Congress options are clear-cut

The Lok Sabha poll produced the best possible outcome for the Congress by denying and promising it power at the same time. Hope and disappointment in equalmeasure are essential for its well-being. Hope is what will help hold together a party notoriously prone to crumbling in adversity. The shortfall in seats in its own camp and in the United Front protected the Congress from its own worst instincts which would have driven it into the self-defeating process of presiding over an unworkable coalition.

Chandrababu Naidu’s neutrality is responsible for scuttling Harkishen Singh Surjeet’s plans and putting an early end to unwise Congress ambitions. Because the BJP has enough of an edge to compel it to make the first experiment, the Congress is spared the necessity of building a secular front on unstable foundations. Its chief ideological adversary crosses the barricades for the first time in 50 years, not triumphantly but almost apologetically and heavily shackled by partners and the numbers. This provides time and opportunity for the Congress to prepare thoroughly for its next bid for power at the Centre.

This best option obtains as long the BJP can somehowcrack the whip on its motley 18 allies and form a government. If the BJP stumbles at the threshold or soon thereafter, things become more complicated for the Congress. The assumption that the Congress can consolidate or extend its base by supporting minority governments is proved false by its experiences in UP, Gujarat and at the Centre. Irrespective of whether the motives were to contain the BJP, keep disloyal members in check or sheer expediency, the party decimated itself by backing Mulayam Singh Yadav in UP and Chimanbhai Patel and Shankersinh Vaghela in Gujarat. Experiments at the Centre were short-lived but also invited disaster. Such realpolitik as well as the undeniable ambitions of Congress leaders will tempt them to try, for a change, to lead a coalition with the UF.

On the other hand, all the constituents of the UF, and particularly the Left Front and the Telegu Desam Party have even more powerful reasons for keeping their distance from the Congress. The can accept its support but not put aCongress government in power. Someone has to form a government at the Centre in the event of an early BJP collapse and the Congress has a key responsibility in fashioning a workable alternative. That would mean, among other things, avoiding entanglements with J Jayalalitha whose talent for arousing chauvinistic sentiment when thwarted is equal to the BJP’s, and also, as far as possible, tiny one-member entities. That narrows the choice down for the Congress to supporting a government formed by the UF as it is presently constituted.

V.P. Singh believes the 12th Lok Sabha is the last but one stage in the search for stability at the Centre. He may well be right if the Congress plays its cards well. For the BJP the poll was the opportunity of a lifetime gone sour. The secular front which blocked its road to power was in disarray. The Janata Dal was disintegrating, the Congress looked like going the same way. Yet in the end, the Congress managed to hold its own, the Left Front stood solid and the SP advanced.But for the still inexplicable Coimbatore-driven verdict in Tamil Nadu, the BJP would not have had a chance.The Congress came through with two additional seats in the Lok Sabha and 26 per cent of the vote, a whisker ahead of the BJP. This is well below the traditional 30 per cent base mark for the Congress and it was wiped out in UP and Tamil Nadu. Even so it is a surprising result in the face of all manner of very black marks against it monumental corruption, the failures in Ayodhya and Punjab, untrustworthiness as a coalition partner, an organisation in decline, bankrupt leadership. Furthermore, unlike the BJP which has had to deny its fundamental beliefs in order to make common cause with its allies, the Congress is not required to turn somersaults or wear masks. Its conflicts with potential allies from the left, regional or “social justice” parties in the UF are out in the open, plain for all to see. There need be no hidden agendas in a UF-Congress common minimum programme and all sides of thecoalition and their supporters will readily recognise the virtue of that.

The President was wise to ask Atal Bihari Vajpayee to produce written evidence of the success of his negotiations with both pre-poll and post-poll allies. There is no special virtue in pre-poll alliances among parties opposed to each other on ideological grounds. Among the 18 or so parties supporting the BJP only one, the Shiv Sena, shares its value system. The Samata Party, an old ally, and the Trinamul Congress, the AIADMK and the Lok Shakti want no truck with issues which are at the centre of Hindutva and the BJP’s identity. One in four voters chose the BJP or its soul-mate, the Shiv Sena; the overwhelming majority of votes even in UP went to parties which either share to a greater or lesser degree a pluralistic world view or (like the Akalis) thrive under it. The battle for secularism is not being lost.To turn a standstill verdict into something more substantial the Congress will first have to put its own house in order. It hasvery little time to overcome its huge credibility problem and to replace an unworkable top-down structure with a democratic system which puts decision-making where it ought to be, in the hands of State leaders with proven popular bases. Maharashtra has shown that lost ground can be retrieved with a sound organistion and unified leadership. Sonia Gandhi can be useful in keeping the party together during the transition from the old guard to a new, collective leadership.

But in the end the Congress needs more Sharad Pawars with solid grassroots support and to get rid of palace courtiers and power-brokers.