Last May, around the time Prime Minister Narendra Modi completed one year in office, a hitherto-undistinguished Bharatiya Janata Party member of Parliament, Bharat Singh, shot to fame by standing up in a weekly meeting of the party’s parliamentarians and, in the presence of Modi, questioned the functioning of the government. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu, who was coordinating the meeting, had no option but to intervene and stop it abruptly.
The lone voice of dissent, which seemed feeble back then, has become louder as the BJP completes the second year in office. The wall of silence that appeared impregnable until it was breached by Bharat Singh, the BJP MP from UP’s Ballia constituency last year, seems to have weakened.
Not only have BJP MPs stopped taking Modi’s instructions in the parliamentary party meetings seriously, many of them have started expressing their rebellious voices on the floor of Parliament, embarrassing the government in full public view.
The just-concluded Budget session of Parliament was most striking in that sense, as three BJP MPs spoke out openly against the government. The most embarrassing moment for the government came just before the end of the Budget session when party MP Bhola Singh declared in the Lok Sabha on May 11 that “while eastern India lacks development, it has brains. Western India has development but lacks brains”.
Modi, who hails from Gujarat in western India, was present in the House when the remark was made. Many party MPs were seen suppressing giggles. Singh also hit out at Modi government’s flagship smart city project, saying it would only help the developed cities to make further progress and increase regional imbalances.
On May 2, Singh also had another awkward question. “With regard to Reliance, the policy of the previous government and in some instances the present government remains the same," he said. "I want to know what is the compulsion of the government in resolving the dispute clearly and firmly with the company?” As Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan sought to defend the government, many party members were seen congratulating Singh.
Open dissent
Modi was left even more embarrassed on May 3 when two party MPs put the government in the dock while many other BJP parliamentarians thumped their desks.
Hukum Singh created a flutter in the Lok Sabha when he expressed his unhappiness with Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh. “You have given a very elaborate reply but the problem remains as it is," he said. "The price of pulses is not coming down and that of onions is not going up.”
Moments later another BJP MP, RK Singh, rose to contradict his party’s government. After Home Minister Rajnath Singh denied that there was ever a provision for housing in the Centre’s police modernisation scheme, the BJP MP from Ara in Bihar said, “I just want to clarify one fact. There was a provision for housing in the police modernisation scheme… It has been stopped since the Centre has increased the share of taxes to the states.” Embarrassed, the Home Minister sat down, without contesting his party MP.
These statements on May 3 came merely an hour after Modi gave to his party’s parliamentarians a pep talk, listing his government’s achievements and asking them – as he has been doing in almost every other parliamentary party meeting – to take these to the people.
Cracks in the fiefdom?
Some BJP MPs are uncertain what message they should carry. “What should we tell the people?” a party MP from Bihar asked Scroll.in. “That we are trying to make the country clean and that we have started the process of creating some smart cities at some distant places? Or should we tell them that a few years from now there would be a bullet train running between Mumbai and Ahmedabad? What about the widespread unemployment and the unusual rise in prices of food items after Modiji became the Prime Minister?”
In many situations, such dissent would be construed as a good thing. It is a sign of intra-party vibrancy in a democratic set up. But in the case of Modi, such expressions are the sign of a big problem. Modi is known to run the government and the party in an autocratic manner, and the sudden emergence of autonomous voices from within may well be construed as a threat to his authority.
