Recent days have seen a riveting altercation between two BJP leaders - Sinha Senior and Junior, Yashwant and Jayant, minister past and minister current. Yashwant Sinha wrote a fiery column criticizing the economic performance of the present government; almost as he finished, his son issued a trenchant rebuttal.
Yashwant Sinha's was primarily an unabashed attack on Arun Jaitley: that despite having lost in the general election of 2014, he was given four ministries, which even competent ministers would have found it difficult to manage - including the finance ministry, which by itself requires full-time attention. Jaitley was lucky to take over when oil prices had collapsed; he could have used the handsome bonanza to do wonders with the economy. He wasted the chance; and he allowed inherited problems, such as stalled projects and banks' bad debts, to worsen. Today, the economy is in a crisis: industrial production has declined, agriculture is in distress, construction is doing badly, private investment has collapsed, exports have shrunk, and demonetization, Jaitley's magic wand, was a disaster. Goods and services tax has done tremendous harm to business and thrown millions out of employment. Taxpayers have made huge claims for input tax credits; instead of giving them a fair deal, the finance ministry has asked its income tax department to chase the claim makers, as well as those who deposited substantial cash in banks following demonetization. Economic growth rate has fallen quarter after quarter; it would look even worse if the government stopped doctoring the statistics. Even if the government takes steps now to reverse the crisis, it is doubtful if the economy will revive by the time of the 2019 general election.
That is Yashwant Sinha's case against the government. In rebuttal, Jayant Sinha calls GST, demonetization and digital payments "game-changing"; they will raise tax revenue, reduce friction in the economy, and make it easier for people to prove their creditworthiness because loans and servicing will be digitized and available for inspection. Instead of being turned into political favours, coal mining licences, telecommunication spectrum allocations and passenger flight routes have been allocated through auctions. Borrowers who do not repay banks will be taken to bankruptcy courts; their assets will be seized and used to liquidate their debts. Government handouts are now going straight into beneficiaries' accounts; that will eliminate much corruption. The government is investing in rural power supply, highways, rural roads, housing and air transport; all that investment will reduce costs. Flying will cost less than taking an auto-rickshaw. Atal Innovation Mission, Mudra, and India Aspiration Fund will pour millions into innovations and new, small enterprises; four hundred start-ups are housed in students' rooms. Soon, every Indian will have guaranteed food, power, job, house, bank account, toilet, cooking gas, insurance, micro-loans and a road up to his house.
The difference in the dominant tense is noticeable: Sinha Senior mostly uses present perfect ('x has happened'), whereas Sinha Junior uses the future ('y will happen') a lot. In other words, Junior is not narrating his government's achievements, but hopes of achievement. That suggests a paucity of achievements, which would support Senior's case. Lack of achievement is understandable; things take time to achieve in government. But what will happen may not happen; an appeal to a bright future requires the listener to share Junior's optimism. His case is not made to convince sceptics or fence-sitters.
He does claim three achievements: demonetization, GST and digital payments. Was the war against black money worth fighting? Of course; no one would say that dishonesty and tax cheating are good. But was demonetization a winning move in the war? Careful research may eventually give an answer. But the inconvenience caused by demonetization was palpable; the long queues and disruption of normal life were for everyone to experience and see. Whether they were good or bad is a matter of political faith. GST, again, is a good thing. But it is being shaped by long negotiations amongst the states. Whether the compromise they come up with is an improvement or a miss is not yet certain. And digital payments - there is no reason to worship them. Cash has worked perfectly well for millennia; digital payments are more convenient in large transactions, but not necessarily in all. So faith in them is, again, a matter of faith.
What is remarkable is Junior's complete silence on the disasters that the Senior lists as having already happened, in particular, the sorry state of the economy. Arun Jaitley also, in his reply to Senior, recounts instances of Senior's failures and incompetence; he does not answer any of Senior's thematic criticisms. In Jaitley's defence, one should say that the course of events does not depend on policies alone, let alone policies of the finance minister. So it would be unfair to blame Arun Jaitley for the dire state of the economy. But it does not do him, or any of the policymakers, any credit. And until they recognize the mess, whether of their making or just a part of their fate, they cannot even begin to repair it.
Few policymakers have the courage or honesty to say, 'I have made a mess.' But all competent ones recognize a mess in time and address it. Not quite in time, but this government has recognized it too; that was the point of the prime minister's mass recruitment of economists for his council just weeks ago. But it is not as if economists have the key. There are many policy options; and their consequences remain uncertain. Choosing amongst them is a matter of judgment; and that judgment has to be that of the current government. Will it do better than it has? The Senior will say no; the Junior will say yes. Going by past experience, the probabilities favour the Senior.
That does not give us hope. But those who are not supporters of the ruling party will not be concerned only about the government's economic cluelessness. They will be equally worried about its political dominance: there is no sign of competition in Parliament, not even a sign that it might emerge by 2019. The point of having democracy is that options in governance, political, economic, social, technological, are freely laid out and discussed, and choices are made on their merits. That is something our democracy is no longer doing.
If this is generally recognized, the right thing to do would be to repair the democratic system. At the moment there is no recognition. Hence it is best not to think about our political condition, and instead, to live in a world of imagination. Some would call it make-believe. In other words, Sinha Junior has one imaginary world to cheer himself up with; Sinha Senior has none. These are not the only choices; it is also possible to create other make-believe scenarios that crowd out the depressing economy altogether. We have hundreds of television channels; less than 10 per cent of them serve out politics. We can keep watching the other 90 per cent. Unless we become victims of a sordid scenario ourselves. Even if we do, there will always be hope.
