Events & Issues
New Delhi, 16 December 2008
India’s ‘Old’ Leaders
IS AGE IN POLITICS
AN ISSUE?
By Prakash Nanda
Debating and discussing personal matters, including health,
of political leaders before voting for them is a normal phenomenon in Western
democracies. However, in India,
this has rarely entered the political parlance. Whatever may be the animosity,
political leaders have avoided personal attacks on their opponents. This is very
unlike situation in countries such as the US
and Great Britain,
where scandals in private lives have cost many a promising leader a bright
future. Though India,
so far, has not witnessed such scandals, influencing electoral outcomes, the
age factor is now increasingly attracting attention.
For instance, take the just-concluded Assembly elections in Delhi. In the debating
circles, it is becoming more fashionable to say that the BJP lost primarily because
of its projection of “old” Vijay Kumar Malhotra as its chief ministerial candidate.
Taking a cue from the results in the country’s Capital, one is now hearing that
the National Democratic Alliance’s future in the forthcoming and more
important, parliamentary polls is virtually doomed unless “old” L K Advani is
replaced by a younger leader.
In this context, one may just recall how on the eve of the
2004 General Elections, former Union Minister Ajit Singh, better known in
political circles as Late Prime Minister Charan Singh’s son, had described the
then Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in one of his election rallies. Though
not long before that, Singh, leading a one-man party in the 13th Lok Sabha, was
a Cabinet Minister under Vajpayee. Singh, no longer in the NDA, ridiculed the
“old and sick” Vajpayee’s political ambition, mimicked his gait, and laughed at
Vajpayee’s weight and the way he was being “craned”. Sadly, the way Singh
described Vajpayee’s health was truly sickening, to say the least. As a student
of Indian politics, I do not recall any such instance when an Indian leader
spoke so disgracefully about the health and personal life of another leader,
and that too of a Prime Minister.
It is a different matter altogether that the same Ajit Singh
is now being courted by the BJP to be its electoral partner in Uttar Pradesh. Perhaps,
Singh can today say that in 2004 he stood vindicated as the Vajpayee-led NDA
was voted out of power. In fact, Vajpayee’s age had been commented on by his too
critics during the electioneering. A Congress spokesman had asked the BJP to
give him rest and spare him from strenuous campaigning. Likewise, Congress
leader Jaipal Reddy (now a senior minister under Manmohan Singh) went to the
extent of suggesting that India
should have a rule or convention that should ensure politicians above 70 take sanyas.
But then, as subsequent events prove, the Congress-led UPA
selected not exactly a young person as Prime Minister. And as has been pointed
out recently by Congress leaders, the same Manmohan Singh, who is approaching
80, will continue as Prime Minister should his alliance obtain a fresh mandate
in 2009. No doubt, “old” Malhotra has lost in Delhi, but the 70-plus Chief Minister, Sheila
Dikshit is not exactly young!
This is not to suggest that we should not discuss the factor
of age in Indian politics. In fact, the country’s does require a debate on this
issue, but it should be “healthy”. It is a pertinent point if one questions the
logic behind 80-year-olds running a country, which has 500 million youth under
the age of 25. However, it is equally legitimate when some others point out
that age has nothing to do with politics. Many political stalwarts such as Sir
Winston Churchill (1874-1965), Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948), Charles
de Gaulle (1890-1970), Ho Chi Minh (1890-1969), Nelson Mandela (b. 1918), Mao
Ze Dong (1893-1976), Joseph Stalin (1879-1953) and Tito (1892-1980) have
contributed much for the cause of politics, with different strategies and
outlook.
It is true that four leading nations of the world are now
being governed by leaders below 60 years of age – George Bush in the US (he is
giving way next month to a much younger Obama), Dmitry Medvedev in Russia, G.
Brown in Britain and Hu Jintao in China.
Recall that former British Prime Minister Tony Blair became a father while in
office. He had entered office in his early forties! So was Bill Clinton when he
became the President in 1993. In contrast, India has had only one “young”
Prime Minister – Rajiv Gandhi, who was just forty-plus when he occupied the
most powerful elective office of the country. His grandfather, Prime Minister
Jawaharlal Nehru had entered office in his late 50s and India, by and large has
had septuagenarian and octogenarian Prime Ministers - Morarji Desai, Charan
Singh, Chandra Shekhar, Narasimha Rao, Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh.
Interestingly, in this context the community of Madiswil in
canton Bern, Switzerland had in August 2002
fixed an upper age limit of 70 for local council candidates. The decision had evoked
countrywide apprehension and the Swiss federal government was forced to scrap
the provision, terming it “discriminatory, unnecessary and inappropriate”. Prior
to this the government had carried out an investigation by its “justice
ministry”, which found that four cantons - Bern, Glarus, Appenzell Inner Rhodes and
Appenzell Outer Rhodes - had an age limit of 65 years for members of the
cantonal government! The Swiss
government took the stand that older people were “capable of great things in
the fields of politics, culture or science.”
Should “old” leaders run a country like India, which is
increasingly becoming younger, with an age-group of 20 and 50 years now
constituting over 60 per cent of the population? Certainly it is a legitimate
question, but given the global experience one cannot arrive at a definite
conclusion or an answer. Take, for instance, the example in the Western world.
It might have a Blair or Clinton or Bush or Putin (and now Obama), but the fact
remains that it has also had the likes of highly effective septuagenarian
Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schroder, the French President and the German
chancellor respectively. It will not be out
of context to recall that Ronald Reagan took the oath of office in his
seventies and went on to become, arguably, one of the most powerful Presidents
of the US.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower once said, "I'm saving
that rocker for a day when I feel as old as I really am." And he was
elected President in 1952 at the age of 62 and left office in 1961 at the ripe
age of 70. Importantly, if one looks at
the makeup of those who shape policy nationally, including the U.S. Congress or
Supreme Court, there is it ample evidence that age is not a deterrent. Not long
ago, the Americans had a Senator in 98-year-old Strom Thurmond. Similarly, the
Chinese and Russians, until recently, were, invariably, led by the
octogenarians.
Clearly, age
does not matter in politics so long as one is active and performing. Political leadership is not necessarily about
physical prowess, youth or age but about what one has in one’s head and one’s
heart, and about competence, good judgment and integrity. --INFA
(Copyright, India News and Feature
Alliance)
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