In politics, foes quickly turn into friends
The 19th-century German statesman Otto von Bismarck’s famously said “politics is the art of the possible, the attainable ... the art of the next best” and it aptly describes Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar’s yet another political somersault to revive his ties with the friend-turned-foeturned-friend BJP.
Nitish had taken a moral high ground in June 2013 when he broke his 17-year-old ties with BJP over the naming of Narendra Modi as its PM candidate for the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.
In August 2014, he joined hands with RJD chief Lalu Prasad for assembly by-polls in Bihar. The Congress too became a part of the so-called secular formation, known as ‘Mahagathbandhan’ or grand alliance (GA).
Nitish termed the tie-up between JD(U) and RJD as “the need of the hour” and said the country was in danger with the Modi government “spreading religious passion” to grab power in states. The GA defied the Modi wave to win the 2015 assembly elections, the campaign for which was marked by vicious mudslinging. At a rally in Muzaffarpur on July 25, 2015, Modi attacked Nitish over his frequent change of political allegiances, saying it seemed that there was “some problem with Nitish Kumar’s DNA”. Nitish vowed to never join hands with the BJP.
Two years later on Wednesday, Nitish thanked Modi for congratulating him after he quit over allegations of corruption against Prasad’s family members. Within minutes, he met BJP leaders to formalise his return to the NDA fold after four years. But he is not alone in such flip-flops.
On September 27, 2013, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi criticised the UPA government’s ordinance that sought to reverse a Supreme Court judgment on the immediate disqualification of lawmakers convicted in a criminal case carrying jail terms of more than two years.
The move hurt Prasad for he had been rendered ineligible in 2013 from contesting elections for 11 years after being convicted in a corruption case and sentenced to five years in prison. Gandhi later justified his party’s alliance with Prasad, saying the tie-up was with a political party, with an idea and not an individual.
Again in 2016, the Congress struck an alliance with arch-rivals Left Front to oust Trinamool Congress in West Bengal but fought a bitter battle against each other in Kerala.
Prior to that in J&K, the PDP and BJP were at each other’s throats in 2014 elections. But the two diametrically opposite ideologies formed a coalition government in March 2015.
RJD supremo Lalu Prasad is set to take the battle for Bihar to the Supreme Court, challenging governor Kesrinath Tripathi’s decision to invite Nitish Kumar to form the government.
Prasad claims that propriety required the governor should have called on the single largest party to form the government. “We’re considering an appeal in the Supreme Court against the governor’s decision. We are taking legal advice and will move court after that,” Prasad said.
Bihar saw surcharged political maneuvering after Nitish resigned on Wednesday as CM to protest against his deputy and Prasad’s son, Tejashwi Yadav, who has stayed on in the Cabinet despite being named in an FIR over corruption charges.
Nitish’s JD(U) teamed up with BJP and staked claim to form the government in the state. On Thursday, Nitish took oath as CM and BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi joined as deputy CM.
But independent legal experts believe even though the concept of single party issue is a vexed one, the decision to fight the legal battle may not yield much. They say there is nothing illegal about the governor’s action and Prasad’s claim that since RJD was the single largest party in Bihar, it should have been invited to form the government may not hold much weight.
Senior advocate Dr Rajeev Dhawan said, “The idea of a single largest party comes after election, after a crisis comes the concept of who has the larger and a stable combination – So the governor has the discretion to call on a combination or party who will enjoy majority on the floor...”
Senior advocate Sanjay hedge also is of the opinion that “there is no obligation on the governor to call on the leader of the largest party at this moment”.
The governor’s job is to find someone who will enjoy majority on the floor of the house and he has material before him to believe that the person sworn in will provide a stable government. But the governor has to ask the sworn-in to prove the majority as soon as possible.