Sultan of somersaults

As public outrage over the October events died down, few realised that Agrawal was capable of springing one more surprise. But he did precisely this by withdrawing support to the Kalyan Singh government and becoming deputy chief minister in the Jagdambika Pal government on February 21. Two days later another somersault followed and Agrawal was backin the BJP camp.

According to him, he has achieved what he set out to do.“I have proved that only the Loktantrik Congress can provide a stable government,” he said, after Kalyan Singh managed to prove his majority with help from the Loktantrik Congress MLAs on Thursday. It may sound ironical, especially since the BJP has been campaigning for these elections on the stability plank, but this is what politics in UP is all about. Agrawal symbolises its darkest aspects.

Agrawal is no novice in UP politics. His father, S.C. Agrawal, was a three-time MLA. His grandfather, C.L. Gupta, represented Shahabad twice in Parliament. Naresh himself had been elected to the Assembly for the fifth time in October 1996.

Born in October 1951 into a Hardoi-based lawyer’s family, Agrawal graduated in law from Lucknow University. His first foray into active politics came with his appointment as president of the Hardoi district Youth Congress Committee in 1974. By 1978, he had become the general secretary of the State YouthCongress Committee in 1978. In 1980, he became an elected MLA.

Agrawal was pugnacious in his politics. When he was denied a Congress ticket for the second successive time in 1989, he contested as an independent and won. He managed to claw his way back into the party subsequently and was appointed general secretary of the UP Congress Committee in 1990. He won the assembly elections again in 1991 and in 1993 was elected deputy leader of Congress Legislature Party (CLP) under long-time friend Pramod Tiwari.

Yet politics makes for ruthlessness and friends often turn bitter foes. Agrawal came into the limelight through his “oust-Pramod Tiwari” campaign in 1997. With the help of 22 out of the total 37 members of the CLP, Agrawal dislodged Tiwari last March. However, because of the political turmoil at the Centre his mentor, Jitendra Prasada, the then UPCC president, refused to recognise the election.

Agrawal waited only for six months for the party high command to accede to his demand for Tiwari’s removal.At this juncture, he reportedly was in touch with BJP leader Kalyan Singh too, since the latter needed the support of about 35 MLAs to get rid of Mayawati. Within moments of Mayawati withdrawing support to the Kalyan Singh government on October 21, the chief minister had got in touch with Agrawal in Delhi and within 24 hours Agrawal was ready with 21 other MLAs to form the Loktantrik Congress and bail the Kalyan Singh government out.

A stunned Congress termed him and his fellow legislators “traitors”, while they were “saviours” for the BJP. Agrawal also quickly jettisoned any ideological convictions that he may once have had, stating that terms like communalism and secularism needed to be redefined.

For his quick-change act, he was suitably rewarded with the energy portfolio in the Kalyan Singh cabinet. But clearly it did not satisfy the politician in him. This is probably what led him to topple the Kalyan government on February 21 almost as swiftly as he had saved it. He was sworn in as deputy chiefminister in the Jagdambika Pal Cabinet on the same day. It was now BJP’s turn to call him a “traitor” and for the Congress to hail him. Agrawal, on his part, accused the BJP of “radical communalism”.

It was the High Court verdict reinstating Kalyan Singh as chief minister, that caused Agrawal to change tack once again. Back with the Kalyan Singh camp, he continued to talk to the CM’s opponents like Jitendra Prasada and Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh until in fact only hours before the crucial composite voting was to take place as directed by the Supreme Court. “He has been purchased by the BJP,” was all that Pal could say.

Agrawal himself blames Kalyan Singh’s autocratic behaviour for his decision to withdraw support. He insists that if he had not joined the Pal camp, the rebel LC members would never have returned to the BJP fold. “What is the use of a Chief Minister who refuses to meet his own ministers?” asks Agrawal, adding that at least two of his colleagues have not been provided anofficial car and about a dozen have as yet not been allotted a ministerial residence.

Agrawal’s is clearly a politics of convenience. Despite having changed sides thrice over the last week, he still continues to talk breezily on ideological matters. “I never agreed with BJP’s idology. We have separate parties with different ideologies. I have a firm faith in secularism and would continue working for it,”he says. He adds that he returned to the BJP only after Kalyan Singh openly realised his mistake in ignoring his own ministers. Those who know him well feel that such observations herald another somersault in the not-too-distant future.

Agrawal, however, remains unfazed by such jibes. While answering the numerous phone calls congratulating him for winning the vote of confidence for Kalyan Singh and retaining his ministerial berth, he frowns occasionally and growls, “Ab kitni baar badhai dooge? (How many times will you congratulate me?)” Some of the callers had evidently congratulated him on hisbecoming deputy chief minister in the Pal cabinet as well. Clearly, Agrawal and his brand of politics suffer from no dearth of admirers.But his staunchest admirer is wife Manjul. The world may have mixed responses to him but his wife never. “He is such a caring person,” she gushes. The couple have two children a son studying in a Delhi school, and a daughter studying business management in Ghaziabad.

Manjul reveals that her husband never discusses politics with her “because he feels women spill the beans very easily”.

This is not really surprising. Discretion is of utmost importance in the kind of politics her husband practises. Ultimately, no one can be trusted, not even one’s wife.