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Where Is The Prime Minister?

Some say his style is the triumph of consensual democracy.Or is he neutral to a fault, to the point of abdicating his responsibility?

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Where Is The Prime Minister?
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An uncharacteristically belligerent I.K. Gujral greeted the 21 Janata Dal MPs who called on him last week to seek his help in resolving the party's leadership crisis.

"Parliament mein meri pagri uchhali… you ignored me when I pleaded with folded hands..has any prime minister been treated that way?" he berated them.

Gujral was referring to the concerted attack on him by JD working president Shared Yadav and his coterie over the women's reservation bill in Parliament. Let bygones be bygones, pleaded the MPs. As the party's 'buzurg' and father-figure, he ought to mediate between Sharad and Laloo Yadav, contenders for party presidentship. "You vilify me in the House and apologise behind closed doors.

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Ab mein kis moohn se Sharad ke paas jaoon?" he asked. And put the ball right back in the MP's court, seeking their counsel to sort out the mess.

Some say his style is the triumph of consensual democracy. Or is he neutral to a fault, to the point of abdicating his responsibility?

Gujral's studied neutrality was perhaps typical of the man. The Janata Dal, clearly, cannot look to him to settle its feuds. The Yadav duo may have ganged up to make him prime minister, but he has no cause to like either of them-Laloo, who showed little enthusiasm when he wanted to contest from Patna, is the JD's biggest perceived liability today. And Sharad, after privately agreeing to the tabling of the women's bill, reserved all his barbs for a public attack. So Gujaral tilts nowhere; not does he, inexplicably, lift a finger against either. This hands-off approach has drawn trenchant criticism; from the fodder scam to the oil pool deficit to the JD's troubles, the prime minister has distanced himself to the point of invisibility. Somehow, he's not there.

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FOREIGN affairs and diplomacy have all along been Gujral's forte and he appears to find himself more at home interacting with diplomats and intellectuals than grappling with Laloo or the growing oil pool deficit. But when he chooses to spread the Gujaral Doctrine in Nepal at such a critical juncture at home, he wins no admirers.

Gujral's own justification is that he prefers to be a non-interfering prime minister, one who believes in consensus rather than confrontation. Thus, when asked why he could not rein in CBI director Joginder Singh, he says he is no "thanedar". As for not reacting to Sharad and his shouting brigade who embarrassed him in parliament, Gujral takes refuge in unwritten protocol: that it does not become a prime minister to shout back in the House.

Perhaps, the prime minister really does believe that his position is rarefied, giving him the licence to perch above petty politics and inner-party strife. But does it? Many of his colleagues in the JD say Gujral is too much of a gentleman for the scruple-free rough and tumble of coalition politics. They recount how Gujral literally broke down in a television interview on Doordarshan when he spoke of those who had struggled for Indian Independence. The prime minister, his detractors claim, must be made of sterner stuff.

In true Gujral style, his response to the fodder scam has been a total lack of initiative. A fact that has irritated not only fractious party members and a section of the Congress but the UF's major constituent, the Left. Says CPI leader A.B. Bardhan: "It is not enough to say that the prime minister is not a policeman or that if he were in Laloo's shoes, he would have quit. He is the head of the government, whose job it is to investigate and punish wrongdoers…the government is not run on statements of high principles."

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Then, instead of merely refusing to meet Bihar governor A.R. Kidwai, it behoved the prime minister to suggest a direction out of the stalemate on the CBI chargesheet, he adds. The delay has done no good either to Bihar or to the UF's avowed commitment to purging the polity.

In the main, C.P. Bhambri of JNU's Centre for Political Studies says Gujral's wavering and dithering over three vital issues -- the women's reservation bill, the oil pool deficit and the fodder scam -- has left people baffled. "Where is the prime minister? What is his position?" he wonders. While Gujaral's rationale for inaction is a preference for "national consensus", the Left insists it cannot form an excuse for non-governance. Says Bardhan: "We want this government to continue, but we also want it to function."

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In Gujral's defence, a senior cabinet minister also toes the consensus line. This ensures that no half-backed measures get legislative or executive sanction, he says. Some political analysts also veer around the view that consensus is the order of the day. Points out noted sociologist Ashish Nandy: "It is the way a democracy functions and if certain decisions like the oil price hike are delayed as a consequence, it's a price we have to pay."

Indeed, Nandy maintains that Gujral ought not to be expected to perform any differently since he is functioning "in a model of politics where the prime minister does not exercise a dominant influence…he is more of a facilitator". What were once ideological factions within parties are now parties in themselves. As a result, the clout of the premier has declined. The era of tall, charismatic leaders carrying parties to power has given way to average-sized individuals elected on party platforms. "We have a prime minister who cannot get votes for others, rather they must get votes for him.

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Gujral's votaries insist the compulsions of handling a coalition leave him with barely any room for manoeuvre, If he is to ensure the longevity of the government, he must carry the coalition -- and the Congress -- with him on all issues. Says Janata Dal Rajya Sabha MP Som Pal: "He must be accommodative. He cannot afford to forget for one minute that he is the head of a coalition, supported from outside by the big bully of the Congress." Since every regional satrap and, indeed, every minister sees himself as equal to the prime minister, he has to balance their aspirations.

A cabinet minister points out that if the chief executive intervenes, he must do so effectively. So given the fact that Gujral has no support base whatsoever, he must tread cautiously. For instance, on the intra-party crisis, he has opted for "strategic neutrality". A senior JD leader feels Gujral's inaction arises from

"majboori rather than strategy…he cannot afford to do anything risky". But in proceeding cautiously, retreating when necessary, he is "displaying great wisdom and sensitivity". By doing so, feels his erstwhile advisor Bhabani Sengupta, Gujral has turned his weaknesses -- the lack of a political base and his non-combative, non-manipulative nature -- into strengths.

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But not everyone buys that argument. Some political observers feel Gujral should have cashed in on the goodwill he enjoyed and acted positively, even aggressively. Says Professor Zoya Hasan of JNU: "Given the goodwill he has, or had, one would have thought he could act without worrying about his tenure and take principled decisions. The premier, base or no base, has a certain primacy. He has not exercised it. He has been ineffectual and indecisive, certainly not the first among equals"

She cites the PM's performance on the women's bill as a case in point. When attacked by Sharad, Gujral, she feels, should have demanded an apology and turned it into a prestige issue -- even threatened resignation, if necessary. The erring JD leader would have had to apologise and Gujral would have emerged stronger. Subsequently, he could have bargained on every issue from a position of strength.

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Instead, Gujral's call for a national debate on the women's bill is seen as the politician's classic way of putting a thing off. He clearly intends to wait until tempers have cooled and he can come up with a compromise, say, egging the quota for women in Parliament at 25 per cent. "His way of handling controversy is discussion. His tactics are taken out of the textbook of consensus-building," offers Sengupta in defence.

Bardhan feels Gujral's response to the women's bill sent out the wrong signals: "It is not enough to say that if someone else is a rowdy, he should act like a gentleman. It is not a matter of rowdyism. As prime minister, he should not have been deterred from introducing any bill. All right, he thinks some measures call for persuasion…but how long will he wait? How many years? His signals are unclear, it seems he is not determined to carry things through. The impression is that the government is at a standstill."

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SIMILARLY, in Laloo's case, there is an opinion gaining ground that Gujral should have asserted himself, living up not only to his own principles, but to his party's stand on corruption. "His non-committal attitude defies logic," says Zoya Hasan. Bardhan agrees that if Gujral "lets things slide, like P.V. Narasimha Rao did", corruption would be as rampant as it was in Rao's time. But Gujral's defenders say it is unkind to expect dramatic results overnight. "He has inherited a flawed legacy. Corruption has been institutionalised and cannot be weeded out at once."

By dithering over the women's bill and the fodder scam, Gujral is not living up even to the limited agenda he has set for himself -- restoring democratic institutions and providing social and gender justice. Asks Hasan: "In sharp contrast to his performance as external affairs minister, there has been no articulation of his vision. Where is the domestic version of the Gujral Doctrine?"

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The other area of contention is the CBI: critics say he has let the investigative agency have a free rein, giving the impression that, as Bhambri puts it, the bureaucracy takes him no more seriously than his own cabinet. "Respect the CBI's autonomy but do not forget that it is part of the system, not above it," warned a JD leader. For the CBI director to keep the press, rather than the prime minister, informed is not on. The Bhabani Sengupta incident, says Bhambri, sent out the message that the prime minister cannot even appoint an OSD, much less his own cabinet.

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Both Gujral baiters and supporters agree that he is caught in a dual vice: on the one hand, the struggle between the Congress and the Left for dominance over the UF and, on the other, the struggle between the Congress and the UF to occupy the same centrist space in the political scenario. The left continually warns that if the Congress has shown it cannot be taken for granted, neither can the Left. Its leaders frequently complain that their concerns are not being articulated by the UF. Thus, the cavalier attitude towards the women's and the agricultural workers' bills.

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Gujral's votaries compare his circumstances to those of Indira Gandhi in 1966. She was believed to be a malleable puppet in the hands of the Syndicate but cleverly built up her own base. But she had age and charisma on her side --Gujral does not. Further, says Bhambri, she had the capacity to challenge and take calculated risks that Gujral does not. "He puts up with daily humiliation merely to stay in power. Remember that he opposed Indira Gandhi during the Emergency, but accepted ambassadorship to Moscow."

It would be a mistake, say his detractors, to see Gujral's recent gentle chiding of Laloo or his willingness to attend the party's national executive as assertive action. Tokenism is no substitute for lack of initiative, they insist. Gujral's main problem, says a cabinet minister, is that his influence and his "pehchhan" are limited to the capital. Delhi is essentially Gujral's durbar, where he loves to hold court.

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