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Viewing cable 07MUMBAI38, MUMBAI GOES TO THE POLLS ON FEBRUARY 1

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Reference ID Created Released Classification Origin
07MUMBAI38 2007-01-23 05:53 2011-08-30 01:44 UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY Consulate Mumbai
VZCZCXRO5224
PP RUEHBI RUEHCI
DE RUEHBI #0038/01 0230553
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P R 230553Z JAN 07
FM AMCONSUL MUMBAI
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5061
INFO RUEHBI/AMCONSUL MUMBAI 9940
RUEHNE/AMEMBASSY NEW DELHI 6222
RUEHCG/AMCONSUL CHENNAI 1318
RUEHCI/AMCONSUL CALCUTTA 1199
RUEHKA/AMEMBASSY DHAKA 0697
RUEHLM/AMEMBASSY COLOMBO 0706
RUEHIL/AMEMBASSY ISLAMABAD 0702
RUEHKT/AMEMBASSY KATHMANDU 0558
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC
RHEHAAA/NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL WASHINGTON DC
RHMFIUU/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL
RHHMUNA/HQ USPACOM HONOLULU HI
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHDC
UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 MUMBAI 000038 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM PINR PTER KDEM KISL IN
SUBJECT: MUMBAI GOES TO THE POLLS ON FEBRUARY 1 
 
 
Summary 
------- 
 
1. (SBU) Residents of Mumbai and several other cities in 
Maharashtra will go to the polls on Feb. 1 to elect the 277 
members of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), the 
city's main municipal body.  As in the past, the urban poor, 
swayed by opportunistic politicians who deliver the pork shortly 
before the election, will come out to vote, whereas higher 
income groups will mostly avoid the polls, turned off by the 
corruption and mismanagement that characterizes the BMC and many 
of the city's leading politicians.  Several urban groups and the 
city's media are calling for the middle and upper income classes 
to vote to change the political culture of the city, yet it 
remains to be seen whether such voters will actually respond to 
these initiatives.  A shift in thinking about the city is 
noticeable, however, as more of the city's middle and upper 
classes become dissatisfied with a decrepit urban environment 
that is not improving in tandem with the material improvements 
of their personal lives.  It is too early, however, for such a 
trend to find its way into the election results, which remain 
unpredictable.  The BJP/Shiv Sena "saffron alliance" that has 
controlled the BMC for the last 15 years is struggling to cope 
with successive leadership crises.   Many observers expected a 
Congress/NCP alliance to easily come to power, yet bickering 
between the two parties will likely divide their electoral base 
and indirectly strengthen BJP/Shiv Sena. Communal and caste 
parties hope to capitalize on the universal dissatisfaction 
towards all established political parties, yet most observers do 
not expect them to make much of an impact.  The elections will 
also test, for the first time, former Shiv Sena wunderkind Raj 
Thackerey's ability to establish a foothold in the city's 
politics.  End summary. 
 
Mumbai Votes On February 1 
--------------------------- 
 
2. (SBU) All 277 seats in the BMC are up for election on 
February 1.  Although authority to deliver municipal services in 
Mumbai is divided among more than a dozen agencies, many of 
which are controlled by the state and central governments, the 
BMC is considered to be a crucially important entity, as it 
controls one of the largest municipal budgets in the country. 
In the sordid history of Mumbai's politics, many BMC members 
have not viewed the BMC budget as a tool to service the city's 
population, but rather as a vehicle for political patronage and 
outright corruption.  The BMC is the lead agency for delivering 
the city's most basic services such as road maintenance, water 
supply, and sewage removal, the purses of which offer many 
opportunities for political patronage and graft.  Although BMC 
members receive only a modest honorarium, many past members have 
grown wealthy in these positions, and thousands of candidates 
are expected to compete.  Political parties also view the city's 
budget as a war chest to finance future state and national 
elections. 
 
A Political Shake-Up? 
--------------------- 
 
3. (SBU) Until recently, most analysts believed that Congress 
and the National Congress Party (NCP), the so-called "secular 
parties," had a good chance to win control of the BMC for the 
first time in 15 years.  Both sides of the governing BJP/Shiv 
Sena "saffron alliance" are beset with leadership problems, and 
the parties are considered to be weaker than they have been in 
many years.  Raj Thackeray, the nephew of Shiv Sena leader 
Balsaheb Thackeray, has formed his own political party and will 
likely act as a spoiler in the elections.  (The difficulties 
faced by the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance and the role of Raj 
Thackeray will be addressed in septel.)  Interlocutors agree 
that Congress and the NCP will need to cooperate in order to 
capitalize fully on the BJP/Sena weakness.  That cooperation has 
not been visible, however.  Both NCP and Congress have bickered 
over the number of candidates that each party should field.  As 
a result, the two sides recently announced that their 
seat-sharing talks had failed, and each will contest the 
elections independently.  This failure to reach an agreement 
will almost certainly split the secular vote and has provided a 
major boost to the rival BJP-Sena alliance.  While previously 
 
MUMBAI 00000038  002 OF 004 
 
 
most observers were predicting a Congress-NCP victory, this 
outcome is now much less certain.  Whatever the outcome, 
however, most observers think that NCP and Congress will 
continue to cooperate at the state and national levels. 
 
4. (SBU) Congress and NCP hope to capitalize on Mumbai voters' 
clear and growing frustration with the BMC.  In the last few 
years Mumbai has experienced flooding, terrorist bombings, 
increased traffic that has begun to paralyze commercial life in 
the city, and a seeming lack of progress on many high-profile 
infrastructure projects.  The BMC's inadequate response to these 
problems has led to increased allegations of corruption and 
incompetence.  Voters seem ready to assign blame to the 
governing BJP/Sena coalition, but Congress and NCP will have to 
fight off their own records of corruption and ineffectiveness at 
the Maharashtra state level.  Congress claims that winning 
control of the BMC will allow it to obtain assistance from the 
state and national legislatures that it already controls, as 
well as coordinate more effectively between the many city and 
state agencies that make up Mumbai's government.  Most observers 
agree that the stalemate between the Sena-controlled BMC and 
Congress/NCP-controlled state government has contributed to the 
lack of progress in upgrading the city's services. 
 
A Third Front 
----------------------- 
 
5. (SBU) Many traditional supporters have their own gripes with 
Congress and NCP.  Dalit groups have expressed frustration with 
rapes and killings that hit their own in rural India last 
September.  Muslims have expressed anger over the handling of 
official inquiries into terrorist attacks and the lack of 
progress in other high profile cases.  Anant Gadgil from the 
Congress Party told poloff that many Muslims had expressed 
dismay about Congress' increasingly close relationship with the 
U.S.  Gadgil said he was concerned about Muslim voters' anger 
over the Indian-US Nuclear agreement and the Saddam Hussein 
execution.  Bharatkumar Raut, editor of the Maharashtra Times, 
dismissed these concerns, however, saying that Muslims' anger 
with Congress stemmed from a perceived lack of support on 
domestic issues like the reservation of parliament seats, 
educational opportunities and government jobs for Muslims.  Raut 
told poloff that he feels the political mobilization of Dalits 
and Muslims is a "silent revolution" that is not receiving the 
coverage in the media that it deserves.  He pointed to the 
unexpectedly large rally in South Mumbai that occurred last 
March in response to President Bush's India visit as an example 
of the unnoticed strength of these groups. 
 
6. (SBU) Although both Dalits and Muslims are traditional 
supporters of Congress, many party leaders have expressed 
nervousness that these groups will not support the party as 
strongly this election.  Several Muslim and Dalit political 
parties have attempted to form a "Third Front" coalition that 
consists of the (Dalit) Republican Party of India (RPI), the 
(Muslim) Samajwadi Party, and 19 other parties.  This coalition, 
which calls itself the "Mumbai Vikas Secular Front" is 
positioning itself to be an alternative to the other alliances, 
but it too has become bogged down in squabbling over 
seat-sharing, with even marginal parties demanding lots of 
seats.  Analysts say these broad coalitions have not been 
durable in the past, but Raut suggests that even if the 
coalition fails, the increased cooperation between disaffected 
Muslims and Dalits could cause headaches for Congress. 
 
7. (SBU) Poloff spoke with Ravi Bhilane, editor, and Anil Pawar, 
executive director, at the Dalit newspaper "Mahanayak," and they 
confirmed that there is deep dissatisfaction with Congress and 
NCP among the Dalit population.  They said that Dalits are 
perpetually disappointed by these parties in terms of actually 
fulfilling their campaign promises and said that leaders of 
traditional Dalit parties like RPI are usually bought out by 
Congress.  Pawar said that the most authentic political party of 
the Dalits is now the Bahujan Samajwadi Party (BSP), but that 
few in the media recognize this, instead focusing on the actions 
of RPI.  They acknowledged that the BSP may not win any seats, 
(which they blamed on careful redistricting designed to divide 
the Dalit vote,) but suggested that it will nonetheless give the 
Dalits a political voice and identity, which they described as 
 
MUMBAI 00000038  003 OF 004 
 
 
vitally important to this population, even more than delivery of 
basic services like water and sanitation. 
 
Additional Challenges Facing Congress-NCP 
----------------------------------------- 
 
8. (SBU) Congress also has internal rivalries that may 
complicate matters.  Former Shiv Sena leader Narayan Rane was a 
high-profile defector to Congress in 2005 and helped the party 
make substantial gains in state by-elections.  Some analysts 
feel that a Congress victory in the BMC polls will consolidate 
Rane's power and create a strong internal rival to Maharashtra 
Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, who may be secretly hoping 
against a Congress win for this reason.  Rane will face his own 
pressures from having to reward several former Sena members who 
defected with him to Congress.  The recent arrivals are viewed 
suspiciously by many of the Congress rank-and-file, and the 
resulting tension with local Congress boss Gurudas Kamat may 
cause problems.  Congress and NCP leaders are also nervous that 
the BJP and Shiv Sena will instigate communal flare-ups as a way 
to rally their base. 
 
Are the Middle and Upper Classes Beginning to Care? 
--------------------------------------------- ------ 
 
9. (SBU) About sixty percent of the city's population live 
either in areas designated as slums, or on the street. 
Traditionally, these groups have turned out to vote in Mumbai. 
Middle and upper-middle class voters have shown little interest 
in BMC affairs, not bothering to vote or even to learn the 
identity of their representative.  The urban poor have long 
served politicians as "vote banks."  Many of Mumbai's large 
slums are actually highly organized urban organisms, with key 
community leaders being able to sway large numbers of people. 
Politicians discovered long ago that a few supporters in key 
positions in the city's slums can organize large numbers of 
voters and get out the vote.  To secure the support of the urban 
poor, politicians have delivered tangible services such as water 
wells, toilets, or electrical power to slums shortly before 
elections or have resorted to outright bribery, paying slum 
dwellers directly to show up on election day. 
 
10. (SBU) Such antics have alienated the better-off sections of 
the city's population, who have watched in disgust as local 
politics degenerated into a populist carnival for the poor, 
organized by corrupt and often criminal politicians who do 
little for the broader good of the city.  This may be changing 
now, however. Siddharth Bhatia, an editor at the Mumbai 
newspaper DNA, told poloff that "the story" of the 2007 
elections is the increased civic activism found among voters. 
Many analysts say that because of rising incomes and the recent 
high-profile disasters in the city, middle class voters are 
taking a renewed interest in Mumbai's affairs.  Several citizens 
have started NGOs to improve the governance of the city.  The 
Association for Governance and Networking in India (AGNI) and 
the Association for Democratic Reform (ADR) are working to boost 
middle class voter turnout.  In addition, AGNI is attempting to 
publicize candidates' qualifications by creating a five star 
rating system for corruption and good governance that they 
intend to distribute through print and electronic media.  The 
Indian news network NDTV reports that as many as 20 percent of 
this year's candidates have some form of criminal record.  In 
the last election the average margin of victory for the 277 BMC 
wards was less than 1000 votes, and 10 wards were decided by 
less than 100 votes.  This suggests that efforts to publicize 
the candidates' qualifications could affect the election's 
outcome. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
11. (SBU) None of our interlocutors expects that the outcome of 
the BMC elections will have a noticeable impact on regional or 
national politics in the near to mid-term.  A Congress/NCP 
victory, however, will accelerate the demise of the once-mighty 
Shiv Sena party.  It may also reveal just how much potential Raj 
Thackerey has in the city's and the state's politics in the 
future.  Most importantly, however, it may signal the beginning 
of a new political culture in the city if, in fact, the city's 
 
MUMBAI 00000038  004 OF 004 
 
 
mid- and high-income groups begin to vote in higher numbers than 
in the past.  It may be too early for these groups to actually 
express their frustration through the ballot box.  A shift in 
thinking about the city is noticeable, however, as more of the 
city's middle and upper classes become dissatisfied with a 
decrepit urban environment that is not improving in tandem with 
the material improvements of their personal lives, but is 
actually getting worse.  End comment. 
OWEN