This talk was delivered at the annual History for Peace conference on 'The Idea of Belonging' in Calcutta, 2024.

This paper explores the engagements of political parties and people with India's Constitution during the 2024 General Elections, and also during the equal citizenship protests in 2019-20 against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), 2019. It seeks to throw light on the significance of people’s interactions with the Constitution and its effect on creating a sense of belonging and on democratic renewal and during these moments.

There’s a widespread assumption that constitutional politics is an elite idea and the idea of India embedded in the Constitution is an elite construct too. It is often argued that these ideas including democracy comes from the privilege of those who could read the Constitution, and not the unlettered. However, the invocation of the Constitution in the anti-CAA or equal citizenship protests in 2019-20 and in the recently concluded 2024 Lok Sabha election suggests that people do not consider it an elite idea, they relate to it as a people’s Constitution and have used the power of the vote to embrace the Constitution, to save democracy, rights and reservation. To them, the Constitution offers a moral compass as well as the institutional framework to create an egalitarian society. This is reflected in the remarkable verdict of this election.

The Constitution of India played a pivotal role in the 2024 election. While the scale of mobilization around the Constitution in this election was remarkable, it builds on a long history of mobilization by many groups around the Constitution and the sense of belonging it gives citizens, most notably during the protests against the CAA.

Equal Citizenship Protests in 2019-20

The Constitution first made its appearance in public view back in December 2019 emerging at the focal point of the protests against the government’s decision to amend the Citizenship Act and its plans for a nationwide National Registration of Citizens (NRC).^[1] The new law seeks to fast-track citizenship to non-Muslim minorities in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh on grounds of religious persecution. It does so by creating an exemption from the ‘illegal migrants’ category for Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians, but does not offer the same exemption to Muslim refugees and immigrants.^[2] The choice of communities was justified as a ‘reasonable classification’ granted by the Constitution.^[3] The plea to include Muslims was rejected on grounds that the persecution of Muslim sects is ‘intra-religious’ whereas the CAA recognizes only ‘inter-religious’ persecution.^[4] It was justified on grounds that they were not minorities in the neighbouring countries and therefore, the possibility of injustice to them was diminished whereas others face persecution, because those countries are governed by an official state religion.^[5]

Citizenship provisions in independent India avoided any communal or religious identification adopting a birth-based rather than descent-based model.^[6] This was contrary to the Indian Constitution which adopted a universal, religion-neutral idea of citizenship.^[7] By introducing a clear separation of categories and groups and by privileging some groups for favourable treatment, the CAA contravenes the guarantee of equal treatment set out in Articles 14 and 21.^[8] 

The new law rapidly occupied the centre stage of Indian politics. It provoked major protests which highlighted the unconstitutionality of the new law and the discrimination inherent in it. Protests erupted across India drawing people from over a hundred cities and towns, galvanizing thousands into an unparalleled display of opposition to the CAA. This campaign against the CAA should be viewed in the larger political context of policy changes driven by majoritarian politics. While the CAA appeared to be the proximate cause of the protests, it came on the heels of several moves by the government to further its political agenda. It was the culmination of a series of steps taken to centralize and concentrate power, strengthen the executive, weaken public institutions, and delegitimize dissent as anti-national. Furthermore, the CAA was not a standalone law but had to be viewed in conjunction with a proposed NRC and National Population Register (NPR), which, in combination, would impose an extremely complicated religious test for citizenship, laden with bureaucratic documentation hurdles which would become a tool for discrimination.^[9] Justice A.P. Shah, former chief justice of the Madras and Delhi High Courts, has noted that ‘the combination of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, the National Population Register, and the National Register of Citizens is designed to deprive Muslims of equal rights under Indian law and in Indian society.’^[10]

This movement introduced a new idiom of protest, choosing secular civic symbols—the national anthem, the tri-colour, and reading the Preamble to the Constitution—over religious identity markers, to assert rights enshrined in the Constitution.^[11] Constitution was looming large in these protests, it served as the key instrument to advance the claims of equal citizenship. Most movement sites saw collective readings of the Preamble.^[12] It was photocopied and displayed everywhere. Reading the Preamble brought the Constitution right into the streets with an emphasis on words such as secular, democratic, socialist, justice, liberty and equality. Thanks to this, the Constitution travelled from parliament and courts to the streets and public places. ‘Save the Constitution’ slogans outnumbered all others as men and women came onto the streets to lay claim to it.^[13] It was held up as the only document of consequence. As people defended the Constitution, they reclaimed national space and reiterated their belonging as equal citizens.

From Uttar Pradesh (UP) in the north to Tamil Nadu in the south and West Bengal in the east to Maharashtra in the west, from Delhi to the streets of Cochin, Lucknow and Mumbai, people fell back on the Constitution and held the government accountable to it.^[14] It thus became a social movement which highlighted its relevance for every citizen. The most riveting aspect of this campaign was the way in which constitutionalism was reclaimed and reasserted by ordinary citizens. This represented a new form of politics with the Constitution itself becoming the chief instrument in the bid to assert equal citizenship.^[15] At the same time, the Preamble’s declarations were held up as a mirror against which laws and other provisions would be judged.^[16]

Legal scholar Rohit De points out that numerous subaltern groups claim the Constitution as their own and have organized movements to demand Constitutional rights. However, as De notes, most popular interest in the Constitution has focused on particular aspects and clauses.^[17] The engagement during the equal citizenship movement was much wider as ordinary citizens laid claim to it.^[18] This time the posters, banners, and slogans loudly proclaimed the message that there is no democracy and no nation-state without the Constitution. Political philosopher Akeel Bilgrami captured it well when he wrote:

They [the protesters] are without any theoretical vanguard fashioning through their struggles a theoretical framework that brings together practices and abstractions; and thereby instructing us into the habits and dispositions of democracy, which the Constitution’s abstractly formulated laws and principles always had as their deeper underlying historical source and which were always formulated with a view to producing a cultivation and enactment of these habits and dispositions in the citizens of the future to whom they applied.^[19]

 

Save the Constitution Narrative in the 2024 Elections

Once in the public eye, the Constitution has since refused to leave. It made a re-entry in 2024 general elections. The election campaign was launched in January with the spectacular consecration of the newly built Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, constructed on the site of the Babri Mosque which was demolished in 1992. It was the longest election ever, seven phases extending over 44 days. It was fought against the backdrop of growing Hindu nationalism and deepening authoritarianism and the ruling party’s stranglehold over money, media and capture or subversion of nearly every significant institution in India. The election campaign was preceded by revelations such as big business purchase of anonymous electoral bonds most of which were donated to the ruling party. The Supreme Court decision declaring the electoral bonds scheme unconstitutional has robbed the BJP of what remained of its image of a corruption-free government. In a far harder fought election than expected, the opposition, headed by the Congress-led Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA), fought back for a more equal India. It found new energy in the weeks immediately preceding voting after the government targeted the opposition with arrests and freezing bank accounts.^[20] 

The election was a battle between two political narratives and two ideas of India arguing sharply for or against equating democracy with majoritarianism. ‘Save Democracy’ rally organized by Opposition parties in Ramlila Maidan in Delhi on March 31 was a political precursor, providing an opportunity for the Opposition to articulate its narrative. Unease with institutional decline, adherence to the Constitution and emphasis on social harmony were three key elements of this narrative.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had set the stage for this contestation by his claims over the BJP’s landslide victory. ‘This time, over 400 —Ab ki baar, 400 paar’ The BJP’s electoral bloc, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), was supposed to surpass 400 seats and the BJP itself to win 370, a two-thirds supermajority. At least four BJP leaders asked voters to re-elect the party with an overwhelming majority so that it can make changes to the Constitution.^[21] These include Ananth Kumar Hegde’s statement in March 2024 followed by statements by Lallu Singh, Kirori Lal Meena, Jyoti Mirdha and Arun Govil.

Many voters believed that the BJP had made ‘400 paar’ its goal so that it could amend the Constitution, modifying the formally guaranteed quota of reservations in government jobs and education. Those who had been to the field noted that this election was being fought on the issue of saving the Constitution. In May 2024, a visiting Brahmin Pandit in Jajpur village of Sitapur district who had come with his daughter sitting for the NEET exam told a group of reporters gathered around a tea stall not to talk to ‘these’ people as they speak ill about the BJP government despite enjoying free ration and amenities.[22] After a long silence a dissenting Dalit Pasi youth commented, ‘True, last time he came to distribute Ram Mandir invitations. Now he is here for his daughter’s exam. Let the paper get leaked, then he would know for once and always why we speak ill of the government.’[23] Later he told the reporter that he has been a victim of the paper leak twice and works at a computer shop in the nearby market. A few days later NEET paper was leaked. He told the reporter, ‘This government wants us to keep begging for five-kilogram ration. That is why it deliberately leaks exam papers. So that no one gets the job and the government gets bailed out of the obligation of giving reservations. The paper leak is directly linked with the BJP’s intent of ending the reservation guaranteed by the Constitution.’[24] This conversation is representative of the shifting political paradigm in UP, the citadel of Hindutva since 2014.

This author visited Lucknow at the end of April to get a sense of the elections. Talking to people the narrative revolved around paper leaks in UP and threats to the Constitution. A major takeaway for anyone interested in decoding the reasons behind the uproar over Save the Constitution was paper leaks.[25] Paper leaks, unemployment and the cancellation of jobs due to paper leaks figured prominently in interviews. ‘Paper leak was deliberate to avoid reservation and promote privatization’ was a common refrain in interviews with people from different walks of life.[26] The message was clear––the government doesn’t want to give jobs because it doesn’t want to implement reservations.[27] These comments were an indication of popular resistance against discrimination. This made space for the Constitution to emerge as an overarching issue of the elections of 2024.

 

Opposition Landed a Punch

The opposition landed an early punch by using the BJP’s own campaign slogan of 400 paar to argue that they want to change the Constitution and abolish the existing reservation system. While the BJP was unaware of the groundswell building up on the Constitution, the INDIA bloc went on the offensive, presenting it as a major question in the election. The Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Congress declared the Lok Sabha elections as a contest between the ‘rakshak’ (protectors) of the Constitution and its ‘bhakshak’ (predator). Akhilesh Yadav termed it a ‘life-giver’ and said as long as the Constitution remains safe, ‘our honour, self-respect and rights will remain safe.’ In Domariyaganj in eastern UP, he said: If the BJP wins the election, it will change the Constitution. And if they change the Constitution, your rights and my rights will be snatched. All the respect we get will also be taken away. They will also seize our right to vote.^[28] 

Rahul Gandhi’s two Yatras, the Bharat Jodo Yatra (BJY) in autumn and winter 2022-2023 and the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra (BJNY) in winter 2024, highlighted the significance of the Constitution. These long marches through the length and breadth of India brought pressing issues such as economic inequalities, price rise, unemployment, social injustice and subversion of the Constitution to the fore, creating a distinct narrative of inclusiveness. The yatras were pitched as a journey to save democracy and the Constitution. The Constitution made its appearance again as the climax in Rahul Gandhi’s BJNY. He ended the Yatra in Mumbai by reading the Preamble. Rahul travelled with his copy of the Constitution, across the country, taking it to most election rallies that he addressed waving a copy of it everywhere.

Civil Society Campaign

The network of non-government organizations and civil society was an important player behind the scenes in this political process. It had started talking about the Constitution proactively after 2019 elections. Civil society was put off with the government which had encroached on civic space by criminalizing dissent and imposing bans on foreign funding to close down NGOs. Many of these groups actively joined the election process to prevent the regime from further impinging on civil liberties and overturning the foundational underpinnings of India’s secular and inclusive polity guaranteed by the Constitution

The social ground was created by many different movements of the last five years, notably the anti-CAA movement, the farmers’ struggle and struggles of groups such as students, minorities and women, which gave voice to a simmering anger building up against the right-wing regime.^[29] The political ground was prepared by the Eddelu Karnataka (Wake Up Karnataka) and Bahutva Karnataka (Pluralistic Karnataka) campaigns, a consortium of local civil society groups in Telangana, and issue-based social movements (e.g. Right to Food, Right to Information) in Rajasthan and beyond.^[30]

Post-2014, things changed fundamentally with regard to rights. Earlier, constitutionally guaranteed rights were aligned with ethical and moral considerations. Post-2014 majoritarian politics made rights-based regime almost redundant by turning it into a battle of identities and binaries. The idea of rights-based development as a way forward for a more humane society was sidelined as this government emphasized the need to prioritize duties over rights.^[31] The realignment of rights and duties is not just about giving greater attention to duties; it is about giving less importance to rights.^[32] It goes against the egalitarian ethic of the Constitution.^[33] Even so the pursuit of rights was considered unnecessary.

Various civil society groups worked with political parties to highlight people’s concerns within the constitutional framework. Many of these groups had no formal party affiliation but made voters aware of the failures of the BJP government in states and the Centre by disseminating material through traditional as well as social media. Their activities spanned organizing events, mobilizing public opinion, actively interacting with parties and submitting concerns of citizens to them during the elections. They established a model of civil society intervention which crossed borders encouraging progressive individuals and organizations in other states to similarly intervene in the democratic processes. They all shared a common concern that the 2024 election was the most consequential for the future of India’s democracy as vast swathes of civil society opposed to ethnic nationalism and majoritarianism presented a unified front.

Shifting Political Paradigm

As the Constitution emerged as an antidote to majoritarian politics, reservations for Muslims story was invented by the BJP to attack the Opposition and the Congress in particular. It picked on the Congress slogan of jitni abadi, utna haq, proportionate quotas for jobs and education, to allege that Congress will re-allot existing reservation provisions to Muslims. The Prime Minister claimed that if the Congress comes to power, it would snatch reservations away from Other Backward Classes (OBCs), Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) and give them to Muslims with a mangalsutra as bonus. The 2006 statement by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh emphasizing that minorities, particularly Muslims, should have the first claim on resources to help uplift their socio-economic status, was quoted out of context distorting its original intent to uplift marginalized communities.

Opposition fortunes were boosted by the support of Dalits, who favoured its agenda of social justice and protection of the Constitution, as well as Muslims who gravitated en bloc to the Congress and its alliance partner. In reserved constituencies the BJP’s tally was reduced from 77 (out of a total of 131) in 2019 to 55. This was true of non-dominant OBCs as well. The increased hold over this segment of the vote was a major reason for BJP’s electoral success since 2014. From 17 per cent of the OBC vote in 2009, it managed to go up to securing nearly 47 per cent of the OBC vote share in 2019.^[34] However, cracks appeared in this coalition largely because of fears that the BJP-led NDA would change the Constitution to end reservations. These fears were dismissed as absurd but it resonated with voters, especially Dalits who feared that reservations would be diluted if the BJP gets 400 seats.

Election Outcome

BJP’s expansionist ride has stumbled in the 2024 polls. This election was fought against the backdrop of growing Hindu nationalism and deepening authoritarianism and the ruling party’s stranglehold over money, media and capture or subversion of nearly every institution in India. It still fell short of an absolute majority. It had hoped for a landslide victory in the 2024 elections, but won 240 seats, well under the halfway mark of 272 and needed coalition partners to form the government. The NDA has 293 MPs, not far above the majority mark of 272 in the 543-member Lok Sabha, while the Congress-led Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) has 234 seats.

The campaign to save the Constitution played an important role in shaping electoral outcome in several states. This narrative certainly cost the BJP a state like UP, where the BJP and its allies got fewer seats than the opposition INDIA bloc partners, Congress and the Samajwadi Party (SP), with the latter emerging as the biggest gainer.^[35] No other state exemplifies BJP’s disappointment more starkly than UP which had propelled it to power in the 2014 and 2019 elections, but voters there appeared to be pulling back their support. The BJP and the media assumed that the election was a done deal in UP after the Ram temple’s consecration in January, billed as the ultimate triumph of Hindutva. It turned out to be a damp squib with little electoral resonance on the ground. Far from gaining more votes or seats on the strength of the temple inauguration, its vote share in UP declined by eight percentage points. Narendra Modi won in his own constituency of Varanasi by a narrow margin of 1.5 lakh votes when the BJP was boasting of a victory by a record margin. Faizabad-Ayodhya where the Ram temple is located rejected the BJP in favour of a Samajwadi leader from the Dalit community in a non-reserved seat. SP’s battle cry, ‘Na Mathura, na Kashi, abki baar Awadhesh Pasi’ (Neither Mathura nor Kashi, this time Awadhesh Pasi) triumphed over the Ram temple move in Ayodhya and in several of the surrounding constituencies, much to the discomfiture of the saffron camp.

Post-elections, many BJP leaders admitted to the harm that Save-the-Constitution narrative did to the saffron party's electoral prospects. It united 26 opposition parties to form an alliance to counter the attacks on democracy and the Constitution, witnessed during the second term of the NDA government. This was reflected in the enactment of the CAA, the change in status of Jammu & Kashmir, attacks on individual freedoms and the massive rise in hate speech and persecution of Muslims—all this was in conflict with the fundamental values envisaged by the Constitution. This agenda was taken to its extreme when the new criminal laws were steamrollered through parliament without consultation or debate and after the suspension of over 140 MPs. In the circumstances, voters actively and affirmatively responded to the call to save the Constitution by voting against authoritarian manoeuvres.

The BJP’s narrow win is an indication of a course correction in Indian democracy. Indian voters have shown that when they see threats to democracy, they tend to place limits on leaders with autocratic tendencies, something they have done in this election. That may be the most important consequence of the 2024 election for the future of India’s democracy. 

The significance of the Constitution continued after the elections. The INDIA bloc leaders entered the Lok Sabha on the first day of the 18th Lok Sabha holding copies of the Constitution. They raised slogans such as ‘Long Live Constitution’, ‘We will save Constitution’, ‘Save our Democracy’. The Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi and other Opposition MPs waved copies of the Constitution when the Narendra Modi was being sworn in. The scene was repeated when home minister Amit Shah took oath.

The Prime Minister launched a frontal attack on the Congress and the Emergency in his speech on the motion of thanks to the president to counter the way the opposition leveraged the Constitution against the BJP in the elections. He called the Congress the biggest opponent of the Constitution and accused it of running a ‘fake narrative’ to mislead the public. He claimed that the recent elections were not fought on the issue of ‘protecting the Constitution’. According to him, Indians voted on this plank only once when they threw out the Indira Gandhi government in 1977 after the Emergency. He listed the excesses of the Emergency, including arrests of political activists and suspension of civil liberties. The Emergency was undoubtedly a ‘direct and frontal attack’ on the Constitution. The Congress was punished for it in the 1977 election by a coalition of parties which had come together with the sole objective of defeating the authoritarian excesses of the Emergency and restoring democracy. The Save-the-Constitution plank figured prominently in this election too, no matter what the BJP might say today.

After the elections, the NDA government tried to salvage its commitment to the Constitution by its decision to celebrate 75 years of the Constitution. This is in addition to the decision to observe 25 June, the day Indira Gandhi imposed the Emergency in 1975, as ‘Samvidhan Hatya Divas’ every year. Both these moves are an afterthought to counter the Opposition’s campaign during the election that BJP would change the Constitution.

The 2024 election reinforced the vitality of India’s democracy contrary to the democratic backsliding witnessed in the last few years. This election is important for revalorizing the Constitution, for a yearning for the defence of constitutional values and the significance of people’s issues as against identity politics. The Constitution needs to be revalorized and protected and promoted for the ideas and practice of social justice, but also in terms of the values of secularism, diversity, federalism, human rights, and intellectual freedom.

Notes and References

[1] This section ‘Equal Citizenship Protests in 2019-20’ is based on Zoya Hasan and Avishek Jha, When People Rise in Protest: Mobilizing for Equal Citizenship in India (New Delhi: Three Essays, 2024).

^[2] On citizenship, see Niraja Gopal Jayal, Citizenship and its Discontents: An Indian History (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 2013).

[3] The test of reasonable classification follows the State of West Bengal vs Anwar Ali Sarkar case in 1952. According to the Supreme Court, which was interpreting the scope of Article 14 in that case, ‘Article 14 does not insist that every piece of legislation must have universal application and it does not take away from the State the power to classify persons for the purposes of legislation, but the classification must be rational, and in order to satisfy this test, (i) the classification must be founded on an intelligible differentia which distinguished those that are grouped together from others, and (ii) that differentia must have a rational relation to the object sought to be achieved by the Act.’

[4] On reasonable classification, see Faizan Mustafa, ‘Citizenship Law Fails Three Tests of Classification: Faizan Mustafa, VC, Nalsar University of Law’, Economic Times (15 December 2019).

[5] The Home Minister based his arguments in parliament on news reports as evidence of religious persecution against Hindus in Pakistan, ranging from forced conversion to demolition of temples. While Shah claimed that persecution has been rampant in Bangladesh since the death of Sheikh Mujibur Rehman, Bangladesh’s Foreign Affairs Minister A. K. Abdul Momen has denied any religious persecution.

[6] Suhrith Parthasarathy, ‘Why the CAA Violates the Constitution’, India Forum (17 January 2020); Gautam Bhatia, ‘Citizenship and the Constitution’, SSRN (accessed 22 September 2020) (available at: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID3565551_code2212312.pdf?abstractid=3565551&mirid=1).

^[7] Apurva Vishwanath and Kabir Firaque, ‘Explained: What is Citizenship Amendment Act’, Indian Express (25 December 2019).

^[8] Suhrith Parthasarathy, ‘Why the CAA Violates the Constitution’, India Forum (17 January 2020) (accessed 15 December 2021) (available at: https://www.theindiaforum.in/article/why-caa-violates-constitution).

[9]Aruna Natrajan, ‘Explained: Should you read the CAA in conjunction with the proposed NRC?’ Citizen Matters (17 December 2019) (available at: https://citizenmatters.in/faq-on-citizenship-amendment-act-and-nrc-connection-14928).

[10]‘CAA, NRC, NPR designed to deprive Muslims of equal rights: Justice Shah’, Asiaville (28 January 2020) (accessed 16 December 2021) (available at https://www.asiaville.in/article/public-panel-discusses-caa-nrc-npr-29693). 

[11] Ibid.

[12] Tom Ginsburg and Aziz Z. Huq, How to Save a Constitutional Democracy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2019).

[13] Charmy Harikrishnan, ‘Anti-CAA protests: People hold up Constitution as the only document that matters’, Economic Times (26 January 2020).

[14] Mantasha Ansari, ‘The Preamble of the Constitution Becomes a Social Movement’, The India Forum (6 March 2020) (accessed 16 December 2021) (available at: https://www.theindiaforum.in/letters/preamble-Constitution-becomes-social-movement.).

[15] Gautam Bhatia quoted in Mantasha Ansari, ‘The Preamble of the Constitution Becomes a Social Movement’. Ibid.

[16] Ibid.

[17] Rohit De and Surabhi Ranganathan, ‘We Are Witnessing a Rediscovery of India’s Republic’, New York Times (27 December 2019) (accessed 27 September 2021) (available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/27/opinion/india-Constitution-protests.html).

^[18]Aakar Patel, ‘First Mass Movement in defence of the Constitution’, National Herald (19 January 2020).

^[19]Akeel Bilgrami, ‘Two Historic Deeds: The Common Muslim has done what Gandhi, Nehru, Ambedkar or Azad Couldn’t’, Outlook (17 February 2020).

[20] The Hindu Bureau, ‘I-T department freezes Congress bank accounts over 2018-19 returns; appellate tribunal provides partial relief’, The Hindu (6 February 2024) (accessed 17 July 2024) (available at: https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/bank-accounts-of-congress-youth-congress-frozen/article67852292.ece Accessed 17 July 2024.

^[21] For an account of the statements made by the ruling dispensation see The Wire Analysis, ‘What is Behind the Disappearance of Modi’s ‘400 paar’ Slogan? The Wire (26 April 2024) (accessed 12 July 2024) (available at: https://thewire.in/politics/behind-disappearance-of-modis-400-paar-slogan).

[22] Abhishek Srivastava, ‘How Lok Sabha Elections 2024 Became a Referendum on the Indian Constitution – I &II’, Lokmarg (26 May 2024) (accessed 23 July 2024) (available at: https://lokmarg.com/how-lok-sabha-elections-2024-became-a-referendum-on-indian-constitution-i/)

[23] Ibid.

[24] Ibid.

[25] Field trip to Lucknow 20-25 April 2024.

[26] Ibid.

[27] Ibid.

^[28] Akhilesh Yadav quoted in Omar Rashid, ‘Can “Save Constitution” Pitch Help SP Break BSP's Grip on Dalit Voters in UP?’ The Wire (23 May 2024) (accessed 14 July 2024) (available at: https://m.thewire.in/article/politics/can-save-Constitution-pitch-help-sp-break-bsps-grip-on-dalit-voters-in-up)

[29]Aditya Nigam, ‘Elections 2024 – After the euphoria, what next? Kafila (13 June 2024) (accessed 17 July 2024) (available at: Https://kafila.online/2024/06/13/elections-2024-after-the-euphoria-what-next/).

[30]Anisha Sheth, ‘How Karnataka’s civil society groups are taking on the Hindutva juggernaut’, News Minute (3 May 2024) (accessed 17 July 2024) (available at: https://www.thenewsminute.com/karnataka/how-karnatakas-civil-society-groups-are-taking-on-the-hindutva-juggernaut).

[31] S. Subramanian, ‘On Rights and Duties’, The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy (3 February 2022).

[32] Jammi Rao, ‘Is Modi right in saying too much emphasis on rights, not enough on duties?’ News Laundry (24 January 2022) (available at: https://www.newslaundry.com/2022/01/24/is-modi-right-in-saying-too-much-emphasis-on-rights-not-enough-on-duties).

[33] Garimella Subramanian, ‘Only a conversation can help evolve a common ethic: political theorist Rajeev Bhargava’, The Hindu (26 Jan 2023).

[34] Sanjay Kumar, ‘Verdict 2019: The expanded support base of the Bharatiya Janata Party’, Asian Journal of Comparative Politics 5(1) (2020): 6–22, https://doi.org/10.1177/2057891120907699.

[35] Sarthak Bagchi and Rama Shankar Singh, ‘On the Politics of the Nishad community’, The Hindu (16 July 2024).

Question and Answer Session

Audience Member 1: Thank you for your insightful presentation. In this changing political discourse, we have also noticed an important role played by the youth, voters between 18 and 21 and the civil society at large. How have political parties harnessed their support? Do you think their role swung the political outcome? How have civil society organizations influenced policy debates?

Zoya Hasan: To answer your first question, I think it was interesting because civil society played a more important part in this election than in other elections. Secondly, what made their participation more noticeable was that they were working in tandem with political parties. In the past, civil society organizations have mobilized and worked during elections but they have not worked with parties. This is perhaps because they did not want to join hands with any political party, particularly the Congress. However, after the Bharat Jodo Yatra, there was a connect between the civil society organizations and the INC. Although I have not done too much research in this area, during my field work on another project, I did notice that the Telangana Assembly Elections, then the Karnataka Assembly Elections, showed signs a connect that had not been felt before.

In the past, civil society organizations insisted they were non-party based. Many of these organizations were rights based, like Right to Food, Right to Employment etc. The UPA government with all its faults was responsible for introducing Right to Education, Right to Employment (which was so useful during the pandemic), Right to Information etc. However, now there has been a shift away from rights and focus on duties instead. The Prime Minister even wrote about this in an op-ed in The New York Times.

With regards to policy, most rights-based policy was influenced by civil society organizations. In this regime, there is perhaps a need to distinguish between the civil society organizations which have the favour of the government or are indirectly connected to the RSS and related organizations, and those that are not. Unfortunately, how the latter has been treated does not need further elaboration.

Audience Member 2: This is not a question but I wished to share some observations. You were telling us about how the anti-CAA movement brought together people from different walks of life. While I was pursuing my undergraduate in Pune I witnessed these protests in Pune and never before had I seen this scale of mobilization. Albeit I had lived in Pune for three to four years already, this was unprecedented. I am from Kolkata and public protests here are much more common, but I had not anticipated this in Pune and was pleasantly surprised. It was an electric atmosphere! A lot of people from our private college, so people from very privileged walks of life, were leaving their comforts to congregate and become part of the protest.

We got in touch with Lokayat, Pune, which has been doing grassroots-level mobilization since the ‘70s and even they were telling us that this scale of congregation to express discontent had hitherto never been witnessed in Pune. This was succeeded by many events, charitable fund raising for the underprivileged, food donation drives etc.

Kannan Gopinathan: Many a times we feel that something is sui generis, that is it happened spontaneously, when in reality, there was months of planning behind it. I was involved in many anti-CAA protests. And I wanted to pointed out that in many cities the protests were preceded by planning and committee formations months in advance, even prior to the Bill being tabled. We were having these conversations in October, in November across 30-40 cities and the protests really mobilized in December. In Pune, there were three meetings before the first protests happened. So, I just wanted to draw attention to the massive efforts that went into conducting something along these lines.

While we were in our planning efforts we found it very difficult to communicate with political parties––they had lost the 2019 elections and they were completely demoralized. They were not even ready to broach the subjects. And we tried many times, conducted meetings and met with party members but they were just not responsive to our efforts. Some support did come from left organization and then the National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM). There was a conference in Puri where the NAPM passed a resolution to oppose the CAA. So, NAPM played a crucial role and wherever they held a strong presence, civil society movements followed.

I also wanted to draw attention to our attempts to connect with Muslim organizations. They kept telling us, ‘It is easy for you to protest but we cannot protest. It is easy for you to be on the streets protesting but it is not the same. If we mobilize the same way, there will be violence. The state will not think twice before resorting to violence to quell the disturbance. What we suggest is that you begin these public acts of congregation and we will follow.’ I think this is tied to the idea of belonging that we have been discussing thus far––he can protest because the state affirms his belonging but I cannot protest because the state views me as an ‘outsider.’ This is one of the biggest hurdles we faced prior to the protests actually taking shape in December of 2019.

The first public acts against the CAA included readings of the Preamble. I was one of the five detained in Mumbai. Then that modality of protest––reading the Preamble––spread to Jamia, to other college campuses etc.

My concern was linking the anti-CAA protests to this notion of concord between civil society organizations and political parties. I think it took the political parties a long time to realize the importance of using the Constitution in protests. Along with this I think that mobilizations against the regime in UP was accompanied by many other layers of discontent, political mobilization etc., apart from what you mentioned in our presentation.

ZH: I think you are right about the role of political parties and their ambivalence about the CAA. However, I think we cannot say that all political parties were ambivalent. For example, the left parties organized and supported protests in Kerala, in West Bengal Mamata Banerjee (TMC) led a massive protest etc. The interesting thing is that due to this ambivalence parties did not want to be seen taking a leadership role but my sense is that behind the scenes they were backing the protests but they were not willing to come to forefront of the public agitation. I think there were some parties which were very reluctant; they did not want to be seen anywhere near the Shaheen Bagh protests.

I would outline two phases. When the CAA first came up political parties opposed it vehemently in the Parliament, in Standing Committees and so on. However, somewhere they changed their line later so when it came time for the actual ‘passage’ of the CAA, most parties fell in line. So, yes, I think the party position is complex but I think there was behind the scenes support.

Apoorvanand: My reading of the anti-CAA is slightly different. My friends at Lokayat, Pune, took me to a protest site. It was a Muslim locality and like Shaheen Baghs in Delhi, Patna, Goa elsewhere, it was exclusively a Muslim protest. It was difficult to find a non-Muslim space there if you leave Lokayat aside.

Leaving that protest site, I was talking to the driver and I asked him if he had spoken to the people there. He replied, ‘Yeh inka problem hai (it’s their problem)’. I asked him, ‘Aap aisa kyun sochte hain? Kagaz toh aapko bhi dikhana padega (Why do you believe so? You would also need to produce documents).’ He said, ‘Yeh problem ek baar solve ho jana chahiye. Mushkil toh hoga lekin problem solve ho jana chahiye. (We should solve this problem once and for all. It will be difficult but it must be solved once and for all.)’ This was across cities.

Non-Muslim participation was witnessed but this was largely among students and some civil society organizations. It was largely a Muslim protest. There was a distance between Muslims and non-Muslims. The protests were demonized, all kinds of conspiracy theories were spread and Hindus believed in them. That led to support against Shaheen Bagh in Delhi. We also spoke to people after the violence and we found that many Hindus believed that these protests were led by terrorists, the BJP succeeded in spreading this message.

I think this something that deserves further attention––Why couldn’t these protests attract non-Muslims? Why couldn’t the protests attract citizens at large? Why did it remain mostly a Muslim issue? In Uttar Pradesh, twenty-one Muslims were killed, hundreds of Muslims were arrested and recovery made for damages. When Shaheen Bagh became a protest site in Delhi, the BJP and the Bajrang Dal tried to mobilize people who were living across Shaheen Bagh; they announced a counter-protest.

We also need to describe the protests as they really happened and then learn our lessons. I think the anti-CAA protests were complicated, messy and we need to study these complexities more to understand what it was.

ZH: I think we can agree to disagree on this one. If we focus on Uttar Pradesh and Delhi, then yes, it was a largely Muslim protest. However, if we widen the arc of study to Pune, Punjab, Maharashtra, Telangana, Mumbai, we might notice a more diverse demography. Somewhere, the anti-CAA protests are being viewed through the lens of Shaheen Bagh where it does appear to be a Muslim protest and my understanding is that we need to broaden our lens. However, I do acknowledge that you are right in pointing out that there are many layers to this participation. I would like to assert that one needs to recognize the participation of non-Muslims even as the protests remained largely dominated by Muslims.

Audience Member 1: Your speech mentioned how citizens in civil society organizations played an important role in heralding the protests against the Centre and protecting the Constitution. However, our school textbooks always taught us that the judiciary was the prime protector of the Constitution. What was the judiciary’s role?

This becomes more acute when I recollect instances of security forces, police officers, etc. standing by and letting these incidents occur. For example, my friend at FTII shared with me the brutal beating him and his friends were subject to by outsiders who entered campus to disrupt their protests against the pranpratishtha ceremony of the newly inaugurated Ram Janmabhoomi temple at Ayodhya, as security personnel let it happen. When they registered an FIR, some persons registered a counter-FIR which stalled the investigation. Around the same time, a Judge of the Calcutta High Court upon his retirement announced his affiliations with the RSS and is now a member of Parliament. Whilst civil society organization and some parties of the Opposition have taken up the cause to protect the Constitution, what about those who are invested with the primary duty of protecting it?

ZH: I think we can’t write-off the judiciary. Whilst there are cases like the ones you mention, if you compare that with the number of judges that have retired over the last couple of years, the number of judges who join the BJP/RSS upon retirement are few. Further the record of the judiciary varies from Chief Justice to Chief Justice. They do take progressive stances of freedom of speech, right to dissent and the like. When it comes to matters of religion––the issue of disputed sites like Ayodhya, Benares or Mathura, the question of aastha prevails over the Constitution. The judiciary’s record then varies.

One of the problems I think is that the judiciary thus far has largely avoided taking stances on ‘contentious issues’ like the CAA. It was tabled in 2019 and we are now in 2024 and nothing has been pronounced by the judiciary. It took them a very long time to pronounce on the issue of Jammu and Kashmir. Above all, I think the judiciary’s delay in declaring electoral bonds unconstitutional has cost us heavily. The point is that the Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional in March but it was known from 2018, if not 2017! There were petitions before the Supreme Court and it allowed the ruling party to collect so many funds that sponsored their campaigns. The hearings were held in September of 2023 and the judgement was only pronounced in March of 2024. So many assembly elections were held and of course the campaigns for the Lok Sabha elections where huge numbers of electoral bonds were collected and encashed. There are some issues where the judiciary finds it difficult to intervene with the executive. This is why the lawyer, Gautam Bhatia, calls it the ‘executive-judiciary’ where the balance between the judiciary and the executive has shifted in favour of the executive.

Audience Member 2: My question is with regard to the digital platforms’ role. I think the coverage of the 2024 Elections by our traditional media has been extremely questionable. How significant do you think was the role of digital media was?

ZH: I think the digital world was quite divided. To begin with it was dominated by the regime. Later there are some wonderful digital warriors played a really significant role––the Youtubers, independent news media houses etc. In the end, social media did play an important part in taking on the ruling establishment. This is why the government is now bent on taking on some of these warriors. For example, the new digital rules have been used against documentaries the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) which YouTube has taken down on the orders of the government. A documentary on the Indian diaspora in Australia could not be aired and secondly, a reporter based in India did not have her visa extended and a documentary based on that was taken down. I think there is much greater vibrancy in social media than was anticipated by the ruling establishment. They are coming down quite heavily and stringently on this. The genie is out of the bottle now and it is not easy to put it back.

Monideepa Banerjie: In Faizabad did the BJP lead in the Ayodhya constituency? That seems to be what the BJP has been emphasizing––they led in Ayodhya and losing Faizabad had little to do with the Ram Mandir consecration. The second question is: How long can the Opposition bask in the afterglow of the 2024 Election results?

ZH: The first one is a factual question. You are right the BJP has intervened to say that they led in Ayodhya, and we need to check that. However, I think the larger point is that Ayodhya is a small town, even if the BJP’s vote share did not decline there, they lost the constituency. We can certainly say that the impact of the temple consecration cannot be limited to just Ayodhya. It had no effect in and around. Many others critics of the BJP have pointed out that there should hold demolition of houses, inadequate compensation and widening of roads responsible for their dismal electoral victory. That was certainly an issue. However, one would have expected that the consecration of the temple would have prevailed over all these material considerations.

In response to your second question, I think the Opposition will bask in the afterglow as long as it can. The fact that is that the BJP and the BJP-led NDA is in power. 240 seats is not to be sneered at and they do have a strong presence in the Hindi heartland and they have made inroads South India which was seen to be the last bastion against the BJP. These are significant reminders that one has to be realistic about the Election results.