Developmental State and the Dalit Question in Madhya Pradesh: Congress Response

Front Cover
Routledge, May 13, 2013 - Political Science - 554 pages

Dalit assertion has been a central feature of the states in the Hindi heartland since the mid-1980s, leading to the rise of political consciousness and identity-based lower-caste parties. The present study focuses on the different political response of the Congress party to identity assertion in Madhya Pradesh under the leadership of Digvijay Singh. In Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, in response to the strong wave of Dalit assertion that swept the region, parties such as the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) used strategies of political mobilisation to consolidate Dalit/backward votes and capture state power. In Madhya Pradesh, in contrast, the Congress party and Digvijay Singh at the historic Bhopal Conference held in January 2002 adopted a new model of development that attempted to mobilise Dalits and tribals and raise their standard of living by providing them economic empowerment. This new Dalit Agenda constitutes an alternative strategy at gaining Dalit/tribal support through of state-sponsored economic upliftment as opposed to the political mobilisation strategy employed by the BSP in Uttar Pradesh.

The present study puts to test the limits of the model of state-led development, of the use of political power by an enlightened political elite to introduce change from above to address the weaker sections of society. The working of the state is thus analysed in the context of the society in which it is embedded and the former’s ability to insulate itself from powerful vested interests. In interrogating this state-led redistributive paradigm, the study has generated empirical data based on extensive fieldwork and brought to the fore both the potentials and the limitations of using the model of ‘development from above’ in a democracy. It suggests that the absence of an upsurge from below limits the ability of an enlightened political elite that mans the developmental state to introduce social change and help the weaker sections of society.

 

Contents

Developmental State the Dalit Question and Political Response
1
The Congress Party Dominance Inclusion and the New Dalit Agenda
25
Land Reform for the Disadvantaged An Experiment in Publicprivate Partnership
123
Moving Beyond Reservations The Supplier Diversity Experiment
285
Political Fallout The Dalit Agenda and the 2003 Assembly Elections
417
Conclusion
464
Postscript
485
Glossary
498
Bibliography
509
About the Author
525
Index
526
Copyright

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

About the author (2013)

Sudha Pai is Professor, Centre for Political Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.

Bibliographic information