Walking on eggshells

Prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee8217;s much awaited cabinet expansion 8212; the second in his seven-month tenure 8212; was something of an anti-climax. The reinduction of Samata Party stalwart, Nitish Kumar, was entirely predictable. The Biju Janata Dal had a Cabinet ministership, and a ministership of state independent charge and the posts were duly filled in accordance to the wishes of Navin Patnaik, chief minister of Orissa and top honcho of the party, after his luckless party colleague, Dilip Ray, was asked to resign. Patnaik was particular to retain the Steel and Mines portfolio, and the Prime Minister obliged him, indicating the clout that regional satraps continue to wield in Delhi. It also does not need any great perspicacity to gauge that this short and sweet exercise must have left many with a chilling sense of being let down by the High Command yet again. Most of this lot, incidentally, are from the Prime Minister8217;s own party and include three former chief ministers of Delhi. To them, Vajpayee conveyedan unequivocal message: the expansion is complete for the time being, therefore abandon all hope of ministering unto the nation for now.

Sushma Swaraj and Sahib Singh Verma must be feeling particularly aggrieved, given the fact that they had resigned the first as a Cabinet minister, and the second as the chief minister of Delhi on the express promise from their party leaders that they would be accommodated in the Union ministry at a later date. This is not to argue that either Swaraj or Verma should be in the Cabinet, but rather to decry the tendency of party leaders to come up with quick-fix solutions to political crises, only to regret their over-hasty moves at leisure. Swaraj8217;s induction as Delhi8217;s chief minister as a desperate, last-ditch attempt to buttress the party8217;s fading electoral fortunes in the days when onion prices and the mustard oil scandal ruled the headlines, is now regarded as an unmitigated disaster. The BJP lost that November 1998 election resoundingly in a region that it had long regarded as its home turf. So scalded was it by the experience that now it does not even have the nerve to shunt out chief ministers whoeminently deserve to go like Uttar Pradesh8217;s Ram Prakash Gupta.

The resignation of Nitish Kumar as Union minister of agriculture a few months ago was also dictated by short-term considerations which boomeranged badly. The idea was that he would lead the combined forces of the NDA to storm the Rashtriya Janata Dal citadel. Although Nitish made it to the chief minister8217;s post, thanks to the succour provided by Bihar Governor Vinod Pande, his government fell within a week. At that point of time, Nitish made it generally known that he was going to stay on in Bihar, dig in his heels, nurse the NDA coalition and fight the RJD until Laloo Prasad Yadav was driven into political oblivion. No one would seriously dispute that this is a cause worth fighting for, given the poverty of administration that continues to mark Bihar today. Nitish Kumar8217;s return to Delhi, therefore, albeit as Union minister of Agriculture, marks a personal defeat for him. It must have drawn a deep chuckle from Laloo Yadav.