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Hardanahalli Deve Gowda, the accidental Prime Minister of India who
is rapidly making himself the laughing stock ,of intelligent
citizens has come to the astounding conclusion that the concept of
a coalition government at the Centre has come to stay. Everyone is
welcome to his delusions and Gowda is welcome to his. The truth,
however, is otherwise. The United Front Government is not only
proving itself unworkable but is a disaster to the country. If it
holds together it is because of its congenital hatred of the
Bharatiya Janata Party and of the monumental cowardice of the
Congress which is lurking round the corner. The 'United' Front
knows in its heart of hearts that if it fails to stand together,
its individual members would be destroyed separately at the
hustings. The Congress knows that, too.
All those who either form the government or who support it from
outside are aware that if they go back to the people they won't
stand the ghost of a chance to return to power. As sure, as the
sun rises in the East, they will be swept off and cast into the
dust bin of history. To all of them it is a daunting prospect.
At this point the Congress Party under Sitaram Kesri is on a
particularly sticky wicket. Kesri is no more in complete control
of the party organisation. Sharad Pawar is playing his own game,
as he has always played in the past and can be expected to do
anything to he catapulted into the seat of office as a coalition
partner. Pawar has been assiduously courting Deve Gowda who, is in
dire need of support from any source. Gowda's need and Pawar's
vaulting ambition are putting paid Kesri's hope of running the
United Front government through remote control. But for the mess
we are in there seems to be no immediate respite.
Gowda is only fooling himself if he thinks that the Front
government is functioning. Plainly, it is not. Whether it is in
regard to the budget, Bofors or Bhandari, the Front's constituent
parties are at sixes and sevens with each other. The Government
does not- cannot- speak in one voice. If we are to believe Sitaram
Yechury, a member of the CPM Politburo, the second budget presented
by P. Chidambaram is a pro-rich budget that his party cannot
possibly accept without substantial modifications. Yechury
contends that the presumption that lower tax rates will lead to
greater compliance and hence greater revenue is "erroneous".
The CPM is outraged at the pro-rich thrust of the budget and has
made it plain for all to know. Not even Dr. Manmohan Singh has a
kind word to say about the budget and has been critical of its
provisions. The result has been a sensational fall in the Sensex.
And if the father of the liberalisation process is disappointed,
what more can be said about the budget now under review?
The less said about the Ramesh Bhandari ode, the better. Here is a
Governor who has broken all rules of administrative procedure,
going to the extent of attacking no less than the Home Minister
himself in public. It has been an amazing performance. The
Communist Party of India (CPI) has virtually demanded the dismissal
of Bhandari for his statement openly contradicting the Union Home
Minister and CPI leader Indrajit Gupta. In the words of a CPI
member Gurudas Dasgupta, "if a person is found delinquent on number
of occasions, the. best course is to dispense with that person".
According to Dasgupta, Uttar Pradesh is being pushed into a
situation of an "agonising ordeal". The CPI member also asserted
that "there has been a case of grave impropriety by a person
occupying the highest position under President's Rule".
The 'agony' part of the comment is easily understood if one runs
through the crime statistics of Uttar Pradesh in 1996 and 1997. In
the first 45 days of 1996 there were 859 murders in the state. In
the first 45 days in 1997 there have been 928 murders. In the
first 45 days of 1996 there were 157 cases of rape registered in
Uttar Pradesh. In the first 45 days of 1997 the number has
increased to 175 and so on, all down the line. Murder, rape, arson,
burglaries, kidnapping have all shown substantial increases which
alone must have moved Indrajit Gupta to say, honestly, that Uttar
Pradesh is steadily drifting towards "an archy, chaos and
destruction". Strong words, those, but very apt ones, telling it
like it is. But now the Union Home Minister has been forced to cat
his words. We are now informed that by 'anarchy' Gupta meant
political anarchy, by chaos he meant social chaos and by
destruction he meant only the harmless, just economic, destruction.
Which, for Gupta's information, is precisely what everyone thought
they meant. What can be worse than political anarchy, social chaos
and economic destruction?
And all this in the name of secularism and keeping the Bharatiya
Janata Party out of power for its alleged "communalism".
Communalism? What "communalism" has the BJP government shown in
Rajasthan? And what "communalism" has the BJP in partnership with
the Shiv Sena shown in Maharashtra where the combination has been
in power for over two years now? In two years there has not been
one instance of sustained communal disturbance. In the Mumbai
Municipal Corporation elections the BJP-SS combination practically
swept the polls, leaving Congress gasping. In Behrampada which
suffered the most during the 1993 riots, a Shiv Sena candidate was
elected by a predominantly Muslim electorate. What does it
suggest?
Unfortunately for the United Front and the Congress, the "communal"
charge against the BJP is wearing thin and nobody takes it
seriously, even if the UF-CP did, which is doubtful. The BJP-SS
government in Maharashtra has shown itself to be exemplary in
enforcing peace in the state. The Muslim electorate has begun to
appreciate it faster than one expected it to. Crime is on the
increase only in Uttar Pradesh where the Samajwadi Party leader
Mulayam Singh Yadav holds sway and in Bihar where the Janata Dal
'leader' Laloo Prasad Yadav rules the roost. The situation in
Bihar is worse than chaotic or anarchic or destructive.
It is apparently beyond redemption. Trains have become sitting
ducks for nocturnal bandits. Dacoity is openly practised.
Newspapers report looting of passengers on almost a daily basis.
And all that Laloo Prasad has done is to pass the buck and to
suggest a dacoit-politician nexus.
There is enough evidence to show that such a nexus does indeed
exist but that is no consolation to the passengers who have been
robbed. If a Chief Minister cannot ensure the safety of passengers
in trains passing through his territory what is he a Chief Minister
for? Everybody knows that in Bihar it is standard practice for
politicians to encourage attacks on trains. That is the political
culture of the state and it is ruthlessly - even shamelessly _
exercised. The theory is that for all the existing ills of the
state it is the Centre that is responsible and that the only way to
send a message to the Centre is to attack what is considered as
'central property' viz. the train. Whether anarchy, chaos and
destruction prevail in Uttar Pradesh or not, they certainly do in
Bihar whose Chief Minister is supposedly the chairman of the Janata
Dal. the main constituent of the United Front government in Delhi.
And that is the most delicious irony of it all.
There is no government functioning in Bihar; that is for sure.
There is even less administration in Uttar Pradesh; and that is
there for all to see. And yet we watch helplessly the spectacle of
supposedly "secular" paties preventing the BJP from coming to power
when that could at least have helped to stem the, rot. The tocsin
has to be raised. What is happening in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar
today could spread like the plague in neighbouring states, bringing
the nation itself crashing down its ears. The United Front and
Congress Party are playing with fire - and they should be told so,
The nation itself is dangerously close to entering a phase of chaos
and anarchy. For the United Front and the Congress to retract
their steps and to concede that the BJP is better placed to
administer the land, whether at the Centre or in the States is to
admit to past folly. All these months the so-called "secular"
paties have tried to convince themselves and others that the BJP is
a dangerously anti-national party. But how long is the nation
going to allow itself to be fooled? The time surely will come soon
when people will take to the streets and demand the immediate
resignation of the United Front government and the holding of fresh
elections. The BJP has never had it so good.
It has to do nothing but just stand and wait for power to fall into
its hands. The United Front government stands exposed, as do its
component parties. Equally standing exposed is the Congress which
has not a shred of clothes to cover its political nakedness.
Perhaps it is just as well that the Vajpayee government did not
last for more than 13 days. The BJP does not even have to say
"I-told-you-so" when the shortcomings of the Congress and the
United Front are there for all to see. These parties are digging
their own grave; it is only left for them to lie in the holes they
have dug. They have no alternative.
Deve Gowda is living in a cuckoo land of make-believe. Rather than
face up to the facts, he has been on his wings most of the time,
wasting his time and public money on trivialities such as
breakfasting with Bill Gates, flying to his home state umpteen
number of times for the silliest of reasons or going to distant
places to preside over meaningless functions.
These are signs of a tottering government and not a well-placed
administration, which leads one to the conclusion that the
government may fall sooner than is expected and much sooner than
even the most optimistic is willing to concede. The Centre cannot
hold with the United Front in place. If the Front will not go, the
Centre may have to collapse but nobody wants that to happen.
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