Finally, A ‘Congress-Mukt’ North East

As was widely predicted (read this), the last bastion of the Congress in the North East — Mizoram — has fallen. The Mizo National Front (MNF), an important constituent of the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) which was birthed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) after its sweep of the Assam Assembly polls in 2016, has won a decisive 27 of the 40 seats in the Mizoram Assembly. The Congress has been reduced to a pale shadow of its former self, managing to win just seven seats, down from the 34 it won in 2013.

The MNF’s handsome victory is being seen as a popular vote of no-confidence against Congress Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla, who has ruled the tiny northeastern state that shares its borders with Myanmar and Bangladesh for 20 of the 31 years since Mizoram became a full-fledged state in February 1987. The prediction by some political pundits that the MNF suffers from a negative image due to its association with the BJP in this Christian-majority state has turned out to be totally wrong. The Congress has been felled by strong anti-incumbency, charges of corruption, misgovernance and failure to improve the state’s crumbling infrastructure.

Significantly, the BJP has been able to open its account in the Christian-majority state. Even though it has won just one seat this time, the BJP has bagged a considerable number of votes in at least 10 constituencies. This is being seen as a sign that the BJP’s saffron tinge is not a hurdle for it in an overwhelmingly Christian-majority state. The MNF and the BJP campaigned vigorously against the Congress, accusing it of corruption and misgovernance. “This victory is as much a vote against corruption as it is for development. Mizos have realised that only the MNF can ensure development,” said MNF chief Zoramthanga, who is slated to be sworn in as the fifth Chief Minister of the state.

The Congress had suffered a body blow before the polls with five of its top leaders, including the home minister in Lal Thanhawla ministry (R Lalzirliana) and health minister (L Sailo), junior minister B D Chakma as well as assembly speaker Hiphei, quitting the party. Lalzirliana and Sailo joined the MNF while Hiphei and Chakma joined the BJP. as was expected, the anti-Congress Zoram People's Movement (ZPM) and the PRISM are expected to cut into Congress votes and as the election campaign showed, PRISM had captured the imagination of young voters with its strong anti-corruption pitch. The ZPM has won five seats.

A major concern among many in Mizoram now is if the MNF will live up to its campaign promise of re-imposing prohibition in the state. The MNF and the ZPM had taken on the Congress for lifting prohibition in 2015 in the face of stiff opposition from the powerful Church and civil society organisations. The MNF’s vow to reimpose prohibition had also found strong endorsement from the Church, which holds that alcoholism is a social evil that had destroyed many Mizo families in the past. But prohibition, argued the Congress, had led to rampant bootlegging and brewing and sale of illicit liquor in the state. “Prohibition had hardly led to any decrease in consumption of alcohol in the state and had, instead, given rise to organised and unorganised crime rackets,” said a Congress spokesperson.

The Congress has already been unseated from power in the remaining states of the North East; it faced humiliating defeats in the assembly polls in Assam, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura, while in Arunachal Pradesh, it has been reduced to a non-entity with nearly en masse defections from its ranks to the BJP. The Congress doesn’t have much of an existence in Sikkim. All these seven states are now ruled by constituents of the BJP-affiliated NEDA. Mizoram was the last Congress-ruled state in the region, and today’s defeat is an enormous loss of face and prestige for the party in a region that it long considered to be its natural turf.

Mizoram — the only Indian state to have been bombed by the Indian Air Force (IAF) on orders from then prime minister Indira Gandhi on 5 and 6 March 1966 — had done well on various development parameters since it became a state after the 1986 Mizo Accord that brought an end to insurgency in the state. But it has, of late, fallen behind, thanks to misgovernance and corruption. The number of people below poverty line has risen from 15.4 per cent to 20.4 per cent since 2011. Dropout rates at the primary and secondary levels are very high at 15.36 per cent and 30.67 per cent respectively, much higher than the national average of 6.35 per cent and 19.89 per cent respectively.

Development is lopsided with some districts like Serchhip (Lal Thanhawla’s home district) being favoured over others. Unemployment and underemployment is very high, job creation negligible and agriculture is ailing. Roads and other physical infrastructure is in a mess and specialised healthcare remains out of reach of most. The Congress, which has been in power for a long time in the state, has been punished by Mizoram’s electorate for all this.