Prime Minister Narendra Modi has a Cabinet of “yes people with two exceptions”, his government has been less than honest about the situation in Ladakh, and the electoral bonds scheme was a "mighty scandal" that the government cannot escape. These are some of the accusations made by former Union minister and senior BJP leader Subramanian Swamy in an interview to podcaster Ranveer Allahbadia aka Beer Biceps.
The interview, over 1 hour and 20 minutes long, was aired on May 3. It sees Swamy dwelling on a host of topics – from his opinion on the electoral bonds to the ongoing Lok Sabha election as he went to the extent of saying “Modi should not contest”.
Swamy, a veteran lawyer known to make controversial comments, has emerged as one of Modi’s most vociferous critics even as he stays within the BJP framework.
Asked by Allahbadia about the scope for feedback among top politicians — within the government and the Opposition — Swamy said with the exception of “one or two” members of the current Union Cabinet, “all the others are picked up because they don’t have a spine”.
“They are not people who are entitled to become ministers,” he added. “Modi has selected such people… So, what do you expect from such people? They will never do anything that annoys Modi.”
The two exceptions, he said, are Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari.
“They can speak up frankly… say this can’t be done. This can be done… but they are not listened to,” he added.
To a question on whether he had heard of instances where the two tried to speak up, he said, “Yes, I have.”
“I mean, not publicly, and that perhaps is because of the discipline of the RSS system, which is very strong. They have spoken, but in private,” he added.
When Allahbadia asked if he sensed a healthy team spirit in the government, he said no.
“It is Modi and then his ‘Sancho Panza’,” he added, referring to Union minister Amit Shah. “The rest… have to obey.”
To clarify his comment, Swamy explained that ‘Sancho Panza’ was a reference to the 18th-century Daniel Defoe book ‘Robinson Crusoe’, where the protagonist has a right-hand man he refers to as “my man Friday”. Sancho Panza, however, is the sidekick of the title character in the 17th-century novel ‘Don Quixote’ by Miguel de Cervantes.
Electoral Bonds A ‘Mighty Scandal’
Swamy was also highly critical of the electoral bonds scheme – the political funding mechanism introduced by the Modi government as a tool against corruption, but declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court earlier this year over transparency concerns.
He said it was a “mighty scandal”, adding that, “I don’t think he [Modi] can escape it… it [the truth] is gathering momentum.”
Electoral bonds were a bearer instrument “in the nature of a promissory note and an interest-free banking instrument”. They allowed people to make anonymous political donations to parties of their choice through banks.
The government argued that they brought political donations under a regulatory framework and reduced the cash component in such transactions, thus bringing more transparency. However, critics said, among other things, that the anonymity created a scope for potential quid pro quo.
Modi has continued to defend the scheme, while acknowledging that there could have been room for improvement.
Swamy said, “The truth is that people who are bankrupt obviously had dirty money… and paid in large amounts and they got contracts from the government when they should have been thrown in jail.”
He added: “So, such things are all coming out. Nothing much has come out so far. There’s more that’s going to come out. The issue basically today is there is no transparency whatsoever."
‘Ladakh Statement A Lie’
As he spoke about what he described as the lack of transparency in the current system, Swamy labelled PM Modi’s statements on Ladakh as a "lie".
India and China have been engaged in a stand-off on the Line of Actual Control in Ladakh over the past four years, but PM Modi has denied allegations of the Chinese taking over Indian territory amid the tensions.
“There are a lot of lies… Take for example the occupation of 4,065 square kilometres of Ladakh by China since 2020,” Swamy said.
“What… the Prime Minister said about it is that nobody came… But that’s not what is the truth… I have filed an RTI petition… no one answered. Finally, I had to go to the judicial part of the RTI… and the ministries were instructed to answer [my] questions by April 2. I have to see whether they do,” he added.
“How can they answer now after saying that the Chinese occupied nothing… that they have occupied 4,065 square kilometres of Undisputed territory in Ladakh,” he said. “Why is Mr Modi keeping quiet?”
Asked if this would affect the ongoing election season, Swamy said “it depends on whether I’m able to effectively put it across”.