Shepherding lawmakers to protect them from poaching in India

POLITICS in India can be ruthless. It can be so ruthless that parties often resort to desperate measures to counter their rivals. The western state of Gujarat is witnessing a bout of intense politics over the election of some lawmakers to the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the bicameral federal parliament.

The opposition Congress party has whisked away its 44 state assembly lawmakers to a resort in Bangalore in south India over fears that some of them could be lured away by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to vote against its candidate.

Losing legislators could upset the Congress calculations of getting a new Rajya Sabha term for its senior leader Ahmed Patel, who is party president Sonia Gandhi’s political secretary.

The Rajya Sabha, or the ‘Council of States’, is a ‘permanent’ chamber and one-third of its members retire every second year. Its members are elected for a term of six years by an electoral college comprising state legislators.

Defections in Indian politics are not uncommon, but an antidefection act in 1985 has sought to make it more difficult for legislators to switch sides.

Politicians now employ more sophisticated methods to cause defections and break rival political parties, without attracting the provisions of the anti-defection law. The Rajya Sabha election on August 8 is crucial for both the BJP and the Congress in Gujarat.

“BJP tried to buy 22 of our MLAs (members of legislative assembly) before the Rajya Sabha polls for cross-voting by offering them Rs 15 crore each (US$2.3 million),” Congress spokesman Shaktisinh Gohil said at the south Indian resort in the presences of party lawmakers.

One member said: “We have been threatened, offered money to defect and some have done so.” The BJP rejected the allegation of bribery.

“Gujarat Congress leaders are levelling allegations at the BJP in Bengaluru. It is like a thief criticising a cop. If their leaders are leaving them, it has nothing to do with us,” said Prakash Javadekar, a minister in the Narendra Modi government.

The Congress, however, has reasons to be worried.

During the recently-held presidential election, there was cross-voting by some Congress lawmakers in Gujarat when the joint opposition candidate received the support of only 49 out of the party’s 57 members. Three Congress MLAs quit last week, reducing the party’s strength in the 182-seat Gujarat assembly in which the BJP has 125 members. Patel needs the support of 47 MLAs to win.

Also, the memories of this year’s assembly elections must be fresh in Congress minds as their party despite its numerical superiority in the states of Goa and Manipur could not form governments there. Just last week, the eastern state of Bihar saw an abrupt change in government. Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar broke his ‘grand alliance’ with regional ally Rashtriya Janata Dal of prominent politician Lalu Prasad Yadav and formed a new government by joining hands with the BJP.

The Congress was a junior member of the Bihar coalition that fought the 2015 election on a strident anti-BJP plank.

Tamil Nadu’s ruling party All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) in February successfully saved its government by herding its MLAs to a resort before a trial of strength in assembly.

The Congress perhaps understands that is one way to keep their flock together. — Bernama