Commentary/Saisuresh Sivaswamy

The United Front stands naked to its enemies

Nobody expected the Union Cabinet to take a tough stand in Uttar Pradesh and recommend President's rule in the state. But then, no one expected the President to return the recommendation in the cover it came in, with a request to reconsider. But then, that is the stuff Indian democracy is increasingly being made of. As the nation goes increasingly corporate, the present set of events can be likened to the board of directors, charged with running a corporation, misusing their powers, and the auditors correcting the course.

No doubt, there is no dearth of decent men in the present dispensation. The prime minister himself is one of them. As is the finance minister. The home minister. The agriculture minister. But collectively, as the storm of political partisanship raged through New Delhi, they were showed up for their inability to withstand the gale. No doubt, in buckling, they may have recalled the hoary Indian saw that it is only the coconut tree that breaks in the wind, the lowly grass living to fight another day.

But again, greatness is conferred on those who tread a solitary path, of splendid isolation, never mind if the horde has taken the wrong turning. There is no great Indian left in the political system; the checks and balances are increasingly being put to use in the face of executive infraction.

Yes, there are a few silver lining to the dark cloud. The President has re-enforced the Presidential prerogative, and shown that it is up to him to exercise his discretion, and that he need not be a rubber stamp of the government in power. In these days of coalition governments, that are vulnerable to disparate pressures, it is his steely resolve that will steady the nation.

Contrast the incumbent's sagacity with that of his representative in Lucknow, who has crawled when his political bosses told him to bend. The judiciary, of course, has for long been the sentinel of democracy in the face of wayward politicians, and the Rashtrapati has nodded in this direction.

Much is being made of the President returning the Cabinet's recommendation for reconsideration, the unprecedented nature of this move. But not much thought appears to have gone into what a government, which has suffered obvious loss of face when its collective wisdom has been rebuffed, ought to do. Pride, they say, is the prerogative of the scholarly, and by this yardstick, the collective wisdom of the present lot is enough to fit on a pinhead, with space left for angels to dance. In my opinion, a government that has suffered this fate has no moral right to remain in office, even if the legislative numbers are on its side.

Democracy is not merely a game of numbers, it is also about values and their upholding. This government has been caught on the threshold of violating the statute, and is thus bereft of even a fig leaf to cover its modesty. It is, truly, naked to its enemies.

But then, it will be humoured for a little more time, since those propping this arrangement know surely that the fallout of their collective stupidity will be paid for with blood at the hustings and hence would like to delay the inevitable.

The Rashtrapati, who too knows that the time is nigh, would not want to step into the arena of adventurism and will remain a bystander, perhaps till the next set of errors. And the nation knows that its coffers cannot afford yet another round of electioneering, not so soon after the previous round. And thus, the Inder Kumar Gujral government will trundle along, a gathering of wise men outshadowed by the pettyfogging ones among them, individual stars eclipsed by the dark moon.

Are there any winners at the end of the last round, or is it no-win no-lose? The United Front is clearly among the losers, its lack of resolve and sagacity now a byword among students of Indian politics. As for the Congress, and Sitaram Kesri in particular, it is as if a typhoon has entered its front door. Just as he thought he had Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat sewn up, if not the Centre, things have come apart at the seam.

In UP, where the party liked to believe that its fortunes were on the upswing, a majority of the legislature party has crossed over to the Bharatiya Janata Party; something unheard of in the annals of free India. It could be a portent of things of come; if the think-tank of the 'ultra Hindu nationalist party' could pull off something akin to this at the Centre, then the party will be truly and finally over for the country's natural party of power. The most of charitable thing to say for the Congress right now is that it will take some time for it to wash the stains off its hands.

For the BJP, it is like as if the events were scripted by the editor of Tarun Bharat, so much in its favour have they been. In just 48 hours, the UP chief minister has turned a potential defeat into a remarkable turnaround, and has broken the back of his political foes, a feat that his federal counterpart was unable to perform one and a half years ago.

The worst that you could charge him with is engineering political defections, but he has seen to it that he has remained on the right side of the law in doing so. Yes, you could say that his legislators, rather than return the Samajwadi Party's and the Bahujan Samaj Party's compliments inside the assembly that fateful Tuesday, could have taken recourse to Mohandas Gandhi's example, it would have surely fetched the party more votes when the ballot boxes are opened.

The biggest winner, of course, is the system, often parodied. The founding fathers have not left behind a shell, they have bequeathed a covenant that has stood the test of time and men with petty ambitions. It is an entirely different matter that we have shown ourselves to be unworthy of such a legacy, and all it has taken to hold a mirror to ourselves is a little man from the backwaters of Kerala.

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