This one for farmers: The Hindu editorial on Jagdeep Dhankhar’s NDA nomination for Vice President

The numbers clearly stand in favor of Jagdeep Dhankhar, National Democratic Alliance candidate to the office of the Vice President. Opposition – 17 parties participated in a joint meeting on Sunday – has announced the Congress leader Margaret Alva has been nominated. Mr Dhankhar, who joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2003 after initial stints in the Janata Dal and Congress, remains a loyal soldier of the party and its current leadership. Even the post he currently holds as the governor of West Bengal has not come in the way of his party loyalty. He has had frequent public clashes with the Trinamool Congress’s Mamata Banerjee-led elected government. On several occasions it appeared that Mr. Dhankhar was playing a partisan role in the state politics by colluding with the BJP. While announcing his candidature, the BJP has described him as the son of a farmer – a very clichéd, still powerful label that politicians claim. The claim has a specific meaning in this context, as Mr. Dhankhar belongs to the Jat community, a landlocked dominant caste in parts of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan. Strong resistance from the community was one of the reasons that forced the Center to withdraw three agricultural laws in 2021. A large section of Jats had sided with the BJP in this year’s UP assembly election, and Mr. Dhankhar’s promotion will strengthen the BJP’s grip. communities, especially in their home state Rajasthan where elections are due in 2023.

For the opposition, the election of the office of President and Vice President would have been an opportunity to advance its politics. In that sense, it looked like he had done a bad job. Ms Alva’s entry on the scene is unlikely to move the needle for opposition politics in any impressive way. She, like Yashwant Sinha, the opposition candidate for the presidency, is a forceful orator but does not mobilize any political field. She hails from Karnataka, a state with elections due next year, but it is unlikely that her candidacy will contribute to Congress in the state or opposition politics at the national level in general. As it stands, Mr Dhankhar is all set to become the country’s Vice President, who is also the Speaker of the Rajya Sabha – two offices the occupants of which must be unquestionably non-partisan. They are expected to abide by the rules and the constitution on the one hand, and on the other, to innovate to ensure smooth relations between the government and the opposition. Mr Dhankhar should try to build better relations between the government and the opposition and uphold the prestige of the Upper House. There is a transition that he may struggle for influence, as he has demonstrated so far, as he moves into a new national role.