Commentary/Mani Shankar Aiyar
The Era of Coalitions does not so much augur the 21st century as a return to 18th and 19th century Mughal India
Panditji would not have needed to issue any such clarification
since no UP chief minister of his day would have asserted, as Karnataka's
chief minister did but a few days earlier, that Karnataka can
expect to prevail over Andhra Pradesh on the Almatti dam because
there is a Kannadiga prime minister enthroned on the Dilli simhasan.
Nor was Panditji ever called upon to give the 'devil's strength'
to his home state's chief minister to talk to his neighbouring
chief minister, as J H Patel has happily confessed to receiving
from his predecessor-turned-prime minister in order to open conversation
with Karunanidhi on the waters of the Cauvery.
Indeed, the paradigm of this government was the pathetic spectacle
of Deve Gowda on Alamatti abdicating his duties as prime minister
and handing over the task of prime ministerial decision making
to a cabal of four chief ministers - Jyoti Basu, Mahanta, Karunanidhi
and Laloo - in the hope that their credentials would not be suspect
as the prime minister's track record has undoubtedly made his.
The Gang of Four resembled nothing so much as the Four Horsemen
of the UF's Apocalypse. And, of course, they inevitably made a
mess of it. The brilliant answer they came up with was a technical
committee to resolve a political problem - only to find Law Minister
Khalap say their solution was wholly contrary to the law of the
land. The award of a tribunal constituted under the Inter-State
Water Disputes Act can be altered only by that tribunal or by
another tribunal - not reviewed by a bunch of babus substituting
for their regional subedars.
Any real prime minister - an Indira Gandhi or Rajiv Gandhi - could
have told them as much. Deve Gowda could not because he is a regional
satrap elevated by a congeries of regional satraps to unaccustomed
national eminence. And the Four Horsemen could not either because
for all that they aspire to a 'national outlook' - they are what
they are - regional satraps, not national leaders.
Tragically, we have entered the Golden Jubilee year of our Independence with
out a Government of the Union. What we have in place is a Circus
of Subedars.
The Era of Coalitions thus being heralded does not so much augur
the 21st century as a return to 18th and 19th century Mughal India,
the era that popular historian Munilal has aptly described as
the Age of the Mini-Mughals. It ended with the writ of Bahadurshah Zafar, the
Shah Alam, running all the way from Red Fort to
Palam. The Mughals took a hundred years to be reduced to that
condition. Deve Gowda has made it in under a hundred days.
I cannot vouch for this story but rumour has it that when Deve
Gowda's right-hand civil servant in Bangalore heard that his boss
was slated for transfer to Delhi, he cautioned him to ponder whether
it was worthwhile sacrificing an assured four years as chief minister
for a possible four months as prime minister.
If there is anything
to the story, and even if there is not, Deve Gowda must be pondering
this dilemma as Almatti raises its head, the Cauvery looms on
the horizon, and the prime minister's political flirtation with
Medha Patkar puts him in the centre of an almighty interstate
row over the Narmada.
If it was the exaction of chauth
which put finis to the pretensions of the Maratha padpadshahi,
it is in river waters that the present UF government seems most
set to meet its watery end. And the basic reason for this is that
it was none other than Deve Gowda, MLA, then Deve Gowda, minister
of PWD, and subsequently Deve Gowda, MP, and finally Deve Gowda,
CM, who showed other aspiring regional satraps that the way to
Delhi lies through H2O xenophobia.
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