Editorial: A national agenda called social justice

It is easy to see Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin’s invitation to political parties to join him in forming a federation built on a platform of social justice as a manoeuvre to elevate himself from a State leader to a national player. After all, the move was buoyed by the high of winning the legal wrangle to secure 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in the All India Quota seats contributed by the states. However, one cannot rule out the motivator called ambition – because for Stalin, who has been raised on the art of politics by his illustrious father M Karunanidhi - the national stage is an idea whose time has come.

Ever since the rise of the new BJP led by Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, the discourse has been altered so drastically that politics now appears to stream from the fountainhead called religion. The impact is such that even in states where the saffron party has little sway electorally, it has managed to captivate more people with its narrative, forcing rivals to respond. How does a party assure minorities of its support while also effectively countering allegations of appeasement of the religious majority?

Some of the parties have responded with regionalism, none as successful as Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal. This strategy aims to relegate religion to much less important a factor when compared to language and culture, which would reduce the effect of the BJP’s main campaign plank and would also make its strong central leadership a liability. The way she vanquished the BJP in one of the most fiercely fought polls in recent times may prompt some parties to adopt that. This game plan may seem to have some merit in states where regional pride has had a strong connect like Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, etc. However, it is fraught with the risk of parochialism which would alienate the people in central states like UP, MP, Bihar and Rajasthan, and more dangerously, may spiral into bigotry.

This is precisely where the idea of convergence based on social justice comes across as a far superior idea, both in terms of being a potentially effective counter-strategy to take on religious hegemony without getting drawn into the ugly battle of identity based on religion and caste, culture and language. More importantly, it is rooted in the idea of equality that is relevant, universal and timeless.

Social justice is not a radically new concept. It has been the driving force in Tamil Nadu politics for decades, and in the ongoing campaign in UP, the Samajwadis led by Akhilesh Yadav has made the election a battle between Mandal vs Kamandal (or social justice vs Hindutva). But treating it as a mere electoral strategy could have two drawbacks: it could get dumped if it fails in UP, and even if successful, it could still be reduced to a mere slogan spouted during elections but seldom practised.

But social justice should not be limited by a use-by date or reduced to a mere utilitarian value. It should be a fundamental, foundational principle on which the society is built and politics is practised, down to the level where an individual leads his life. To paraphrase Latin American writer Eduardo Galeano, politics of religion and culture are vertical, they have hierarchies that condemn a large section of the society to the lower rungs. But it is important to remember that social justice is horizontal - it respects all markers including gender. And that is the guiding principle of India’s democracy that our founding fathers envisioned.