India's political crisis
In a democratic country, where legislators are genuinely chosen by the people they represent, not appointed by the authorities who seek their support, even a small group can play a decisive role in forming the government.
This has been illustrated in the Indian general elections which spanned late February and early March. The Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) together with its allies won 240 seats in the 545 seat Lok Sabha, the lower house of parliament. Despite this strong position, the party is still trying hard to form a new government.
Holding only 240 seats in parliament, the BJP is far short of the 272 seats required for an absolute majority and must seek to build a coalition with some of the many smaller religious and regional parties which won seats in the election.
One such regional party from Tamil Nadu state, the All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Khazagham (AIADMK), which holds 27 seats in parliament, had by yesterday still not submitted a formal letter of support to the BJP. This despite the BJP prime ministerial candidate Atal Behari Vajpayee pledging his commitment "to seeking consensus inside and outside the house on all important social, economic and national security issues".
Reports suggested that AIADMK had demanded that the post of finance minister be granted to one of their members in exchange for support in a coalition government. They also said that their political rivals, who control Tamil Nadu state, must be dismissed before its support would be forthcoming.
When the BJP refused to meet these demands, the process of forming a new government stalled, leaving India in a state of political uncertainty.
President K.R. Narayanan yesterday called leaders of the Congress party, India's governing party for most of its 51 years of independence, and the outgoing United Front to a crisis meetings aimed at breaking the political stalemate.
Narayanan is prudent to involve the Congress party in his initiative and has increased the chances of it succeeding by doing so. The Congress Party for many years accommodated the vast and diverse aspirations of Indian society, including those of the 111 million Moslems who live in this predominantly Hindu country. However, the party fell from grace and became tarnished in the eyes of the younger generations when its leadership was implicated in numerous corruption scandals.
Millions of Indians view a BJP government with great trepidation. The first government formed two years ago by the BJP lasted only 13 days before it collapsed amid fears among Christians and Moslems that the militant Hinduism which it preached posed a threat to the 50 years of democracy India has enjoyed.
This past turbulence and present deadlock has lead analysts to believe that India's new coalition government will be unable to provide a stable administration in the foreseeable future.
The Statesman daily quoted former premier Vishwanath Pratap Singh as saying yesterday: "Whether it is a BJP or non-BJP government, it will not be in office for long, definitely not more than two years. Even if the Congress and the United Front come together, there will be problems".