There is almost a sense of deja vu as the recently dethroned UP CM Mayawati strides out of the hospital ward, where BSP founder, mentor and chief strategist Kanshi Ram is lying stricken with cerebral paralysis.It was eight years ago, in 1995, when Kanshi Ram hurriedly anointed Mayawati as CM for the first time from a hospital bed in the Capital, when he got his first paralytic stroke then, putting a final end to the BSP-SP alliance.Today, it is a not a triumphant CM who is at Kanshi Ram’s bedside but an embattled leader who is now being hauled over the coals by the courts, investigating agencies and a hostile government in UP and at the Centre.Yet, it is a diffident, brave-faced and tough-talking Mayawati who stops to explain why she does not feel alone and burdened to carry on the party’s work, which now has an enviable political presence in the bigger half of the country. ‘‘I have Kanshi Ramji’s ashirwaad (blessings) to do my work,’’ she says with her characteristic pricklyness, ‘‘I don’t feel it is a monumental job. I can take care of the entire party, there is no problem at all,’’ she underlines, now displaying an exaggerated air of lightness and ease.She portrays a picture of indifference to the SC’s judgement this morning, which gave the CBI the go-ahead to take appropriate action against her on the Taj Corridor case. ‘‘I have yet to see the judgement. I will make my statement within a day or two,” she said.It was a brush-off not meant to be because Mayawati had taken matters in her hands with calculated precision: Within half-an-hour of reaching Kanshi Ram’s bedside late this afternoon, she had her lawyer O.P. Khatari, who was with her for four hours. Her arrangements at the hospital are equally daunting. The trickle of tiny, genteel groups that appeared to plead to see their ‘leader’, left obediently when they were told about ‘‘Behenji’s’’ orders.However, they displayed a quiet confidence and political astuteness when asked about the fate of their party now that their mentor was in a comatose state and their leader entangled in a web of scandal. ‘‘Even L.K. Advani will soon face charges, will he resign?’’ a leader of the group from Ghaziabad asks pointedly. ‘‘So, why should she have to leave politics till her name is cleared? If Behenji is implicated, all Dalits will take to the streets,’’ he warned.
