Unscrupulous Mining Lobby

Illegal mining continues to flourish in Karnataka, backed by political patronage.

An EPW Editorial

Shankar Raghuraman on the Koda and the mining lobby

Interview with Times of India senior journalist Shankar Raghuraman on the influence of the mining lobby in Karnataka and the Madhu Koda affair in Jharkhand.

The marriage of money and politics

Like never before, rentier capital dominates politics in Jharkhand and Karnataka

Money and politics has never been separate in India. Many political parties have relied upon and have included richer interests and sections to garner political power through patronage. But what is being seen of late, as evidenced by the marriage of money and politics in several states is the dominance of rich sectional interests of a very high order, so much so that traditional polity or the "political class" lacks a complete autonomy from and is very much subordinate to such interests. This is particularly the case in Karnataka -where a crisis is now underway in the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party - and in Jharkhand, where former chief minister Madhu Koda is being investigated for fraud and ill-gotten wealth of a massive scale.

The state of Karnataka is, even at the time of writing, reeling under the impact of floods that have affected several districts in the state. But legislators of the ruling party, far from mobilising and organising relief work, are busy elsewhere, hiding in resorts in neighbouring states to avoid being "poached" by rival factions. The farcical situation was triggered by a revolt of a set of legislators led by the moneyed mining lobby section- the Bellary brothers as they are called - of the BJP. The rising prices and demand for iron ore, particularly from China has seen a major boom in the iron ore industry in Karnataka centered in and around Bellary and has made a few mining contractors and owners tremendously rich. A share of such incomes has been pooled back into garnering political support to be in power, as the assembly elections in 2008 in the state demonstrated.

The "Bellary brothers - Karunakara Reddy and Janardhana Reddy have made it big by partaking from the flourishing iron ore mining business in Bellary. They have been a tremendous "asset" for the BJP, helping the party garner support of independents and orchestrate the so called, "Operation Kamala" - a "scheme" to induce opposition legislators to resign and re-contest from the BJP ticket. Apparently, since the chief minister B.Yeddyurappa has "challenged their supremacy" in Bellary by making administrative transfers of officials in the area, the Bellary brothers have cried foul and have orchestrated this unsavoury mutiny.

Factionalism and "rebellions" are endemic to India's liberal democratic polity, where most parties are "big tents" of individualistic, opportunistic "leaders" and this has been much discussed upon. What is saliently contemporary is the tremendous dominance of money power and such interests. These interests such as the Bellary brothers' do no longer control politics and politicians outside its competitive realm, but operate from within and for good reason. Politics and staying in power - rather than being close to it - helps these moneyed interests attain administrative writ that help their businesses by garnering very high rentier incomes. Any perceived challenge to the writ, as the Bellary brothers construe from the administrative changes in the local institutions in the area brought about by the panchayat minister who is close to the chief minister, is therefore seen as a threat to the overweening power and interests. The BJP's response has been typical - loath to giving into such blatantly opportunistic claims, but resisting a loss of these moneyed "assets". The "Bellary brothers", after all have supported the BJP ever since the close and high profile electoral battle between Congress supremo Sonia Gandhi and BJP leader Sushma Swaraj in 1999 and the symbiotic relationship was the main reason for the successful formation of the BJP government last year despite the party not winning an absolute majority.

Such congruence between moneyed interests and politics is visible from the Madhu Koda affair in Jharkhand as well. An independent legislator, Koda was pitchforked to the seat of chief minister from a hung assembly due to a quirk of circumstances. Koda made the "best" of his tenures - as minister in charge of panchayati raj and later mining in the Babulal Marandi and Arjun Munda led governments and as chief minister himself between 2006 and 2008. He has from many definitive accounts, revealed during investigations by the Enforcement Directorate recently, played a major role in securing lucrative mining contracts for friends, associates and companies. He is also alleged to have involved in several illegal money transfer transactions, money laundering and diversion of state funds during his tenure. And the murky link between corporates interested in exploiting the natural resources in Jharkhand and politics is not limited to the Madhu Koda affair alone, as the nomination of senior corporate managers as Rajya Sabha members of parliament from the state, despite tenuous connections with the state, attest to.

There is many a similarity between the Karnataka and the Jharkhand affairs, a phenomenon which has transcended the mere nexus between crony capitalism and politics to the marriage of both. Incidentally, both the district of Bellary and the state of Jharkhand have abysmal human development indicators, pointing to the "resource curse" that these places suffer from. While their natural resource wealth engenders corrupt rentiers and speculators who make a killing of the profits that these resources generate, the owners of the wealth - the people themselves are left to fester in poverty and difficult livelihoods. Among all the distortions that persist in India's formalist democracy, the influence of money power, rentier capital and the "resource curse" are the most damning.

Draft of editorial written for the Economic and Political Weekly

Unprincipled Politics in Karnataka

Editorial to be published in Economic and Political Weekly

Unprincipled Politics

President's rule in Karnataka has been declared after the breakdown of the alliance between the Janata Dal (Secular) (JD(S)) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The coalition government formed was on the basis of a power-sharing arrangement which envisaged a handing over of the reins of the chief minister's post from the JD(S) to the BJP after 20 months of rule. This arrangement also involved elaborate division of ministries among both the parties. The JD(S) breaking the covenant, refused to hand over the post of chief minister to the BJP, whose nominee, deputy chief minister B.S.Yediyurappa was supposed to replace the current incumbent from the JD(S), H.D.Kumaraswamy, chief minister since January 2006.

This display of breach of trust has been widely berated, for the reasons offered by the JD(S) for their actions amount to nothing. The sudden discovery by the JD(S) of the communal character of the BJP (even as no such classification was made in the first place during the formation of the coalition) will not convince anyone. Simply put, this action by the JD(S) amounts to petty politics.

This form of power sharing arrangement which lays impetus to ministerial posts and executive positions is not new and neither is the drama that follows the breakdown of such arrangements. In the recent past (in 1997), the BJP had a similar arrangement with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) whose nominee Mayawati as chief minister was supposed to hand over reins to the BJP nominee after a specified period. The transfer of power never happened, resulting in the collapse of the arrangement and declaration of president's rule. A similar situation occurred with the People's Democratic Party (PDP)- Congress arrangement in Jammu and Kashmir, however, after some wrangling, smooth transfer of power did in fact take place.

Most of these arrangements have been made necessary (or atleast such is the reason provided by the parties involved) because of the fragmented nature of the verdicts in the assembly elections. Owing to no decisive victories for any parties in many states, such short-lived and expedient arrangements have been attempted. The sad state of such arrangements is the fact that alliances thus formed, despite the peoples' verdicts, do not coalesce and function according to common policy prerogatives or programmes. The bottomline that governs the formation of such alliances is not a give-and-take on issues or on specific programmatic outlines from the parties that partake in such alliances. It is more to do with the trappings and perks of ministerial power as these posts are seen as avenues to extend patronage to sections and to win over newer segments. Contradictions between the parties are swept under the carpet and the emphasis is on somehow latching on to ministries. The period of early bonhomie invariably vanishes as the alliance enters into a zone of problems, as has proven in the recent case in Karnataka.

The formal alliance between the JD(S) and the BJP was achieved after a segment of the JD(S) which was dissatisfied with the ruling coalition with the Congress (Dharam Singh was the chief minister and JD(S) leader Siddaramaiah was the deputy chief minister in this arrangement after the 2004 assembly elections which lasted till January 2006), broke away to align with the BJP, which had won the single largest number of seats in the elections. The new chief minister Kumaraswamy had justified this unprincipled move by saying that he was keen on a programme of economic development “more important than abstract notions of secularism”. By invoking secularism again as the main reason for the non-transfer of power now, it is clear that alliance was founded upon opportunistic basis in the first instance itself.

The fragmented nature of the polity, with several parties appealing to core sections of the populace has resulted in fractured verdicts, which in turn has meant political arrangements made out of expediency. However fickle a verdict might be, it does not mean that opportunist alliances can be formed without a commonly agreed policy outlook. There is every possibility of instability because of disagreements on various policy positions, but this arrangement is certainly more principled and respectful to the peoples' verdict as compared to a mere portfolio sharing agreement involving rotation of seats of power.