Mahanta's exit

THE RESIGNATION OF Mr. Prafulla Kumar Mahanta both as president of the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) and as leader of the party's legislature wing may have saved him the embarrassment of being asked by the general body to quit. Even if it is true that the immediate context for Mr. Mahanta's exit from the party president's post (that he held ever since he helped found the AGP some 15 years ago) was the story about his ``marriage'' with a woman employee in the Assam State secretariat, there is no denying the fact that he was under pressure to quit for some time now. In this sense, his detractors in the party seized upon the charges of bigamy as a chance to replace him. That Mr. Mahanta announced his resignation a couple of days ahead of the general body meeting convened specifically to discuss the ``crisis'' caused by the reported marriage of the former Chief Minister confirms his losing clout in the party fora. And, in this sense, the story about his marriage had only come in handy to those within the party who had begun to find Mr. Mahanta becoming a liability for the AGP.

The AGP's defeat in the elections to the State Assembly, in which several of Mr. Mahanta's Cabinet colleagues lost (Mr. Mahanta himself lost in Dispur, one of the two constituencies he contested), was seen as a fallout of the effete leadership he provided and his own acts of commission and omission during the five years he was Chief Minister of Assam. Even if it may be unreasonable to hold the Chief Minister alone responsible for the body blow that the AGP suffered in the polls, Mr. Mahanta himself had acted in such fashion that had reduced the AGP into his fiefdom. While the manner in which he ensured the ouster of Mr. B. K. Phukan - his comrade from the days of the All Assam Students Union - soon after the AGP formed its Government in 1986 was inexplicable, Mr. Mahanta went about easing out almost all those who were with him in building the AGP into a powerful political outfit in the same way as he finished Mr. Phukan. Mr. Mahanta, in this way, knocked the bottom off all the ideals and the fire that symbolised the AASU and, rather than presiding over the AGP with a vision that could live up to the ideas that had generated the massive public support it received, he did everything to reduce the platform into yet another political party whose objectives began and ended with preserving his own vested interests. All these took their toll in the defeat of the party in the last elections.

Be that as it may, Mr. Mahanta was not the only weak link, so to say, insofar as the AGP was concerned. It is a fact that the party, in its 15 years of existence, has lost its moorings. This was only natural in one sense. The AASU to begin with and the AGP when it was founded symbolised the expression of the collective anger of a cross section of the people of Assam against the tendency among the political leaders in the State, the Congress in particular, to look up to their high command in New Delhi. It was in this context that the AASU as a movement could strike roots in the State. While the first slogan was to identify and deport ``foreigners'' from Assam, the AASU and the AGP after 1986 came to represent the aspirations of the people of the State and, in this sense, showed all the promise to emerge into a strong platform against the Delhi-centric politics in Assam. But then, Mr. Mahanta failed to deliver and the AGP dispensation even in its first term turned out to be corrupt. And it was ousted from power in 1991. And if the party managed to wrest power once again in 1996, it was because the AGP as a party was not decimated. The situation now is different. It may be true that Mr. Mahanta is no longer what he was when he led the party to victory twice in 15 years. But then, the AGP as a party would be said to have learnt its lessons if those left in it decide in favour of a collective leadership rather than promoting any one leader.

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