both to mobilize maximum resources and to step up production. Once the elections are over, land reforms will be undertaken and, what is more, the affluent agriculture sector taxed. It is increasingly realised that, apart from the failure of the public sector enterprises to generate surplus, absence of adequate tax on farm incomes continues to deprive the Government of revenues from a leading growth sector. Production is hoped to be stepped up by ending industrial strife through bold measures designed to deal equally firmly with the unscrupulous big money and the corrupt trade unionists. West Bengal alone lost some 19 million man days last year as against the loss of 9 million man days in West Germany, which has twice India’s production. 

Mrs Gandhi and her advisers are confident of an 8 per cent rate of growth, given required cooperation, some hard, honest work and elimination of waste which would otherwise constitute our largest resource. They have rejected renewed suggestions for devaluation of the rupee: in any case they feel that the time to look at such proposals is after the monsoons, not before as unfortunately in June 1966. But one thing is clear: all good ideas may come to naught unless the Prime Minister is able to get the State Governments to eschew ad hocism, take greater interest in framing policies rather than in more postings and transfers and introduce some continuity in administration by reviving the tenure system. There is a basic correlation between development and stability. We can ignore it only at our peril. --- INFA

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)