Dr Shashi Tharoor, MP for Thiruvananthapuram, said in an article in Indian magazine Print that moving around in Malaysia, he was reminded of 1977, when the invincible Congress Party, after ruling India uninterruptedly for 30 years, was ousted at the polls.
“There is the same heady atmosphere all around, the same giddy exuberance at the dramatically transformed political reality, the same sense that, now that this election result has happened, anything is possible.
“People spoke back then of a ‘Second Independence Day’, a moment of national liberation; I heard the same words in Kuala Lumpur this week.”
Another similarity, Shashi said, was that in both nations people had felt that the parties that had won their nation’s independence from the colonial overlords had overstayed their welcome.
“In 1977 in India as in 2018 in Malaysia, former stalwarts of the ancient regime, now turned democratic insurgents, were hailed as reborn avatars come to make up for past sins: what Morarji Desai and Jagjivan Ram were in the India of 1977, Mahathir Mohamad and Anwar Ibrahim are in the Malaysia of 2018.”
Shashi said in India in 1977, it was impossible to find anyone prepared to say a good word for the defeated government and its tarnished leader and that the same talk of revenge was in the air in Malaysia, “again couched as justly deserved punishment for the leader’s sins”.
He said the differences were only of degree, giving as example the fact that the Congress party of India had been in power for 30 years whereas the Barisan Nasional had ruled for 60.
“Both had seemed invincible, permanently destined to reign. Morarji Desai was a former deputy prime minister, who had been out of national office for a decade; Mahathir was a former prime minister, out of power for 16 years. Jagjivan Ram’s was a last-minute defection, announced after the elections were called; Anwar had been ousted from the Cabinet 20 years earlier and been jailed for ten.
“The essence of the change was, however, the same: the people had revolted, they had found credible leaders to represent their hopes, and they had brought about dramatic and transformative change, peacefully, through the ballot-box.”
However, he said, the Indian experience did not turn out well for the victors.
“With the hated foe defeated, it took only two years for the contradictions within the victorious new Janata coalition to break it apart; in less than three, the vanquished party was back in office, the election of 1977 seen as an aberration. That’s not the movie script the winners in Malaysia want to hear.”
But, he said the challenges were similar, adding that the PKR, the party with the most seats in the victorious coalition only “had two Cabinet ministers”, which is wrong as PKR has three seats in the Cabinet.
Shashi said the plum portfolios had been allocated to others by Mahathir who had said he wanted to run the country for two years while Anwar waited in the wings to take over.
“Two years, as any Indian can tell him, is a long time in coalition politics.”
He noted that Malaysia had many things in common with India: a multi-religious, plural society, with some rising strains of intolerance; an empowered elite, with a cosmopolitan sensibility and a global outlook, seeking to transform a society still largely rural and traditional; a democratic system that, for all its flaws and manipulability, largely works.
Shashi said he met with Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and Anwar Ibrahim, whom he had known from his days in the United Nations. Shashi had served the UN as an administrator and peacekeeper for three decades.
“Both are aware of the challenges confronting them; both are determined to overcome the inevitable problems and make the future work.
“I was amazed to see how ten years of jail has failed to break Anwar’s spirit, how he radiates calmness and patience along with a lively energy, and how he seems prepared for the long haul. To launch into a punishing schedule, receiving visitors from around the country and the world, so soon after his release, and to do so in a relaxed and good-natured way, speaks volumes for the man and his self-belief.
“His associates, partners and coalition allies have not always been fair or kind to him in the past. Yet he knows that this is a time to forget old wounds, not dwell on them. He realises how easily division can lead to defeat again: the lessons of 1977 are not lost on him. He can only hope they will be learned by his allies as well.”