 Hello and let's talk about the Vetrivel Yatra in Tamil Nadu. This Yatra which is going to be organized by the BJP in honor of the Hindu god Murugan who is also known as Kartikeya, was scheduled to start tomorrow that is the 6th of November. However today the government told the Madras High Court and this is the state government that permission had been denied to hold the Yatra. Now the BJP had planned this elaborate month long Yatra from November 6th to December 6th across various districts at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic continues to rage. Yesterday 2,500 cases were reported in the state but nonetheless the BJP had made elaborate plans and the Yatra was scheduled to end on December 6th the anniversary of the demolition of the Babri Masjid. Now the BJP has really failed to gain a foothold in the state despite trying a number of ways to polarize voters and raise issues of Hinduism and the religion and this seems yet another one of those strategies. To talk more about what exactly the BJP's game plan was, what the relationship between the BJP and the current AI-ADMK government is and overall political situation in the state we have with us News Clicks Neelambaran. Thank you Neelambaran for joining us. So the news of course is that the permission to conduct this vetrivel Yatra has been denied and the BJP was of course looking forward to this but could you first maybe take us through what exactly was the BJP's plan when it came to holding this Yatra and the more important question why was it even considered at this point of time? With the elections due in the state in another six months the BJP was trying hard to sell itself because the BJP has no traditional hold in the state. They were unable to win elections on their own in the recent couple of decades. Only in 2001 they were have few MLAs and again with alliance they had a few MPs from the state. So apart from that on their individual strength they were unable to establish themselves as a huge force in the state. So and the recent controversy on the religious song which is related to Lord Muruga came in handy for them. A YouTube channel was explaining the contents of the lyrics and they created nothing of their own to be honest. They were quoting from the book and the BJP took this as a chance to promote themselves as the representatives of the majority religion here as they do elsewhere in the country. So this was you know the elections due the relation between ADMK and BJP was a little bit of you know going off the what do you say they were not comfortable with each other in the recent time. So they again wanted to project themselves as a huge force in the state. So they decided to hold this Yatra for a one month period starting tomorrow scheduled to start tomorrow which has been now denied firms. So the concluding date also you know was criticized because it was it was planned to be concluding on December 6 which we know what is the importance of that date as well. But with the pandemic on the other side the health minister a couple of days ago stated that the second or third wave can be prevented only with the support of the people. So that condition being taken into consideration the government has denied permission they have submitted that to the High Court of Madras today. So the only the projection of you know themselves being a huge party and the huge force in the state is the only aim of the BJP and it has nothing to do with the demands of the people who just been raised over the past several months in the state. Absolutely right and in this context it's kind of important to also note that like you mentioned as well this is planned in between the pandemic and it's a really strange time to schedule something like Yatra which involves a lot of travel across various regions. But that said you mentioned another point which is very interesting about the ADMK and the BJP's relationship. So could you elaborate a bit more on that we just recently discussed the fact that the current chief in the shadow party Paranisamy was known as EPS is now going to be the face of the ADMK again and BJP has clearly been involved in the ADMK for quite some time in various ways. So what is currently the equation that is going on? Yeah before going to the to that particular the relationship between the BJP and ADMK I would clarify on the path which was planned by the BJP for the Yatra. They were planning to connect the six important stations which were meant for the worshipping Lord Muruga here the six abodes of Lord Muruga starting from Tirupathur in the northern part to Trishandur in the south. So they were trying to connect all these six locations to different parts of the state in which as you mentioned it requires a lot of manpower they were planning to mobilize a huge number of people in these meetings and all those things. So definitely it is not the right time to take out Sachin Yatra you know putting into risk the lives of people who are already suffering so much in Tamil Nadu. And coming to the second part the relationship between BJP and the ADMK is kind of a strained relationship of now. They were not in you know comfort with each other but for the survival of the government in the past three years after the death of late Chief Minister Jailalitha. And the OPS is considered the Deputy Chief Minister, Opa Neusarvam is considered close to the BJP leadership. He went to Delhi when he rebelled against the present Chief Minister and met Narendra Modi the Prime Minister after which the then Governor of Tamil Nadu Mr Vidya Sahaja was done the swearing in ceremony of why OPS was held and they passed up together. So we cannot straight away say that the ADMK and BJP are really close in all ranks but few people in the ADMK is close with the BJP that is how it worked out. But in the recent past in the last couple of months if you take the denial information to the Yathras as well and recently about this particular veterinary Yathras the relationship has further strained. So we cannot say that they have they were very close as we all know late Jailalitha was very close to Narendra Modi as well but she defeated the BJP and have only a statement in that particular election was do you want Modi or this lady? That was the statement she made. So politically they were not close to each other but they had some personal connections maybe. So apart from that the parties cannot be said that they were close. Only few leaders from this party and that party were close. That's all what we can say as far as the relationship is concerned now. But nonetheless it does seem that there is a strong possibility that they will continue to be allies in the coming elections. Yeah, of course that cannot be ruled out because as far as ADMK is considered we cannot rule out anything. They are also far hungry to some extent in the state. They are in part for the past and almost 10 years now. So they want to continue. If they lose the future of the party maybe nothing in another 4 to 5 years. So to get some kind of force the ADMK may again be alive with the BJP compromising on their stance and all these present happenings. That may also happen. The BJP and ADMK may again contest the election together. We cannot rule out that probability also. Right and in this context quickly just going through what is the current political mood in the state as well now because elections are coming close by. It does look like the opposition alliance is fairly set. There is the DMK, the Congress, the VCK, the left parties. They have more or less established a fairly solid working relationship. The ruling side is in far more disarray of course. But considering the pandemic and other issues what is the general mood on the ground? The opposition is united to a larger extent. They set an example for the rest of the country as well in the recent general elections as well. The BJP was decimated and the ADMK could win only one seat here. So they are putting up a united face. There are a lot of joint protests by all these parties. And the DMK is taking the leadership as well. They are conducting different meetings. Their virtual meetings are happening. Their leader is addressing all the meetings. So their ground level work has started. As far as the ADMK is concerned, they are not sure of their alliance as yet. We cannot rule out again. As far as we can say that BJP will be fighting together with ADMK. We can also say that BJP may not fight with ADMK this time. The same is the case with the Patali Makalakshi which is led by Dr. Rangumini Ramadas. They fought the election together, the general election together. But the recent statements of their leadership is against the ADMK as well. So ADMK as of now is not sure who will fight with them together. Whereas the ADMK with the support of the left parties, the Congress, BCK as you said, and MDMK as well led by Mr. Vaiko. They are putting up a united face. And there were a little discussions in the alliance as regards the number of seats they were going to contest. That was also put to arrest after Stalin clarified that there is no problem with the alliance and we will speak with all the parties concerned to decide on that particular issue. The DMK even has started their propaganda work as well. Their election manifesto is being, they are working on their manifesto as well. Whereas ADMK has not, apart from announcing their chief ministerial candidate, nothing has happened technically or more or less nothing has happened apart from that. Right, right. So thank you so much Niran for talking to us. You will be staying in touch in the coming weeks and months as the election scene heats up there. Our next segment is part of an interview with Prof. Praveen Jav, the Jawaharlal University. The last phase of polling for Bihar is scheduled for November 7th and the opposition Mahagat Bandhan has attracted a lot of attention by promising 10 lakh jobs. But if it does come to power, how is this alliance going to fund this promise? Prof. Jha explains. We talked about the government and its various failings. Now the opposition has a very ambitious agenda. They are promising a huge number of jobs. They are promising of course a completely new model of development. How are they, what are the possibilities for financing this if they do come to power? For a state like Bihar which is very limited in terms of mobilization of resources, the challenges will continue to be huge. Because the architecture of resource mobilization in the country has changed for the worse. And there as I said GST played a terrible role. In fact the 10th Finance Commission had brought many areas in terms of raising resources etc. within the ambit of state governments. What happened with GST was a real retrogression. So we need to keep that in mind. So broadly you sort of are very constrained, very challenged. But if we look at the choices which the state government has, any state government, of course one is that you say listen FRBM is something which is hurting us quite a lot. So what has been done for instance in the context of the COVID pandemic, there was some rethink on that, that instead of three you can go up to five and you know the provisions were outlined and so on. Again conditionalities, I mean the union government was behaving like as if it is the big brother and you know like landlord and so on. But I would argue that for many states which are lower down the development ladder, there is nothing wrong in saying okay you can choose to have this kind of arrangement so that your resource kitty can be strengthened. But that is a huge political decision whether that happens or not you know is difficult to say and one would be right in being pessimistic about it given the overall neoliberal climate etc. Borrowing, so you know you have to think of how to use your borrowed resources more judiciously. There could be some improvements there in terms of prioritizing. So whether it is your social sectors or basic infrastructure these could be pushed. So for instance good quality education not only creates good quality education but it also creates huge employment right. So you have a large number of young people train them properly and so on. Why is that not being prioritized? Okay so these things can be done. Then you have and I am being very careful when I propose this. The option which had been foregone which was given up in 2016 and I am thinking of alcohol right. What is this utterly shall I say retrogressive moralism which you want to impose on the state at large? So can we think of taking care of that? Can we ask and this only Bihar cannot do as part of many other states. Insist on if you are not giving us anything else at least give us a share in CES which is our right. I mean why is it that the CES becomes the right of the union government? So these will have to be very important points of negotiation. And any progressive trajectory is to my mind almost impossible without some hard contestation, some difficult choices. So it would have to be a mixture of all that. And that to Bihar would not be able to do it alone? No, no certainly not. So but Bihar certainly can go back on its decision on prohibitions. And you know I talk to anyone from Bihar and it has become possibly one of the biggest illegal industries in that state. Now do we want that? If you want to enforce it then that is a kind of expenditure which itself is extremely skewed kind of option. Instead of having teachers you want to have maybe five inspectors every village. Is that what we want to do? So you know I think possibilities are there, no easy options sure enough. I mean of course whatever slack is there in let us say resource utilization I am not talking about mobilization now that again can be used. But yes if we can do some of these things. I think it should be possible to move ahead but the larger challenge is how to get a more progressive kind of federalism in place again. To my mind as I said earlier you know this GST was anti-constitution and of course it has been adopted by all states. Now you can say that it has been passed so how can you say this? But the spirit of constitution I think this was completely against that. You know very good arguments have been given why as per the constitution it was a disaster. And as an economic arrangement I mean there is nothing which can be claimed for it to my mind you know it is all rhetoric. So if you want to be in the happy world of Alice in Wonderland so be it okay but possibilities are there they have to work much harder.