Naidu’s campaign loses sting, Congress CMs stay away

NEW DELHI, AUGUST 21: Telugu Desam Party chief N.Chandrababu Naidu's campaign against the recommendations of the Eleventh Finance Commissi...

NEW DELHI, AUGUST 21: Telugu Desam Party chief N.Chandrababu Naidu’s campaign against the recommendations of the Eleventh Finance Commission lost some of its sting today when Congress Chief Ministers kept away from it.

Most conspicuous by its absence was Congress-ruled Karnataka. Though Chief Minister S.M.Krishna would not have been able to make it because of the visit of Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori to Bangalore, it was expected that senior minister K.H.Ranganath would depute for him.

Maharashtra was represented at the CMs’ conclave, but not by Chief Minister and Congressman Vilasrao Deshmukh, but by his deputy Chhagan Bhujbal, from the Nationalist Congress Party.

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Though chief ministers of four States where the ruling National Democratic Alliance constituents are in power — Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Haryana and Manipur — is no doubt significant, but all of them are regional parties.

The presence of a chief minister belonging to the Congress, a national party, would have given Naidu’s initiative an entirely different spin. The effect would have been the same had the BJP’s Chief Minister in Gujarat, Keshubhai Patel dared to attend the meeting.

Karnataka’s decision to pull out of the meeting seemed to be a last-minute one as on Sunday, its representative had attended a meeting of finance secretaries convened ahead of Monday’s conclave of CMs. The State’s dissociation from Naidu’s initiative is all the more surprising because Krishna was among the chief ministers who had written to Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee opposing the EFC recommendations.

It is possible that party bosses might have cracked the whip on Congress CMs. Ever since Naidu announced his intention to get together the CMs of the States affected by the EFC recommendations, Congress leaders got into the act. Chief Minister of Congress-ruled Rajasthan, Ashok Gehlot, wrote to Vajpayee supporting the EFC. His Madhya Pradesh counterpart echoed Gehlot’s views.

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Simultaneously, Jairam Ramesh, secretary in the AICC economic affairs cell, and more importantly the Deputy Chairman of the Karnataka Planning Board, also went public with his criticism of Naidu’s move. He had said that he would advise Krishna to keep away from the meeting called by the Andhra CM.

“As a political party, we can pillory the Union Government and destroy one more constitutional institution. There must be a limit to partisan politics in this country,” Ramesh told The Indian Express.

Naidu had invited Chief Ministers of 17 States, but only eight were represented at the conclave. Attendance at yesterday’s meeting of finance secretaries was better, with 13 States sending their representatives.