Anna and the new middle class: Why UPA doesn’t get it

If there is one thing the last few weeks have disproved, it is that politics-as-usual will return once Anna & Co are seen off.
Nothing of the kind will happen — at least in middle class, urban India. Anna Hazares may come and go, but the forces behind him will remain. Our intelligentsia seems blind to this new reality of middle class power, which is different from the middle class of old.
Among other things, many newspaper editors have been lecturing Anna’s cohorts on constitutional niceties. Parliament, we are told, is supreme — as if we didn’t know. The Anna crowds on the streets know that, too, but don’t care.
Here’s what has changed.
The new middle class, which is the social base of Anna’s movement, knows that you can’t get anything done by being reasonable.
Just as the Dalits or OBCs get their reservations and caste-surveys done not by reasoned debate in parliament but through an exercise of street power, the new middle classes have learnt that you get what you want when you are unreasonable enough. This is why they think it is perfectly legitimate for Anna to fast to get his Jan Lokpal Bill.
The second thing that has changed is the demography. In 2004, the NDA lost by prematurely raising the slogan of India Shining. A lot of India wasn’t shining then, and the Congress capitalised on it by telling the poor that the NDA didn’t care for them.
Seven years of hyper growth under the UPA have actually brought India Shining closer to reality. India is now one-third urban, according to the 2011 census. The urban middle class is more worried about getting things done than dabbling in politics. It has only contempt for politicians. Anna works for them because he has the same contempt for regular politicians.

The new middle class will back the Bill just because it promises to put the fear of god into netas and babus. This is something close to its heart. AFP Photo

Not only that. In these seven years of UPA rule, India’s GDP has nearly doubled. So has urban income. We will be a $2 trillion dollar economy this year. The new middle class has discovered its spending power and wants goods and services made to order. Politics, for it, is not about democracy and constitutionalism. It is about delivering governance – even if it means electing CEOs to run cities rather than mayors and politicos.
Third, the new middle class is impatient and self-obsessed. It is the ATM generation, where you put in your card and get your money. It does not believe in negotiating with people, with bureaucracy, and with the political establishment.
Corruption and bribery are obstacles to its progress. This is why it is backing the Jan Lokpal Bill. It may not know anything about the Bill’s specifics, or the Draconian nature of the Hazare version of it. But it will back the Bill just because it promises to put the fear of god into netas and babus. This is something close to its heart.
Fourth, this middle class has a consumerist view of democracy. It will vote if voting is made easier. Its ideal of democracy is something you can give your opinion on through a website poll or a tweet or a Facebook post. It will not go out to vote; but it will vote regularly – and like crazy – if we get e-democracy, where every voter can vote from the comfort of his home.
Five, the new middle class is a product of the decline of the public sector and the rise of the modern private sector. “The pre-liberalisation middle class was typically from professions that grew around the state – such as lawyering, accountancy, medicine and, of course, government service,” says Vinay Sitapati in The Indian Express. But the new middle class is predominantly the creation of private sector expansion — whether it is in software or financial services or whatever.
The new middle class is here to stay, and it will only grow. First in the metros, then the mini metros and, finally, the other towns of India.
The UPA has failed to realise that this new middle class has grown out of the Manmohan Singh reforms of 1991-92, and the turbo-charged growth of the last seven years of UPA rule in 2004-11. It is now deeply disappointed to find that their old hero is now a zero as PM. He does not connect with their aspirations.
Footnote to Anna: This new middle class cannot be taken for granted. It can dump you as easily as it has raised you on its shoulders.