A few days back
there was this interesting tweet.
Like many other tweets, this would fall in the categories of interactive tweets
while evoking a sense of nostalgia. The composer of the tweet indicated the
fall of Berlin Wall was her first political memory and invited the Twitterati
to share their earliest political memories. Like similar interactive tweets,
Twitter was full of tweets each pointing towards their earliest memories. Till date
it had earned around 9000 retweets with comments with more than 18000 replies. This
would not obviously include those who have replied to the retweets or commented
on retweets or commented on replies while retweeting. To each one, obviously
there is journey back in times when they were young just understanding
politics. Certain early memories do have potential shaping of their political
leanings and beliefs. On certain occasions, it might be a sort of baptism by
fire so as to speak.
The blog posts
have usually avoided personal references and worked their way through an analytical
perspective. Yet, this post indicates to be of a different nature and seeks to
describe those earliest political memories. There is of course a tweet
that does indicate about the earliest memories. But Twitter by its very nature
limits the ability to express and elaborate. It is more akin to précis writing
as compared to an essay. Therefore this post will build on the tweet in taking
the journey back to those days of the earliest memories involving political
happenings.
As indicated in
the tweet, the earliest memory could back to the election campaign of Lok Sabha elections of 1980. There
was no knowledge that it was LS elections and there is something called
Parliament or Legislative Assembly but what was enjoyed was the campaign and
knowing the party symbols. Those days election campaigns were in a different
league altogether with lot of banners all over the place. The pamphlets being
distributed would seem infinite number of pamphlets would exist. There would
constant auto-rickshaw campaigns which kept every other boy and girl in the neighbourhood
busy following them. Lot of loudspeaker announcements existed. There would be
numerous visits by the party candidates and their supporters to the houses. The
door-to door campaign was yet another local tamasha for the young. Finally, it
was accompanying the parents to the voting booth which happened to be school
one studied. Once the results came in, there would be discussion among the
elders in the society on the merits or demerits which the young children
understood. There are some faint memories of the death of Sanjay Gandhi and VV
Giri on successive days thanks to school being declared a holiday.
Post that, there
was the Gokak agitation on implementation of Kannada in the state. Some faint
memories of the processions linger on. There were turbulent times with the
farmer agitation spreading across the state. The agitation began with police
firing in Nargund and Navalgund in Northern Karnataka ( had no knowledge of the
firing or the reason for the agitation), but hometown Hubli being closest to
these towns had to bear the brunt of the agitation. There was curfew imposed
with schools being declared off for many days. Presumably it took nearly a
month before things returned to normal.
There were
elections in some state assemblies like West Bengal or Kerala which talk of
some memories of those results. Communist had returned to power in Bengal. An
ex-Chief Minister of Karnataka, Devaraj Urs passed away and guess the next day
saw the death of Sheikh Abdullah. There are some memories of the news of his
son Farooq assuming Chief Ministership of the State of Jammu and Kashmir. In
1982, there was further, the election to the President of India. One came to
know that Neelam Sanjiva Reddy completed his term and was succeeded by Giani
Zail Singh. It also was known that Zail Singh defeated the opposition candidate
HR Khanna, even though one had no idea who HR Khanna was.
The first clear
political memory would be the Vidhan Sabha elections in Karnataka in January
1983. One managed to get a glimpse of the campaign not only in the home city
Hubli but coastal Karnataka while on religious pilgrimage. It was the time when
one heard of leaders in the state like CM Gundu Rao, Janata leaders like SR
Bommai (contesting from Hubli Rural, our home constituency). or the national
level leaders like Chandrashekhar, Charan Singh, Atal Behari Vajpayee, Lal
Krishna Advani among others. It was time to know about the political parties
like Congress(I), Janata Party, Bharatiya Janata Party, Lok Dal, Communist
Party etc. It was also the time when one got familiarized with the political
party symbols. The results came during the pilgrimage tour. It was the news of
Congress defeat. The Chief Minister Gundu Rao lost in Somwarpet to Jeevijaya. There
was talk of the Janata Government being formed. There was news being floated
around that SR Bommai would become the Chief Minister. It was however Ramakrishna
Hegde who became the Chief Minister. As his Cabinet was sworn in, one got to
about Ministers system and the portfolio allocation. Among the new ministers sworn
in, the names of SR Bommai, HD Deve Gowda, JH Patel, PGR Scindia, MP Prakash, Abdul Nazir Sab, Chandraprabha
Urs still come to the mind. There was also the news of DB Chandre Gowda being
the speaker of the VS thus understanding the role of the Speaker. Besides one
came to know about the 224 constituencies in the state. One understood about
the Marathi-Kannada divisions in Belgaum and its electoral impact. One
understood the hold of the BJP in the other Hubli constituency.
There were
assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh too which saw a sweep by NT Rama Rao. It created
a buzz. Tripura too had voted though hardly anyone discussed about the results
there. Moreover, the newspapers like the Hindu carried in depth the election
results. It therefore was a wondrous occasion to learn to read about the votes
cast, the votes invalid, votes polled by the winner, votes polled by other
candidates, the party positions, the margins, constituency names among others. It
was interesting imitation into understanding of electoral politics.
When one looks
back at politics all these years having viewed many elections and analysed them
deep, the memories of the 1983 elections along with the results are perhaps the
best. Maybe it was the first time one observed the elections carefully having
developed some degree of understanding. The 1984 Lok Sabha elections too have
equally wonderful memories being the first Lok Sabha elections followed with some
cursory understanding of politics. It might appear knowledge was cursory today
but scary that one knew those things at a young age those days.
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