Shortsighted tactics?

THE ALLIANCE WITH Ms. Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress in West Bengal evidently makes sense for the Congress(I) as a strategy to sharpen its relevance in the context of the coming elections to the State Assembly. After the exodus of its ranks, including several MLAs, to the Trinamool camp during the past few weeks, the Congress(I) high command may now feel relieved that its West Bengal unit can now hope to stay afloat at least in the immediate context. But then the cold reality is that the reprieve could be managed only after the Congress(I) as a party has agreed to pay a heavy price. First, the party had to accept Ms. Banerjee's supremacy in the State (and the high command agreed to sideline Mr. Pranab Mukherjee, its State unit chief, keeping him out of the negotiations with Ms. Banerjee). The Congress(I), as it appears, has even accepted other conditions set by the Trinamool Congress chief such as denying nominations to some of those MLAs who had refused to leave the party all these days. In this sense, the alliance with the Trinamool Congress has served Ms. Banerjee's interests more than the interests of whatever was left of the Congress(I) in West Bengal. Reports of resentment within the State unit are indeed a fallout of the Congress(I) high command opting for short-term gains even if it could mean problems in the context of the imperatives for the party in the larger context.

The tie-up with the Trinamool Congress, for instance, has strained the relationship of the Congress(I) and the Left parties. This, taking place as it does at a time when the Congress(I) has thought it fit to have a strategic understanding with the Left parties in taking on the BJP-led NDA, is a complication that Ms. Sonia Gandhi and her aides in the Congress(I) will have to take into account. It may be true that the Congress(I) cannot hope to remain relevant in West Bengal without being seen as attempting to form a Government in the State. But then, the tie-up with Ms. Banerjee, which does not present any political platform that is distinct, might not help the Congress(I) in this project. Rather than boosting the Congress(I)'s prospects, the gains from the alliance, even if it is incremental, could be for the Trinamool Congress. The rallying point of the anti-Left votes in the given context is going to be Ms. Mamata Banerjee and her Trinamool Congress rather than the Congress(I). By not considering all these factors and by just jumping at the opportunity to enter into a tie-up with Ms. Banerjee (within days after she quit the Union Cabinet and walked out of the NDA in the wake of the storm raised by the Tehelka ``expose'') the Congress(I) high command might have traded in some crucial political space in the national arena for the chance of a stronger presence in the State Assembly.

There is yet another aspect of serious concern arising out of the Congress(I)'s decision. This is Ms. Banerjee's attitude towards the BJP as a party. The Trinamool Congress chief has refused, even now, to condemn the BJP for its communal ideology and majoritarian attitude. Her exit from the NDA and the Union Cabinet was only due to the storm raised by the Tehelka ``expose'' rather than an expression of her objections to the communal ideology that the BJP is wedded to. Ms. Banerjee found the development an opportunity to get rid of the BJP from her bandwagon in West Bengal. After all, the BJP can boast of neither a mass following nor a strong organisational presence in the State. And in this sense, Ms. Banerjee could not have wished away the Congress(I), given the party's performance in the two general elections (1998 and 1999) as well as in the last round of polls to the local bodies. If the Congress(I) high command has chosen to gloss over all these facts and has gone about striking an alliance with the Trinamool Congress, it has been guided by nothing else than the overwhelming desire among sections in its fold to sustain their own hold in the immediate context rather than allowing long term imperatives to guide the party's course. But then, this is a problem with the Congress(I) and the Left and the other parties of the ``third front'' not just in West Bengal.

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