COALITION GOVERNMENT - INDIA

A government formed by a number of political parties instead of just one political party is called a ‘coalition government’.

The party that has secured the largest number of seats in the Lok Sabha (House of People), after the elections, forms the new government.

In a complex socio-political environment, peoples choices and affiliations vary and thus votes get distributed among a number of political parties. In such cases the leading party allies with other parties that have also won a sizable number of seats, thereby securing a majority of seats in the Lok Sabha. Once the coalition alliance has numerical strength in the Lok Sabha, it is invited by the President of India to form the Union Government and the coalition’s selected nominee is made Prime Minister. The Prime Minister is generally a prominent leader of the party with the largest number of seats in the coalition.

There are two types of coalition alliances

1.       Pre-Poll Alliance – formed when political parties declare their support to a coalition even before the election has taken place

2.       Post-Poll Alliance – formed after the election when political parties, alarmed by their few political gains, come together to form the government

Governance reformers have suggested that the Election Commission of India should ban post poll alliances and make it mandatory for political parties to declare their affiliations through pre-poll alliances so that voters can make informed choices at the polls.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

A coalition government is a cabinet of a parliamentary government in which several political parties cooperate, reducing the dominance of any one party within that coalition. The usual reason given for this arrangement is that no party on its own can achieve a majority in the parliament. However, a coalition government may also be shaped in time of a national complexity or crisis. If a coalition collapses, a confidence vote is assumed or a motion of no confidence is passed.

India’s first ever coalition government was formed under the Prime Ministership of Morarji Desai. It existed from 24^th March 1977 to 15 July 1979 and was headed by the Janata Party.

The first successful coalition government in India to complete the whole tern of five years was the BJP led National Democratic Alliance with Atal Bihari Vajpayee as Prime Minister from 1999-2004.

Another coalition, the UPA headed by the Congress, consisting of 13 separate parties ruled India for two terms from 2004 – 2014.

LEVELS OF COALITION

Coalition can take place at one of the three levels

           1.    Electoral: This coalition occurs when two or more parties contest elections together to fight against a common enemy. This may range from electoral alliance between parties at the National level to a mere understanding at the constituency level.

2.    Parliamentary- This coalition occurs when no single party gains a majority and the party asked the party asked to form the Government refers to rule as a minority Government on an agreement on an understanding with another external support.

3.    Governmental- The Governmental coalition is a 'power sharing' coalition and it occurs when two or more parties, none of which is able to win a majority of its own, combine to form a majority Government.

MERITS OF COALITION GOVERNMENT

• -          Coalition does not offer one party with the authority to put into practice their ideas.
• -          A coalition government is a partnership between parties and both parties will be treated equal.
• -          More minds are involved in decision making in a coalition government

DEMERITS OF COALITION GOVERNMENT

• -          Coalition parties produce unsteadiness within the coalition government
• -          It is difficult to attain true harmony among different political parties
• -          Each political party has the difficulty of intra conflicts. It is not easy to keep all the displeased party members happy. 

LANDMARKS IN INDIAN ELECTORAL PROCESS

1952
FIRST GENERAL ELECTIONS (1951-52)

The first general elections to Lok Sabha were held in 1951-52. It was a historic event and attracted world wide attention. India had emerged as the world's largest democracy with 173 million voters made eligible through Universal Adult Franchise. The conduct of First General Election was a mammoth exercise with 2,24,000 polling booths to record votes for 491 Lok Sabha and 3,283 Assembly seats. There were about 1,800 candidates for the Lok Sabha seats and another 15,000 for the State Legislative Assembly. Apart from the independents, there were 70 political parties. The political parties were big as well as small, national as well as regional, moderate and extremist, rightest and leftist.

Indian National Congress, which had all these years been in the thick of the nation's struggle for Independence bagged 364 out of the total of 491 seats for the Lok Sabha. The party had secured only 45% of the total votes cast and yet managed to bag 74.5% of the Lok Sabha seats.

The overall voting percentage was about 46 although in some constituencies, upto 80% turn out had been recorded. Election clashes were almost unknown at that time.

Illiteracy had been a great retarding factor so far as voters turn-out was concerned but canvassing had been made easy by adopting the practice of each party being assigned an election symbol. The voter may not have been able to read the name of the candidate of his or her choice but could identify the symbol with ease.

1977
SIXTH LOK SABHA ELECTIONS (1977)

The country had its first taste of Emergency in 1975. Indian voters expressed their contempt for this measure by rejecting the Congress under Smt. Indira Gandhi at the 1977 polls. She lost the election and her party was voted out of power at the center. A new party Janata Party came into existence with the merger of Congress (o), Bharatiya Jana Sangh, Bharatiya Lok Dal, Socialist and the Congress for Democracy. The Janata Party contested the elections under a common symbol (man with a plough inside the wheel) and captured 295 seats. The Janata party had obtained 43.17% of the popular votes cast for the 540 member Lok Sabha.

1989
NINTH LOK SABHA ELECTIONS (1989)

Soon after assumption of office, the young Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi showed inclination to do away with the power brokers in the Congress Party and introduced a measure of professional management in party affairs. However, the odds were too heavy against him. Money was needed to run the party and whoever gave it, expected out of turn favours. New tactics were tried to get money and as alleged through cuts in government deals with foreign firms. one such deal which cost the Congress its next term was the 'Bofor's' deal. Corruption in high places became the main issue this time.

V.P. Singh, former Minister in Rajiv Gandhi's cabinet left the Congress (I) party and formed the Jan Morcha with the help of a few senior colleagues. The National Front led by him was voted to power with parties like the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Communists leanding support from outside the government since it did not command an absolute majority in the Lok Sabha.

The government led by V. P. Singh did not last long Inner dissensions led to BJP withdrawing its support and he was replaced by Chandra Shekar as the Prime Minister even though his splinter group commanded an insignificant strength in the Lok Sabha. Even this arrangement collapsed and finally when the Congress (I) too declined to support the government, he submitted the resignation of this government leading to another General Election to the Lok Sabha. 

FEDERALISM AND THE INDIAN FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

Federalism is a system in which political power is divided between a central (national) government and smaller governmental units, states or provinces. The division of power is usually defined in a Constitution.

Federal system of government differs from unitary system. In a unitary system, all power legally derives from the Central Government. States of provinces have only those powers that the Central Government gives them. Some nations that appear to use the federal system really use the unitary system. Their provinces are administrative units rather than political units with separate powers.

In a true federal system, some powers are constitutionally reserved for the states of provinces. The Central Government has direct authority over the people concerning powers granted to it in the constitution. This distinguishes a federal system from a loose grouping of states, commonly called a confederation. A confederation can only act through its individual member states.

THE INDIAN FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

India has a parliamentary system of government. Parliament meets at New Delhi, the capital of India. It consists of Lok Sabha (House of the People) and Rajya Sabha (Council of States). The Prime Minister is the leader of the political party that has the most seats in Parliament. The President appoints the Prime Minister to office. The Prime Minister chooses a Cabinet and heads the government with the support of Parliament. If Parliament withdraws its support, the President either dismisses the Prime Minister or dissolves the Lok Sabha and calls a new election. The President is elected by Parliament and all the state legislatures to a five year term.

Representatives of the state and territories make up Parliament. The number of representatives from each increases or decreases as the population of the state or territory changes. Most of the 544 members of the Lok Sabha are elected by the voters. They serve five year terms, unless the Lok Sabha is dissolved. Most of the 244 member Rajya Sabha are elected by state legislatures. They serve six year terms and one third are elected every two years. A few members of each body are appointed by the President.

A Supreme Court heads India's court / legal system. Each state in India has a High Court and various lower courts. 

INDIA'S ROLE IN THE NON-ALIGNMENT MOVEMENT

The concept of non-alignment emerged during the Cold War. After the Second World War, the world was divided into two power blocs – USA and Soviet Union. 

The origin of the Non-Alignment Movement can be traced back to the Asian Relations Conference held in New Delhi in March 1947. At this conference, Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru highlighted the dangers posed by the hostility between the two power blocs. He also stressed the need for the Asian countries to work for maintaining world peace.

India had adopted the policy of non-alignment as it did not want to lose its freedom of decision making and because India’s primary concern, soon after independence, was economic development. Besides, India felt that it had a positive role to play in reducing international tension, promoting peace and serving as a bridge between the two power blocs. It meant that India wanted freedom to decide every issue on its merit. 

Essentially, non- alignment is an anti-imperialist and anti racist movement. Nehru frequently referred to the importance of India’s location and size as a determinant of the policy of non alignment. By virtue of location, he argued, India not only occupied a pivotal position in Asia, but also a king of meeting ground between the east and the west. He was also aware of the geopolitical significance of Kashmir, Nepal and the northern frontier in general.

Nehru said that ‘India did not belong to any of the power blocs. India’s policy of non-alignment is a positive or dynamic neutralism, in which a country acts independently, and decides its position on each international issue on the merit of the case’.

The policy of non alignment, which has constituted the very foundation of India foreign policy to this day, is probably Nehru’s greatest contribution to international relations.

SINO INDIAN WAR 1962

India adopted a policy of friendship towards China from the very beginning. The Congress had been sympathetic to China’s struggle against imperialism and had sent a medical mission to China in the thirties as well as given a call for boycott of Japanese goods in protest against Japanese occupation of China. India was the first to recognize the new People’s Republic of China on January 1, 1950.  

Nehru had great hopes that the two countries with their common experience of suffering at the hands of colonial powers and common problems of poverty and underdevelopment would join hands to give Asia its due place in the world. Nehru pressed for representation of Communist China in the UN Security Council, did not support the US position in the Korean War, and tried his best to bring about a settlement in Korea. 

In 1950 when China occupied Tibet, India was unhappy that it had not been taken into confidence, but did not question China’s rights over Tibet since at many times in Chinese history Tibet had been subjugated by China. 

In 1954, India and China signed a treaty in which India recognized China’s rights over Tibet and the two countries agreed to be governed in their mutual relations by the principles of Panch Sheel. Differences over border delineation were discussed at the time but China maintained that it had not yet studied the old Kuomintang maps and these could be sorted out later.

Relations continued to be close and Nehru went to great lengths to project China and Chou-en-Lai at the Bandung Conference. 

In 1959, however, there was a big revolt in Tibet and the Dalai Lama fled Tibet along with thousands of refugees. He was given asylum in India but not allowed to set up a government in exile and dissuaded from carrying on political activities. Nevertheless, the Chinese were unhappy. Soon after, in October 1959, Chinese opened fire on an Indian patrol near the Kongka Pass in Ladakh, killing five Indian policemen and capturing a dozen others. Letters were exchanged between the two governments, but a common ground did not emerge. Then Chou-en-Lai was invited for talks to Delhi in April 1960, but not much headway could be made and it was decided to let officials sort out the details first.

On September 8, 1962, Chinese forces attacked the Thagla ridge and dislodged Indian troops, but this was taken as a minor incident. Nehru went off to London for a conference and after returning home once again left for Colombo on October 12. 

A week later, the Chinese army launched a massive attack and over ran Indian posts in the eastern sector in NEFA or what was later Arunachal Pradesh. The Indian army commander in NEFA fled without any effort at resistance leaving the door wide open for China to walk in. In the western sector, on October 20, thirteen forward posts were captured by the Chinese in the Galwan Valley and the Chushul airstrip threatened. There was a great outcry in the country and a feeling of panic about Chinese intentions. It was thought that the Chinese would come rushing in to the plains and occupy Assam and perhaps other parts as well. Nehru wrote two letters to President Kennedy on November 9, describing the situation as ‘really desperate’ and asking for wide-ranging military help. He also sought Britain’s assistance. 

Twenty-four hours later, the Chinese declared a unilateral withdrawal and as unpredictably as it had appeared, the Chinese dragon disappeared from sight, leaving behind a heart-broken friend and a confused and disoriented people.

Despite the strong memories of the short border war in 1962, India has sought, largely successfully in recent years, to develop relations with China on a friendly and pragmatic basis. Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s visit to Beijing in 1986 brought about the first thaw in the cold relations between the two countries for over two decades. 

Positive progress was made in Sino-Indian relations in resolving the decades-old boundary disputes between the two nations. China and India tacitly recognized each other’s respective sovereignty over Tibet and Sikkim and appointed representative to explore solutions to their border dispute. 

The opening of the Nathu-La pass in 2007, for direct trade between India and China was a positive step in this direction. 

MAO'S GREAT LEAP FORWARD

The Great Leap Forward was the name given to China's Second Five Year Plan.

Launched in 1958, the Great Leap Forward was a campaign to accelerate China's economic development. It was based on Mao's firm belief that human will power and effort could overcome all obstacles.

Thus, the government tried to speed development by greatly increasing the number of workers an their hours while ignoring China's lack of capital and modern technology.

The government combined the agricultural cooperatives into huge communes to improve the efficiency of the farm workers.

In industry, labourers worked extra shifts. Machinery was operated continuously, without being stopped even for maintenance.

The Great Leap Forward shattered China's economy. From 1959 to 1961, China experienced economic depression, food shortages and a decline in industrial output.

By 1962, the economy began to recover. However, the Chinese had not solved the problem of achieving economic growth while maintaining revolutionary values. Disagreement over this issue began to produce a major split within the Communist Party between the Radicals and the Moderates.

The Radicals called for China to strive for a classless society in which everyone would work selflessly for the common good.

The Moderates stressed the importance of economic development. They believed that the policies of the Radicals were unrealistic and hampered the modernization of China.

THE PARTITION OF INDIA - REFUGEE PROBLEM

The negotiations between the Congress and the Muslim League, stumbled over the issue of the partition.

Jinnah proclaimed 16 August 1946, Direct Action Day, with the stated goal of highlighting, peacefully, the demand for a Muslim homeland in British India.  

However, on the morning of the 16th armed Muslim gangs gathered in Calcutta and attacked Hindus with the demand for Pakistan, This was later called the "Great Calcutta Killing of August 1946". 

The next day, Hindus struck back and the violence continued for three days in which approximately 4,000 people died (according to official accounts), Hindus and Muslims in equal numbers. 

Although India had had outbreaks of religious violence between Hindus and Muslims before, the Calcutta killings was the first to display elements of "ethnic cleansing," in modern times. 

Violence was not confined to the public sphere, but homes were entered, destroyed, and women and children attacked. Although the Government of India and the Congress were both shaken by the course of events, in September, a Congress-led interim government was installed, with Jawaharlal Nehru as united India's prime minister.

The communal violence spread to Bihar (where Muslims were attacked by Hindus), to Noakhali in Bengal (where Hindus were targeted by Muslims), and other parts of the country.

Late in 1946, the Labour government in Britain, bankrupt due to the recently concluded World War II, decided to end British rule of India, and in early 1947 Britain announced its intention of transferring power no later than June 1948.

However, with the British army unprepared for the potential of increased violence, the new viceroy, Louis Mountbatten, advanced the date for the transfer of power, allowing less than six months for a mutually agreed plan for independence.

In June 1947, the nationalist leaders, including Nehru and Abul Kalam Azad on behalf of the Congress, Jinnah representing the Muslim League, B. R. Ambedkar representing the  Untouchable  community, and Master Tara Singh representing the Sikhs, agreed to a partition of the country along religious lines in total opposition to Gandhi's views.

The predominantly Hindu and Sikh areas were assigned to the new India and predominantly Muslim areas to the new nation of Pakistan; the plan included a partition of the Muslim-majority provinces of Punjab and Bengal. The communal violence that accompanied the announcement of the Radcliffe Line, the line of partition, was even more horrific.

On 14 August 1947, the new Dominion of Pakistan came into being, with Muhammad Ali Jinnah sworn in as its first Governor General in Karachi. 

The following day, 15 August 1947, India became an independent country with Jawaharlal Nehru assuming the office of the Prime Minister.

Massive population exchanges occurred between the two newly formed states in the months immediately following Partition. Once the lines were established, about 14.5 million people crossed the borders to what they hoped was the relative safety of religious majority.

Resettlement of refugees in India: 1947–1957

Many Sikhs and Hindu Punjabis fled Western Punjab and settled in the Indian parts of Punjab and Delhi. Hindus fleeing from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) settled across Eastern and Northeastern India, many ending up in neighboring Indian states such as West Bengal , Assam, and Tripura. Some migrants were sent to the Andaman Islands where Bengalis today form the largest linguistic group.

Delhi received the largest number of refugees for a single city – the population of Delhi grew rapidly in 1947.  The refugees were housed in various historical and military locations. The camp sites were later converted into permanent housing through extensive building projects undertaken by the Government of India from 1948 onwards. A number of housing colonies in Delhi came up around this period. A number of schemes such as  the provision of education, employment opportunities, and easy loans to start businesses were provided for the refugees at the all-India level.

Resettlement of refugees in Pakistan: 1947–1957

In the aftermath of partition, a huge population exchange occurred between the two newly formed states. Most of those migrants who settled in Punjab, Pakistan came from the neighbouring Indian regions ofPunjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh  while others were from Jammu and Kashmir and Rajasthan. On the other hand, most of those migrants who arrived in Sindh were primarily of Urdu-speaking background and came from the northern and central urban centres of India, such as Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Rajasthan via the Wahgah and Munabao borders.

Later in 1950s, the majority of Urdu speaking refugees who migrated after the independence were settled in the port city of Karachi in southern Sindh and in the metropolitan cities of Hyderabad, Sukkur, Nawabshah and Mirpurkhas. In addition, some Urdu-speakers settled in the cities of Punjab, mainly in Lahore, Multan, Bahawalpur and Rawalpindi.

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Rehabilitation of women

Both sides promised each other that they would try to restore women abducted during the riots. The Indian government claimed that 33,000 Hindu and Sikh women were abducted, and the Pakistani government claimed that 50,000 Muslim women were abducted during riots. By 1949, there were governmental claims that 12,000 women had been recovered in India and 6,000 in Pakistan. (By 1954 there were 20,728 recovered Muslim women and 9,032 Hindu and Sikh women recovered from Pakistan.) Most of the Hindu and Sikh women refused to go back to India fearing that they would never be accepted by their family; similarly, the families of some Muslim women refused to take back their relatives.

Perspectives

The Partition was a highly controversial arrangement, and remains a cause of much tension on the Indian subcontinent today. The two nations were granted their independence even before there was a defined boundary between them. There was a complete breakdown of law and order; many died in riots, massacre, or just from the hardships of their flight to safety. What ensued was one of the largest population movements in recorded history.

A cross border student initiative, ‘The History Project’ was launched in 2014 in order to explore the differences in perception of the events during the British era which lead to the partition. The project resulted in a book that explains both interpretations of the shared history in Pakistan and India.

Artistic depictions of the Partition

The partition of India and the associated bloody riots inspired many creative minds in India and Pakistan to create literary/cinematic depictions of this event. While some creations depicted the massacres during the refugee migration, others concentrated on the aftermath of the partition in terms of difficulties faced by the refugees in both side of the border.

Even now, works of fiction and films are made that relate to the events of partition.

Literature described the human cost of independence and partition. For e.g.

-          Bal K. Gupta's memoirs ‘Forgotten Atrocities(2012)’

-           Khushwant Singh's ‘Train to Pakistan’ (1956),

-          several short stories such as ‘Toba Tek Singh’ (1955) by Saadat Hassan Manto, 

-          Urdu poems such as ‘Subh-e-Azadi’ (Freedom's Dawn, 1947) by Faiz Ahmad Faiz, 

-          Bhisham Sahni's ‘Tamas’ (1974)

-          Salman Rushdie's novel ‘Midnight's Children’ (1980), which won the Booker Prize and the Booker of Bookers, weaved its narrative based on the children born with magical abilities on midnight of 14 August 1947.

-          ‘Freedom at Midnight’ (1975) is a non-fiction work by Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre 

Films:

-          Nemai Ghosh's ‘Chinnamul’ (Bengali) (1950)

-           Dharmputra (1961,

-            Lahore (1948)

-          Komal Gandhar (Bengali) (1961)

-           Tamas (1987).  

-           Train to Pakistan (1998) (based on the book), 

-          Hey Ram (2000), 

-          Gadar: Ek Prem  Katha  (2001),  

-          Pinjar (2003),  

-          Partition (2007)

 The biographical films Gandhi (1982), Jinnah (1998) and Sardar (1993) also feature independence and partition as significant events in their screenplay.

A Pakistani drama ‘Daastan’, based on the novel Bano, also tells the tale of young Muslim girl during partition.

The 2013 Google India advertisement ‘Reunion’ (about the Partition of India) has had a strong impact in both India and Pakistan, leading to hope for the easing of travel restrictions between the two countries. It went viral and was viewed more than 1.6 million times before officially debuting on television on 15 November 2013.