Chennai isn’t the only one

Take a look at neighbouring Karnataka, the one state in South India that wholeheartedly embraced the BJP. The party’s alliance with Ramakrishna Hegde’s Lok Shakti paid off spectacularly. The pair won 16 of the state’s 28 seats, with the BJP picking up 13 and the Lok Shakti getting three.

But that same success may have sown the dragon’s teeth as well. The Janata Dal, the ruling party in Karnataka, won just three seats, and the writing is clearly on the wall. It will be easy enough to manoeuvre Chief Minister J.H. Patel out of office. But what happens then? The BJP wants fresh Assembly polls as soon as possible. But the Lok Shakti thinking is that a fresh ministry can be formed in the life of the current Assembly by organising defections from the Janata Dal. Obviously, there is no way to reconcile these diametrically different positions.

The Lok Shakti position is understandable. The party itself was created as a result of Hegde’s expulsion from the Janata Dal. He carefully maintained goodrelations with Janata Dal MLAs in the years of Deve Gowda’s glory. Given half a chance, most would flock to Hegde’s standard. That would be the equivalent of killing two birds with one stone for Lok Shakti. The party would immediately win control of a large and relatively prosperous state. And when the much-dreaded Assembly polls fall due, as they must in late 1999, it would be ideally placed to insist on the principle that sitting MLAs shouldn’t be deprived of tickets.

That scarcely pleases the BJP. Party workers feel they did substantially better than their partner. The BJP won 13 of the 18 Lok Sabha seats it contested, whereas the Lok Shakti tally was three out of 10.

Under those circumstances, it doesn’t make sense to surrender a majority of the Assembly seats. That is why the BJP wants fresh polls as soon as possible. It can then insist on taking all Assembly segments where it won in the recent General Election, thus consolidating its hold on Karnataka.

But the BJP-Lok Shakti alliance is definitelya case where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The BJP always had the infrastructure. (Its love affair with Karnataka was apparent as early as the 1991 General Election). But it lacked a dominating personality to act as a vote-catcher and was handicapped by its perceived anti-minority stance. Hegde, on the other hand, is the tallest leader from Karnataka, familiar on the national stage for over a decade. However, he had no organisation worth the name.

The BJP-Lok Shakti alliance was one where the strengths of the one perfectly complemented those of the other. The BJP lent its formidable organisational capacities. Hegde gave the BJP the benefit of his popularity and his acceptability with the minorities. If the two now start fighting each other, the success of 1998 could be history. (Just as the Janata Dal’s success of 1996 vanished the moment Gowda and Hegde fell out.)

The BJP’s central leadership is caught between pursuing its own long-term interests and the imperatives of the moment.Should it gracefully accede to Hegde even at the risk of annoying party workers in Karnataka? For that matter, will the Lok Shakti chief be able to live with a smaller slice of the cake in the event of immediate Assembly polls? Even assuming that both parties agree on what follows the fall of J.H. Patel, the differences of opinion won’t end. Hegde’s choice of Patel’s successor is R.V. Deshpande (whether as Chief Minister of a defection-created ministry or Chief Ministerial candidate of the BJP-Lok Shakti front in the polls). And here caste raises its ugly head again.

Deshpande is a Brahmin. So are Hegde and H.N. Ananth Kumar of the BJP, both full-fledged Cabinet ministers from Karnataka in the Vajpayee government. It won’t go down very well with the Lingayats, one of Karnataka’s two dominant castes, if their caste-fellow J.H. Patel is replaced by yet another Brahmin. It may be relevant to note that the senior BJP leader in the state, Yediurappa, is a Lingayat.

One compromise being heard about is that LokShakti will engineer defections from the Janata Dal but offer the Chief Minister’s chair to a BJP candidate. However, BJP leaders fight shy of the proposal. Such an administration will be shaky at the best of times. It will definitely sully the party’s image in the state. Finally, it still leaves open the vexed question of distributing tickets in the inevitable polls. (Postponing a decision to 1999 is no solution.)

Ironically, all this shadow-boxing, this fine balancing of caste interests may give the incumbent Chief Minister a breather. As long as there is a difference of opinion between his foes, they can’t afford to remove Patel.Pardon me for going into such detail over Karnataka, but the state presents a glimpse of the BJP’s dilemma in microcosm. Orissa, Tamil Nadu, Bihar, even perhaps Andhra Pradesh — the BJP is required to walk a tightrope wherever its ally is a strong regional party.

In 1971 Indira Gandhi found a solution of sorts in Tamil Nadu. She left the Assembly to her regional partner whiletaking the lioness’s share of the Lok Sabha results. But that wasn’t a very good bargain in the long run.

What is required is a new paradigm for a coalition between a national party and a regional ally. Given self-restraint and a sense of proportion by all concerned, it isn’t impossible. But the BJP and its allies have a bumpy road ahead.