After Kaun Banega PM, it’s Kaun Banenge Mantri

Every major partner in the alliance wants a plum portfolio and the battle in the first round is about the criteria — numbers or ‘‘prestige’’ or a combination of the two — for selection.

If ‘‘prestige’’ is the criteria then ‘‘heavyweights’’ with previous Cabinet experience — Sharad Pawar and Ram Vilas Paswan head the list — should get top posts. Given Pawar’s excellent rapport with PM-designate Manmohan Singh, he was expected to get one of the Big Four ministries — Finance, Home, Defence, External Affairs — and, in his case, Defence seemed likely.

Similarly, Paswan played a key role in building the ‘‘secular’’ pre-poll alliance and was the first leader to offer unstinted support to a Sonia-led government. Once the results came in, his supporters were convinced that he was the next Railways minister: one portfolio much loved by MPs from the East.

But unhappy with such assumptions, other alliance partners want respective strengths of the parties to be the sole criteria for portfolio distribution.

The biggest party in the alliance after the Congress is Laloo Prasad Yadav’s RJD with 21 seats, followed by the DMK with 16, and NCP comes in third with nine seats.

‘‘How can Pawar get Defence when he has only nine MPs? Why shouldn’t Laloo get one of the Big Four when he has more than double the number?’’ is the complaint of RJD loyalists.

The DMK, having decided to join the government, also wants something more ‘‘prestigious’’ than environment and commerce ministries they held in the NDA government. Their first choice, sources said, was Railways. Reason: the ministry has been a preserve of Bihar, and earlier Bengal, for far too long, and it is time the South got a share of the largesse that this ‘‘labour-intensive’’ and ‘‘perks rich’’ ministry brings.

The Telangana Rashtra Samiti, hoping that the ‘‘prestige’’ and not ‘‘numbers’’ criteria will work, also wants a Cabinet berth. But Congressmen from Andhra Pradesh, who form the largest contingent of party MPs, scoff at the demand: ‘‘The TRS didn’t do as well as the Congress in the polls. How can they get a Cabinet-rank minister with just five Lok Sabha seats?’’

Never mind that Paswan’s Lok Janashakti Party has only four, and Shibu Soren’s (another likely Cabinet minister) has five. Given their stature, they could not possibly be fobbed off with a Minister of State rank, and the Andhra MPs know it.

The Andhra Congressman’s attitude towards the TRS demand reflects a more widespread sentiment. In the run-up to the elections, the Congress president went around cajoling Opposition leaders to agree to an alliance and settled for pretty bad bargains — exemplified by the four seats given to her in Bihar.

But now the tables have turned. The Congress, with 145 seats, is the biggest party in the alliance by a huge margin. As one Congress leader, dismissing Laloo’s ‘‘tantrums’’ as of little consequence, said: ‘‘Politics is not just the art of the possible; it is also a game of compulsions. Before the elections, we were compelled to accept the four seats he offered us. Now, he is compelled to be part of the alliance.’’

The underlying message: Congress will be magnanimous in victory but will not hand over all the top Cabinet posts to allies when it has several men and women of experience in its own ranks. The battle for berths within the Congress, however, will take place once the allies’ demands are sorted out.