The Hindu Business Line : Will the safe hands deliver on promises?

Beset by problems from allies even before the task of governance has begun, and with the Opposition already making doomsday predictions, the road ahead for the ruling United Progressive Alliance at the Centre is not going to be easy. Having sorted out the early glitches smoothly, it is time for the Congress and its partners to deliver on their promises to the people, says Rasheeda Bhagat.

The DMK leader, Mr M. Karunanidhi with the Congress President, Ms Sonia Gandhi. The ironing out of the first glitch between the coalition partners will hopefully make for smoother times ahead. — Kamal Narang

THREE months before the election results came in, a neighbour who is a sales executive and my husband's companion on the morning walk, told him confidently: "I visit a lot of rural areas... take it from me, the BJP is not returning to power."

When the gist of this conversation was conveyed at the breakfast table, one brushed it off with a sarcastic: "The problem these days is everyone and his brother thinks he is a political pundit/analyst."

Well, when the election results came out, almost the entire media fraternity and the pollsters/psephologists had to eat their words.

As hectic lobbying began for portfolios, everybody laughed at the Bihar strongman — Mr Laloo Prasad Yadav — aspiring for the Home Ministry with sarcastic observations, such as: "Oh yes, we should make Laloo the Union Home Minster, so that he can replicate the Bihar law and order situation in the rest of India."

But my neighbour had a different take. "Actually, he should have been given the Home Ministry. He would have done the nation a service by putting the VHP and Bajrang Dal types behind bars every time they created an atmosphere of hatred and violence. After all, did not the BJP-led NDA ban SIMI?" No, this neighbour is not a Muslim. He is a Malayali Christian and passionately believes that India belongs as much to the minorities as to anybody else.

Mercifully, the rhetoric of electioneering, the smear campaigns and the venom-spewing politics are all behind us. And the BJP has proved that it is not a party with a difference and has taken defeat very badly indeed. The tantrums of its two women leaders — Ms Sushma Swaraj and the MP Chef Minister, Ms Uma Bharti — at the possibility of Ms Sonia Gandhi becoming Prime Minister were bad enough. But what was worse was that no senior BJP leader was willing to ask them — at least, privately — to behave themselves.

Incidentally, now that Ms Gandhi has taken her decision, and stuck by it, and the media has given her enough pats on the back, it is time to stop singing the `supreme sacrifice' mantra. There can be too much of a good thing. Yes, she won the mandate. Yes, she gave up the highest office of the land. But to call her `Saint Sonia" or compare her act to Buddha's renunciation is ridiculous.

The issue of prime ministership and the possibility of trouble from the Opposition, had she chosen to be prime minister, was only the first hurdle. She successfully crossed it, as also the next one of bringing together disparate allies, whose demands were growing with each passing hour.

But the road ahead is not going to be easy. Even before the task of governance can begin, there were protests from a trusted ally, the DMK, with its President, Mr M. Karunanidhi, directing his seven ministers not to assume charge of their ministries till what had been originally promised to the party — Shipping, and Revenue — were allotted.

This too was sorted out yesterday with the surprising gesture coming from the Telangana Rashtra Samiti chief, Mr K. Chandrasekhar Rao, who volunteered to give up Shipping and Ports, leaving the way clear for the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, to pacify the DMK leader.

This once again proved that politics is full of surprises because KCR, as he is popularly known in Andhra politics, is considered a firebrand. His coming forward to make it so easy for the Congress(I) to placate the DMK must have surprised many people in Andhra Pradesh. But, then, Mr Chandrasekhar Rao, one can be sure, will demand his pound of flesh in the form of a separate Telangana State in the days to come.

While the Congress(I) did not have much say in the matter of those charged with criminal cases making it to the Cabinet, courtesy its allies, it was a little disappointing to see some of the tired horses of the party being given plum portfolios. Prominent among these were Mr Natwar Singh and Mr Arjun Singh. While the former has got the plum post of External Affairs Minister, the latter, who must surely have aspired for bigger things, has been given the HRD ministry.

Surely Ms Gandhi and Dr Singh could have given the nation some positive surprises in the selection of Congress ministers. Sure, loyalty has been rewarded and those who stuck by the Congress(I) chief through thick and thin have got ministerial berths. This includes people like Mr P. M. Sayeed and Mr Shivraj Patil. Both lost the election but were accommodated, and Mr Patil in as key a ministry as Home, which was widely believed to have been reserved for Mr Pranab Mukherjee.

Mr Mukherjee ultimately had to settle for Defence. That he was not too happy with this assignment was made clear by him to media persons who kept badgering him on whether he was satisfied. Turning up his nose at the television cameras, the former Finance Minister retorted: "What is there to be happy or satisfied about? After all I have been a minister for so many years. This is not the first time that I am becoming a Cabinet minister."

Thanks to the in-fighting and groupism in the Congress, veterans like Mr Arjun Singh were of little use to the Congress in Madhya Pradesh during the last Assembly elections, which saw the BJP sweep the State.

But now that Mr Arjun Singh is in charge of the HRD Ministry, it is hoped he will reverse the decision of his predecessor, the Allahabad Professor Dr Murli Manohar Joshi, vis-à-vis the IIM fees.

Giving subsidy to IIM students, who certainly did not deserve it, when the erstwhile HRD Minister could have chosen thousands of villages in India to bestow his largesse on, proved to be one of the lopsided policies of the BJP-led NDA that may have contributed to its Waterloo.

Hopefully, Mr Arjun Singh will take the measures needed to put the IIMs back in the competent hands of their boards.

But the dark horse in the whole task of ministry formation was Mr P. Chidambaram, who was not expected to be rewarded with the plum post of Finance Minister. After all, he had left the Congress and formed the TMC, later separating from the TMC when it allied with Ms Jayalalithaa's party, though via the Congress, in 1996. Even later, in 2004, when Ms Jayalalithaa was busy calling Ms Sonia Gandhi a half-baked politician and worse, he did not think it fit to merge his Tamil Jananayaka Peravai with the Congress(I).

Remaining outside the Congress and yet being given a ticket from the Congress quota in Tamil Nadu and contesting the election on the Congress symbol, was something that caused a lot of heartburn in the party, particularly in the Congress circles in Tamil Nadu. His being rewarded with the Finance Ministry is something that Congressmen may snipe about for years to come, but to little avail.

Needless to say, he was the most competent for the job, because for Dr Manmohan Singh to keep the finance portfolio, as speculated earlier, and also go through the ups and downs of running a coalition government would have been an impossible task.

With Mr Somnath Chatterjee likely to accept the Speaker's post, the Manmohan Singh Government has got off the starting point faster, and more smoothly, than originally expected. Of course, the time for talks and promises is over and the millions in the country who enforced a change in the colour and contours of the regime in New Delhi wait with hope in their hearts and hunger in their bellies — their lands parched for water, their educational qualifications of little use in the job market and the future of their children uncertain.

Leaders like Mr Laloo Yadav, who have spent years mouthing the social justice mantra, have been given yet another opportunity to deliver. They are astute politicians and know that the BJP leaders and their allies, including the Shiv Sena chief, Mr Bal Thackeray, have predicted that this government will not last for over a year.

The challenge before the UPA government is not only to emulate the BJP's example in successfully running a coalition, but also to go beyond it to deliver at least some of its promises. If there is consensus on one thing, however, it is with Ms Sonia Gandhi's statement that: "The country is safe in Dr Manmohan Singh's hands."

(Response can be sent to rasheeda@thehindu.co.in)