Are politicians from elite institutions different?

I am sure that most of us have this common opinion in our minds – ‘Had we had politicians from IITs, BITS and other elite institutions, things would have been different.’ Isn’t it? But the question that remains is if this opinion is a myth or is it a fact to believe. When ever we talk of politicians from elite institutions, we can talk about only a very few politicians who actually made a mark in politics. The reasons for such a small number may be because the present day politics doesn’t allow such people to survive or such people do not prefer and do not believe in current politics or it may be because people from elite institutions do not understand the psychology of the common man and therefore they do not succeed. This is a different issue and a complicated issue to be analyzed. But in this blog, I would discuss if politicians from elite institutions are different from others.

You might have come across the recent news that Jai Ram Ramesh was asked to resign to his ministry and to take charge of congress campaign as campaign strategy lead. He is one among the very few politicians from IITs. He did his mechanical engineering from IIT Bombay and later completed his public policy and public management degrees from MIT and Carnegie Mellon Universities. He held the ministry of state for commerce and Industry and also power till last week in Manmohan’s Government. Apart from him, we have one more renowned leader, Manohar Parrikar from IIT Bombay again, the first IIT Chief Minister. He started as a swayasevak from RSS in the campus, gradually grown as a top leader for BJP in Goa and became the Chief Minister for two different terms and is the current leader of opposition in Goa Legislative Assembly.

We have few BITSians as well in politics. Prithvi Raj Chavan, one of the most charismatic leaders for congress who did his engineering from BITS, Pilani, is now holding ministry of state for PMO in UPA Government. I also heard of one more BITSian who contested an unsuccessful election in the interiors of AP. This topic would be incomplete and unjustified if I do not talk about DU which has produced a galaxy of leaders like Manmohan Singh, Arun Jaitley, Madan Lal Khurana, Pradhan etc.. Most of them have started their careers as DU Students’ Union Presidents and General Secretaries. Unlike other Universities, DU is known for producing mass leaders and active politicians for the country. Few other noted politicians from elite institutions include S Jaipal Reddy, a two term President of Osmania University, Hyderabad and now minister in Manmohan’s Government, Murali Manohar Joshi from Allahabad University, an ABVP functionary from college days and now the BJP MP from Rajya Sabha, Jyotiraditya from Stanford and Harvard.

If we observe the political life of any of those whom I have talked about, it’s evident that they are known for their intellect, strategy making and to an extent for their ideological stands. But then, I would neither confidently say that they have done any thing significant for people in their political career nor would I take the risk of saying that they do not adopt any kind of usual stunts that we witness in Indian politics. Every year, we see violence erupting in DU elections, we see the union leaders of IITs and BITS adopting the usual politics, using regionalism to win their elections, grabbing money from the union and treating their friends, benefiting their friends in various ways. Apart from getting good education from these elite institutions, they also inherit parts and pieces of the legacy of Indian politics and therefore they do not stand class apart from the rest. Therefore, it can only be finally concluded that institutions alone do not differentiate the kind of the leaders that they produce, but it’s a combination of the personal ethos, the institution they come from, the ideology they adopt, the understanding that they develop on the needs of a common man, the vision that they have for the country which distinguishes a good and a bad leader.

Jai Hind