Cautious to a fault

The President’s seeking of an assurance from Atal Behari Vajpayee that he is both willing and able to provide a stable government can only be described as abundant caution. The pity is that it is also superfluous caution. The President should have invited the BJP to form the government as it is the single largest party in Parliament, with the biggest pre-poll alliance, without worrying about its “ability” to provide a stable government. That ability, or the lack of it, would have shortly been demonstrated in Parliament. The country could then have had the satisfaction of knowing that the President went by the book and did the right thing. Instead, his demanding to see letters of support to the BJP creates a potential for needless controversy. Seeking such letters from the BJP’s allies is no guarantee of the party withstanding the confidence vote in Parliament. The recent instance in Uttar Pradesh of Jagdambika Pal providing such letters did not prevent his eventual defeat in the House. So much for stabilitysecured through letters. The BJP, not normally known for its reticence, has itself probably refrained from comment only because it has no wish at the moment to incur the President’s displeasure. But had any other party been asked a similar question, there would have been an outcry in some quarters and certainly in the BJP. The point is that even if a conflict is perceived between the largest numbers in Parliament and stable government, the former must take precedence if presidential propriety is to be preserved.

Most importantly, there is a constitutional question at issue which is best understood if the scenario is reversed for illustration. The test of numbers is a test which constitutional propriety demands should be carried out on the floor of the House. After the BJP’s unfortunate experience with government formation two years ago, it seems reasonable to expect that unless it was sure of winning support in the House this time round, it would have declined the President’s invitation. If it had beenfoolish enough to rush in anyway, it would have deserved to discredit itself, and the President could then have gone on, in proper order, to ask the next largest party to have a shot at running the country. As it happens, the President has popped the question to the party which happens to command the largest numbers and so he can at worst be accused of being over-cautious, not over-ambitious. But his action implies that seeking assurances is the President’s job. Now if he had asked the same question to the Congress, that party could have been invited to form the government on the strength of its promise of stability. Such an invitation could have generated its own momentum to give it the required numbers in Parliament. And so a government might have come into being not on the basis of electoral legitimacy but of governmental stability. By not straightaway inviting the single largest party the President has set a precedent which could prompt another President to exceed his authority. The President’s motivesare honourable. But his means in this instance could help lesser successors to secure more power than allowed by the Constitution.