Opinion - Editorials

No short cuts in Uttar Pradesh

Not for nothing is Uttar Pradesh known in local parlance as `ulta Pradesh', the turbulent State. Consider the psychological warfare currently on between Mulayam Singh and his adversaries — now a jeering crowd with the formal exit from the ruling alliance of the Rashtriya Lok Dal and the Congress. Besieged the Chief Minister may seem to be but he has a reputation for pulling off the impossible — which his opponents believe is shorthand for doing anything to stay on at the helm when the State Assembly goes to the polls soon. For the very reason Mr. Mulayam Singh wants to be in control of the administration, his rivals want him out. What better way to do this than to contrive a situation that makes President's Rule inevitable? The script has bedlam written into it, and this was in evidence when the State Assembly met on Thursday. When the Chief Minister called for the reconvening of the prorogued Assembly, his intention undoubtedly was to prove his majority and then immediately recommend the dissolution of the House. A majority government would be within its rights to pursue that course and Mr. Mulayam Singh could continue to rule — as caretaker Chief Minister.

In the event, round one seems to have gone to the Opposition, although no one can be sure. With the House adjourned till January 24, the Chief Minister stands checked for the moment by the combined might of the RLD, the Congress, the Bahujan Samaj Party, and the Bharatiya Janata Party. So how well equipped is Mr. Mulayam Singh to survive the current ordeal? The numbers are on his side. In a House with an effective strength of 401, he enjoys the support of 209 MLAs — eight more than required. The ruling alliance includes the 33-member Loktantrik Bahujan Dal, a breakaway faction of the BSP whose merger with the Samajwadi Party was quashed by the Allahabad High Court in March 2006. With the Supreme Court reserving its order on a batch of Special Leave Petitions filed against the High Court judgment, the fate of these MLAs hangs in the balance. For obvious reasons, the Chief Minister is in a hurry. The sooner he goes through the floor test, the better it will be for him. His opponents' strategy is the opposite — put off the test for as long as possible. In other ways too, these are stressful times for the SP chief. The threat to his Government comes at a time he is on the defensive over the State's soaring crime graph — brought home last month by the beastliness and sheer evil of the Noida serial killings. Even so, he will be thankful for one thing. After the Bommai judgment, Article 356 fraud by the Centre will be extraordinarily hard to bring off. The battle has to be at the polls and no short cuts are permissible.

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