Entire political class bitten by the walkathon bug – will there be takers in new India?

Padyatra politics is back in vogue. Election strategist turned political activist Prashant Kishor will proceed on a 3000 km long Bihar Padyatra, starting from the location of Mahatma Gandhi's first mass movement against the then British in 1917 at Champaran. RJD heir apparent Tejashwi Yadav has been threatening to go on a walkathon from Patna to Delhi Padyatra to press the demand for a caste census in Bihar. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi along with party comrades has also decided to undertake a Kashmir to Kanyakumari Padyatra starting October 2 in what is called the "Bharat Jodo" exercise. There are smaller padyatras being organised in poll bound states including Gujarat and Karnataka. The entire political class appears to have been bitten by the walkathon bug. 

Padyatras- Then and Now

Padyatras have remained an intrinsic component of India's religious/spiritual and political lineage. Indian traditional beliefs are that an individual undertaking a Padyatra is sacrificing, noble and of elevated or esoteric thought, who had willingly accepted individual and bodily pains to achieve a higher spiritual or national cause. 

Sixth century woman saint Karaikkal Ammaiyar was understood to have undertaken a long and arduous journey from Thiruvalgadu to Mount Kailash on her hands. 

Stories abound in Indian folklore about pilgrims who moved forward on their journeys by prostrating their bodies on the grounds with hands stretched forward. 

Mahatma Gandhi was the first political leader to have imported the Padyatra technique in the political realm. On the advice of Gopal Krishna Gokhale following his return from South Africa, Gandhi initially travelled on trains - or on foot- in a "Bharat Darshan'' yatra. 

In 1930, he undertook the 388 km long "salt march" - called the Dandi March, which emerged as the watershed moment in the history of India's Independence. 

Three decades later, Acharya Vinoba Bhave travelled on foot across India's villages to promote the "Bhoodan movement". It can be said that these Padyatras were driven by the goal of consolidating the national cause. 

Walkathons for power

Political Padyatras in post Independence India have largely seemed powered by immediate goals of obtaining votes. Some of these strategies have worked; some have not provided for immediate results. 

Socialist leader Chandrashekhar undertook the 4000 km Kanyakumari-Delhi Padyatra in 1983 and was not rewarded with immediate political benefits. But the Yatra did pitch him as among the front ranking political leaders and Chandrashekhar was eventually sworn in as the country's eighth Prime Minister seven years later. 

Others, such as the late YSR Reddy, N Chandrababu Naidu, Jagan Mohan Reddy - and even Digvijays Singh - had immediate Padyatra gains coming to them. YSR travelled on foot in Andhra Pradesh for 1500 kilometres in 2003 and became the Chief Minister a year later. Chandrababu Naidu undertook a 1700 km Padyatra in 2013 and was elected the chief minister in 2014. Jagan Mohan Reddy completed his 3,648 kilometres walkathon in 341 days beginning November 2017 and went on to win the 2019 assembly elections with a huge margin.

Even Digvijays Singh's Narmada Yatra in September 2017 was not futile, as the Congress performed well in the 2018 assembly elections, remaining marginally short of the majority mark. 

The moral of the story: Today's Padyatras might well not be guided by the noble intentions of the earlier models, but such walkathons still hold influence on Indian minds. 

Rath Yatra versus Padyatra

The most visible national impact of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) founder, the late NT Rama Rao: The upscaling of the Padyatra technique by introducing the "Rath Yatras".

From Lalu Prasad to Mulayam Singh Yadav to the late Jayalalithaa or Yogi Adityanath, all have travelled in the air conditioned comfort of the makeshift "Raths" during their election campaigns.

In the 2012 Gujarat assembly campaign, then Chief Minister Narendra Modi introduced multiple vans that could reach remote corners of the state and people could hear him speak through hi-tech virtual audio-visual campaigns. 

From huge cut outs of political leaders to massive posters and buntings and podiums decorated as palace halls, the emphasis on past decades has shifted. The trend now seems moving back to the staid and arduous technique of the Padyatra. Or, perhaps, the Indian voter will now get a taste of the Padyatra-Rath Yatra combo.