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Pritish Nandy

Hobson's Choice

Last week I interviewed Inder Kumar Gujral for the last time as prime minister. As he prepared to demit office and leave Race Course road for his new residence in Janpath, joining the burgeoning ranks of those who were once prime minister of India. The interview was scheduled to appear on Doordarshan during the weekend and a new government was expected to be in place by the time this column appears. But will it?

Frankly, as I write this column, it looks most unlikely. But politics is a curious game. Anything can happen at any time. However, as we enter the weekend, the BJP's chances of being sworn in on Sunday (as was prognosticated by the political pundits) are slowly receding. And there is no excitement in the Congress, UF camp either. No sense of victory. No pyrrhic celebration.

This can only mean one thing: Everyone dreads the idea of forming a government that will last till the first no confidence motion in Parliament.

The last time this happened was when the 13 day BJP government was sworn in. Despite its best efforts, it could not stay in power to complete its first fortnight and we got (instead) Haradanahalli Deve Gowda as prime minister, leading a 13 member UF supported in power by a not-exactly thrilled Congress, eager to keep the BJP out of office. Within a few months, however, Sitaram Kesri found some silly excuse to pull the plug on Deve Gowda, and the government collapsed. Under the dead weight of its arithmetical minority. But the political pretext was different: Deve Gowda, claimed the Congress, was not consulting Kesri enough on matters on governance.

But the Congress, despite pulling out every trick it knew or could marshall, was unable to piece together a coalition where Kesri could come in as prime minister. So, once again, they backed off from joining the government and insisted that the UF should run India. They offered support, again from the outside. Gujral was the new murga. A decent if somewhat effete man who lasted all of 11 months till the Congress, once again greedy and desperate to share power, pulled the plug on him. Exactly as it did to Deve Gowda. This time, in the name of the Jain Commission.

It was a laughable excuse but the Congress strategy was simple: To go back to the electorate and seek a new mandate that could give them a chance to form and lead the next government.

To achieve this, they pulled out every stop. They swept ugly old Kesri under the carpet. Pretended Sharad Pawar did not exit. Apologised for Ayodhya and Operation Bluestar 14 years too late. Gave Laloo Prasad a clean chit. Wooed Mulayam Singh. Sent roses to Kanshi Ram and Mayawati. They even brought the reclusive Sonia Gandhi out of the closet with Priyanka, Rahulbaba and a nondescript Vadhera in tow. What is most important, they cunningly projected (albeit low key) Manmohan Singh -- its Ace of Spades -- as the future prime minister. Of course, typically, they kept on the side all their alternative candidates ready for a last minute swap in case a Congress government actually looked feasible.

But the electorate still refused to bite. The verdict was a clear no-no for the Congress and, whatever their propaganda machines may now churn out, everyone knows that their Supreme Commander -- whom sis-in-law Maneka Gandhi rather colourfully described as a windshield wiper, referring to her waving action before huge, pre-paid rallies -- came a clear cropper at the hustings.

The party was wiped out in UP, decimated in Orissa, finished off in West Bengal. Apart from Maharashtra, where it made some remarkable strategic gains by coming to an understanding with the Samajwadi Party and the RPI, they lost even the pocket boroughs of Amethi and Rae Bareilly where the Gandhis have traditionally held their own against almost every wave. Sanjay Singh is as much an unlikely winner as Raj Narain was. The electorate did not vote for him. It voted against the Congress.

But that has not stopped the party from doing some fancy footwork to try and cobble together an anti-BJP front that can bring them back to power. So desperate was this attempt that even the media, historically hostile to the BJP, has in the past fortnight done a full 360 degree swing, with frontpage editorials insisting that the electoral mandate must not be tampered with. For, it is obvious even to a confirmed BJP-baiter like me that the people of India have voted for the BJP. To now claim the mandate is for an anti-BJP front, as the Congress is saying, is false, misleading, patently pernicious.

What is worse than the Congress, however, are its old friends. Now waltzing with the BJP. To the tune of the Blue Danube.

You have fat Amma on one hand. Corrupt, cynical, cock of the new walk. She wants eight Cabinet seats, no less. Call it blackmail. Call it bluster. She does not give a damn. For she is known for worse. It is amazing how the people of Tamil Nadu voted her back to power and, what is even more amazing, is how so many months in jail has not taught The Caped Monster anything. She is her old obnoxious self without a single redeeming virtue. To give in to her blackmail would be suicidal. It will render the new government vulnerable from day one.

On the other hand, you have The Shrieking Harridan. Mamta Banerjee of the Trinamul Congress. Her usual screaming, ranting, hysterical self. Her blackmail is of a completely different kind. But equally venal, equally disgusting. After winning the election with the help of the BJP, she now wants to form her own independent club of BJP allies. So that they can jointly blackmail Vajpayee and hold the BJP to ransom. The case of the tail wagging the dog.

Caught between these two revolting, blackmailing women -- the third, Lakshmi Parvathi having, luckily, drawn a blank in Andhra Pradesh -- the usually tough-talking, browbeating BJP is at a loss for words. It is caught between a rock and a hard place and does not know which way to go. If it succumbs, it will learn (as all victims of blackmail learn the hard way) that the demands of blackmailers never stop. They only grow and grow and grow. On the other hand, if they do not succumb, where will they get their numbers from? How will the next government be formed? Who will step in and how will they manage to cobble together an alternative?

We all know how the Congress managed to keep a minority government going last time. Narasimha Rao is still in the courts, defending himself against charges of bribery filed by the CBI. While the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha MPs -- and other beneficiaries of his largesse -- are laughing all the way to the bank. Do we want that to happen all over again? Do we want a feeble government in office, propped up by corrupt MPs paid off before every session of Parliament? Or do we go, once again, to the people of India for a fresh mandate?

It's a tough choice to make. And there is nobody there to make it.

Pritish Nandy