India News and Features Alliance (INFA)

The curtain finally rung down on Wednesday on a gory political potboiler of betrayal and back stabbing in Karnataka which would put a Bollywood film to shame. With the BJP formally withdrawing support to the 20-month long Government of JD(S) Chief Minister Kumaraswamy, President’s Rule was imposed on the State and the Assembly kept in suspended animation. Governor Rameshwar Thakur favoured dissolution of the Assembly and fresh elections to avoid ugly horse-trading and underhand deals between the parties. Many at the Centre agreed with him in their anxiety to block all possibilities of the BJP and the JD(S) again coming together and forming a Government. But they ran into a major hurdle: the Supreme Court’s landmark judgment in the Bommai case. This left only one course open to the Union Government: impose President’s rule and keep the Assembly in suspended animation.

The Supreme Court’s judgment limits the President’s power initially to imposing Central rule and keeping the Assembly in suspended animation. The President can consider dissolution of the Assembly only after both the Houses of Parliament have ratified Central rule in the State. Perhaps it is as well that the Assembly is in animated suspension in view of the uncertainty over Parliament’s next session because of the UPA-Left logjam over the Indo-US Nuclear Deal. This leaves scope for two alternatives since politics is the art of making impossible possible. At one stage, the Congress was receptive to JD(S) feelers favouring a Government headed by Union Minister of State for Planning, M.V. Rajasekharan, a Lingayat, like BJP’s CM-designate Yediyurappa. But Maharashtra Governor S.M. Krishna, a Vokaligga, scuttled the proposal. Secondly, the JD(S) and BJP could still decide to bury the hatchet and rule the State.

Himachal Pradesh has been taken totally by surprise by the Election Commission’s announcement of the dates for the Assembly poll on November 14 for the snow-bound constituencies and December 19 for the rest of the State. In fact, the first response to the announcement was one of panic as the State was expecting the election in February since the term of the 68-member Assembly ends only on March 9 next. The Government’s biggest worry now is that its plans to announce a slew of pre-election sops --- jobs and development works in the districts --- have gone awry. The State Government had planned to announce these sops after October 15 following the Chief Minister, Virbhadra Singh’s return from Washington. However, the CM is not unduly bothered. He is confident of winning once more on the strength of his Government’s performance over the past five years!

The bomb blast in the dargah of the Sufi saint, Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti in Ajmer, a shrine in Rajasthan venerated alike by Muslims, Hindus and Christians on Thursday has once again pushed the Centre and the State Governments into the dock. Mercifully, the blast was low-intensity and causalities were limited to 2 killed and 17 injured when some 5000 devotees were present. But the incident could have been prevented if only both the Central and State Intelligence and the Police had been truly alert. Only last week, Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil had warned once again that terror groups like the Lashkar-e-Taiba, based in Pakistan, would strike religious institutions to provoke communal conflict. In fact, he even issued a red corner alert to the States at a two-day conference of Director Generals and IGs of Police New Delhi. Sadly, however, in all such exercises continue to end in rhetoric and still more rhetoric. Time for some solid action.

What the Centre can do, Assam can do one better when it comes to minority appeasement. The State Chief Minister, Tarun Gogoi, in a first of sorts, has decided to issue identity cards to daily wage labourers belonging to the minority community. Ostensibly, to stop their “harassment” in the name of identifying illegal Bangladeshi migrants. “The Government cannot allow this,” he thundered at an Iftar party in Guwahati. In addition, the Muslims have also been promised a slew of welfare schemes. All with an eye on reaping the political harvest in the forthcoming Panchayat polls. However, the Congress is worried that a major chunk of Muslims, particularly those of erstwhile East Pakistan origin, might yet vote for the Assam United Democratic Front (AUDF) headed by Badruddin Ajmal. Interestingly, ensuing criticism of the CM’s announcement has got Gogoi to promise something long overdue: an I-card for every citizen. But the question is when?

Failure of the onion crop in Maharashtra and Karnataka has led to copious tears all over the country. So severe is the shortage that the States which account for 30 per cent of the country’s 66 lakh tonne annual crop of onion, are also feeling the heat. Retail prices are now as high as Rs.30 per kg and continue to rise. Adding to the consumer woes, at many places farmers are hoarding onions expecting more prices for their produce. While Government officials blame traders for hoarding, the traders hold the unseasonal rain guilty. Either way for Indian households, barring the National Capital Region of Delhi, the writing is on the wall: pay more for onions in the next couple of months. Delhi’s Chief Minister, Sheila Dikshit, has arranged to provide the common man with onion at Rs.22 per kg from Government-managed counters!

Jammu and Kashmir is on the boil again. Juma’t al’vida, last Friday of the holy month of Ramzan, which fell yesterday, saw a two-member fidayeen squad attack the headquarters Battalion of the CRPF in Srinagar, leaving three police personnel injured on the eve of the 72-hour unilateral cease-fire declared by the Pakistan-based United Jihad Council. Earlier on Wednesday, nine terrorists, two Army majors and a jawan were killed in a fierce battle in the Tanmarg area in Baramulla district. Incredibly enough, the cross-fire between the Rashtriya Rifles and the militants lasted three days, prompting the new Army Chief, Gen Deepak Kapoor to disagree with his predecessor and rule out any “troop cut till the State returns to normalcy.” The outgoing Army Chief, Gen. J.J. Singh had asserted on his last day that the situation in J&K was “fast moving towards normalcy.”

Not unexpectedly, the PDP President, Mehbooba Mufti, latched on to the two statements and attacked the two Army Chiefs for giving confusing signals to the troubled State. However, the PDP, which has been vociferous in demanding troop withdrawal, today finds itself caught on the wrong foot, thanks to its Tanmarg MLA, Ghulam Hassan Mir and former Housing Minister. Shockingly, Mir offered prayers at the graves of the nine militants killed in Tanmarg. Queried about his “betrayal”, he explained to a national daily: “I offered fateha in the capacity of being a Muslim. I don’t think there is anything wrong in this.” Yet the message that has gone out from this PDP leader, who was once in the running for the Deputy Chief Minister’s job under Ghulam Nabi Azad, has caused great embarrassment to his party. It confirms once more the PDP’s close links with the militant groups.

Save the Yamuna campaign in New Delhi is growing. Ignored by the Government, the activists of the “Yamuna Satyagraha” have decided to spread to 11 places across the Capital. Their demand of exempting the river’s floodplains from construction work has fallen on deaf ears, despite their campaigning for the past 60 days. The sit-in, near the riverbed site where the Commonwealth Games Village is to be constructed, will now extend to places including the Supreme Court, India Gate and Raj Ghat. It may be recalled that the Yamuna Satyagraha started in 2000 in protest against construction of the Akshardham complex on the riverbed. It made no impact on the authorities. Now in its seventh year, the campaign is trying to urge journalists, sportsmen, artists and students to join in. Time will tell. ---INFA