The Hindu : Cabinet formation in U.P.

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, May 07, 2002

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Cabinet formation in U.P.

AT A TIME when ministerial berths have been reduced to instruments of self-preservation for members of the political class, constitution of a Cabinet is indeed a breeding ground for dissent. If this is becoming the rule rather than the exception even where the Government consists of a single party, the problem is only bound to be intense where a combination of parties gathers together (and that too after the elections) as it has happened with the BSP's Mayawati in Uttar Pradesh. The important leaders of the BJP in Delhi may claim that the decision to align with the BSP in the State was stoked by their desire to ensure a popular Government in Uttar Pradesh. But then, the truth is that there were compulsions from their MLAs (at least those who saw themselves as prospective Ministers) apart from the urgent need to shore up numbers in the Lok Sabha in the context of the Gujarat debate (under Rule 184) that finally led to the arrangement with the BSP. This is true of the 14-member contingent of Ajit Singh's Rashtriya Lok Dal too.

The BJP leaders may also seek to couch their decision in social terms and claim to have displayed their commitment to empowering the Dalits but then the truth is that the party was in no position to convince its MLAs to resist the possibility of becoming Ministers. The reality being such, it was only natural that those who lost out in the game would now resort to making a virtue out of "principles". The threat, as has been reported, by Chandramani Kant Singh to vote against the Government (when Ms. Mayawati moves the confidence motion in the State Assembly) and the dissent brewing within the BJP Legislature Party spearheaded by the former Ministers, Harishchandra Srivastava and Ganga Bhakt Singh, are only natural given the context in which the alliance came into place. Their protestations, in this sense, may only be seen as public posturing. After all, those making such noises as well as the Chief Minister cannot but be aware of the consequence — they could end up losing their membership in the State Assembly — in the event of executing the threat. This, however, does not mean that the Mayawati dispensation will sail smooth in the State and remain in office for the full five years. The source of trouble, in this sense, may not be contentions over Cabinet berths but some of the ideological conflicts that remain between the two major parties — the BSP and the BJP — in the combine as well as the possible erosion of the BJP's social base (consisting primarily of the upper castes) when Ms. Mayawati begins to implement her own party's agenda of Dalit assertion.

The experience with Ms. Mayawati's first term as Chief Minister (when the BJP experimented with the social engineering agenda) in 1995 is a case in point. The resentment among the upper castes against the instances when the provisions of the Scheduled Castes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act were enforced across Uttar Pradesh and the official sanction for the various cultural programmes in Uttar Pradesh where such symbols of Dalit consolidation as Ambedkar, Jyotibha Phule and Periyar were made icons turned out to be an irritant and all these led to the BJP withdrawing support to the BSP Government. It is true that a lot of water has flowed down the Gomti since then and the BJP, after having been reduced to the third position (in terms of its tally in the Assembly), finds a lasting alliance with the BSP as the only means to keep the Samajwadi Party at bay in Uttar Pradesh. The same is true of the BSP too and Ms. Mayawati knows only too well that her own future at the helm of affairs in Uttar Pradesh will depend on the BJP's support. All these do not mean that the sailing is going to be smooth. What with the criminal-politician nexus so firmly becoming a part of the discourse in the State and the civil society institutions beginning to lose their significance, and dissent and the games that ultimately contribute to a further retreat of the democratic institutions in the State. This is what should concern Ms. Mayawati and her colleagues in the Cabinet for the stakes involved are too high to be glossed over.

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