The Hindu : Congress and coalition

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jul 11, 2003

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Congress and coalition

CONFRONTED BY THE rapid growth of the Hindu Right in recent years, the Congress appears to have realised the importance of building a broad coalition of secular parties to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party, which heads the ruling multi-party National Democratic Alliance. The Shimla conclave of the party, following the course suggested by the Srinagar conclave, called for a united fight against the BJP. This serves as a major corrective to the 1998 Pachmarhi resolution of the party that associated coalition politics with instability, and consequently pushed the smaller, regional parties into the fold of the BJP. The "yes-to-coalition" line, on its articulation in Srinagar more than a month ago, had received a broadly positive response from all the potential allies, notably the Samajwadi Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal and the Left parties. In Shimla, therefore, the Congress was taking another step forward by outlining the contours of a broad alliance and indicating the approach and the terms.

Evidently, the party wanted to make it clear that such a coalition would have to be headed by the Congress under the leadership of Sonia Gandhi. This was necessary for two reasons. First, many of the potential allies, such as the SP and the RJD, had built their support base on an anti-Congress plank. These parties now see the Congress as an ally largely because it is weak in their areas of influence (Uttar Pradesh and Bihar) and the BJP is the main rival. Secondly, the very same parties that can be counted as allies at the moment had at one point of time made an issue of the foreign origin of Ms. Gandhi. Naturally, the Congress does not want a 1996-type situation where it would have to support from outside a "third front" merely to keep the BJP out of power. Moreover, it intends to send an unambiguous message to parties such as the Nationalist Congress Party, which, despite being an alliance partner in Maharashtra, is opposed to Ms. Gandhi becoming the Prime Ministerial candidate of the secular coalition.

One difficulty for the Congress is the replication of the Kerala coalition model at the national level. In States such as Maharashtra, Bihar and Jammu and Kashmir, the party was able to share power only through a post-poll arrangement. The allies in these States are also rivals at one level. The Congress will have to settle for a junior role in several States before it can build an effective national-level alliance. Not surprisingly, the BJP, which made coalition politics the vehicle of its movement towards power at the Centre, senses some kind of threat in the newly exhibited willingness of the Congress to accommodate the smaller regional parties in a broad secular alliance. There is no question of parties such as the Telugu Desam and the Biju Janata Dal, which have the Congress as the principal rival in Andhra Pradesh and Orissa, becoming alliance partners of the Congress, but this cannot be said of several other current allies of the BJP — especially if they feel the electoral wind is blowing in favour of the Congress. By shedding its inhibitions about a coalition arrangement, which effectively prevented the emergence of a non-BJP government alternative in 1999, the Congress can expect to draw support from various political quarters in a new bid to unseat the BJP. It is true that the Congress is the only party capable of challenging the BJP at the all-India level, at this juncture. Its claim to be the natural leader of a "secular coalition" is understandable, even if there have been many problems over the years with the party's real commitment to secular values. What the Congress cannot afford to do is to continue its overbearing and patronising attitude to potential allies and others willing to support it conditionally in order to keep the BJP out.

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