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Losers could be winners in Jharkhand
Strange are the ways of coalition politics that can dislodge winners and bequeath power to the disinherited. The single largest pre-poll alliance’s participation in the new Jharkhand regime has hit a major roadblock with the Congress unwilling to concede to the JMM’s Shibu Soren the CM’s slot he has declared as non-negotiable, reports Vinod Sharma.
Strange are the ways of coalition politics that can dislodge winners and bequeath power to the disinherited. The single largest pre-poll alliance’s participation in the new Jharkhand regime has hit a major roadblock with the Congress unwilling to concede to the JMM’s Shibu Soren the CM’s slot he has declared as non-negotiable.
Numerically, the Congress (14) and its pre-poll ally Babulal Marandi’s Jharkhand Vikas Morcha-Loktantrik (11) could have had with Soren (18) a clear majority in a house of 81. But the JMM leader’s historically antagonistic ties with Marandi are proving to be a stumbling block, not to mention Soren’s image crisis the Congress is loath to be saddled with again.
If it outlasts the brinkmanship phase, the Congress’s refusal to accommodate Soren would push him into the BJP’s lap in his quest for becoming the CM third time. They’d have to look for a fourth partner in that scenario as well, the combined JMM-BJP-JD (U) tally of 38 being three short of the magic figure of 41.
That’ll fetch the BJP a stake in power in Jharkhand. But the arrangement would lack the legitimacy crucial to sustaining a coalition.
Their combined tally down from 36 to 20, the saffron party and its JD (U) partner are the only losers in these elections—the Congress and the JMM having improved their performance and Marandi’s JVM (L) notching up a good tally in its first poll battle.
No matter what combination eventually wrests power, the state apparently is headed for another round of instability.
“We’ll sit in the Opposition if Soren refuses to budge,” said a top Congress official. He was sceptical whether the JMM leader would be able to keep his flock of 18 MLAs to remain CM for a stint longer than his earlier, extremely short-lived occupancies of the office he covets.
The party that leads the UPA coalition at the Centre is chary also of sharing power with the RJD, given its plans to contest the next polls in Bihar without any alliance with Lalu Prasad.
But that’s a relatively lesser concern. Parties in coalition in one state have often fought as adversaries on turfs where they failed to strike a deal. Partners in both the UPA and NDA have had such face-offs.
