Commentary/Saisuresh Sivaswamy

Deve Gowda's exit will ensure clear passage for budget

The current political melodrama that has been having an uninterrupted run in New Delhi for more than two weeks, should hopefully end in another week. By that time we will know the fate of the Union Budget 1997 and also details of the new political arrangement that will preside over the nation's destiny till someone somewhere decides that he has had enough of seeing the same person as prime minister and does something about it.

There is one thing peculiar about this present political drama: in fact, we have seen so many googlies bowled by the players in the arena as to do B S Chandrashekhar proud. And, despite hailing from the same state as Chandra, Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda had little clue as to how to play the deliveries.

The first googly, of course, was bowled by the Bharatiya Janata Party when it agreed to let the Bahujan Samaj Party take first shot at the chief ministership in Uttar Pradesh in a King Vikramaditya-like arrangement that keeps it in power every six months. Strangely, the reaction came not from the batsman, Deve Gowda, but from the runner at the other end, Sitaram Kesri, who decided it was time to throw away his wicket even if it meant the entire team would have to return to the pavilion.

Many sharp deliveries followed but the last googly came from Speaker Purno A Sangma himself. By convening a special sitting of Parliament next week to pass the Budget, the fate of which is in balance along with Deve Gowda's, he has, probably in consultation with the head of the state, ensured that the political crisis does not result in another round of elections. More important, his diktat gives the various dramatis personae the breathing space required to explore alternatives, but it cannot be denied that it also ensures the United Front's continuance in office.

This googly, however, was not bowled to the UF or its opening batsman, but to Kesri. For, while the Bharatiya Janata Party has made clear its intention to vote against the Finance Bill and other provisions of the Budget even before the government fell, it is the Congress that has been virtually asked to redeem its assurance of voting in favour of the budgetary provisions. But whoever was heard of a defeated government successfully piloting the Finance Bill in Parliament!

In fact, if the House votes in favour of the Finance Bill Monday next, it will be an affirmation of its confidence in the government.

If anything, what this ongoing drama has exposed is that there have been no winners, only losers, and that not including the electorate.

In retrospect, it was always clear that Deve Gowda would have to go, for there could have been no other outcome once the single largest party that is supporting the government has voiced this demand. And now that it is crystal clear that the Front is all set to replace him as the chief executive, one cannot help wondering what all the fuss was about in the first place.

If the point that was sought to be proved by his refusal to go before the trust vote was to expose the Congress's designs, the Front itself has not come out shining. And now it is even clearer that he will have to go, if for nothing then for the sake of his government's much-acclaimed Budget, there is no other way the Congress party will help in its passage.

Will Laloo Prasad Yadav be the next occupant of the chair in the Lok Sabha that was once occupied by Jawaharlal Nehru?

What this crisis has focused on, among other things, is on the need for a politician who is at home in the capital, who is no stranger to the working of the capital's political mechanism and who has a fair idea of the nature of intrigues that go on in the corridors of power. Someone like Deve Gowda, who has spent his entire life in the confines of a state, even in the top position there, would find the dynamics in New Delhi strange.

And the prime minister's job is not something that one can grow into, as Rajiv Gandhi proved with disastrous consequences to the nation. In this sense, Laloo Prasad Yadav is slightly better placed than Deve Gowda was, given his proximity to Delhi. But again, he is only slightly better placed than Deve Gowda, and that is certainly no qualification for the top job.

What the Front needs is a regional leader who has also spent enough time in the Union ministries, and the present combination has two such men: External Affairs Minister Inder Kumar Gujral, and Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram. While the first is non-controversial, meaning acceptable to all sides, the latter has better credentials that may swing things the United Front's way. For one, he is politically not naive, and more important, he shares excellent equations with 10 Janpath.

Which, given the UF's dependence on Congress support, may matter a great deal in the new dispensation emerging in steering committee meetings. Surely, Kesri or his successor will think twice before pulling the rug from under the feet of someone looked upon favourably by the presiding deity of his party.

Whoever fortune smiles on in the next one week to occupy 7 Racecourse Road, he or she must be clear that the tenancy will end before the century runs out. It simply will not be in the Congress's interests to let a government dependent on it earn accolades in any field, and the only way to negate this possibility will be accommodate it in the government. That, needless to say, will pose its own problems, but more of that when the occasion demands it.

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