Coalition adharma leads Congress into Lokpal mess

The UPA-II is in a mess and the Congress is at fault. The increasing farcical engagement with Team Anna over the drafting of the Lokpal Bill and the failed one with Baba Ramdev over black money shows the Congress has failed in coalition politics.

The controversy surrounding the bill has brought to fore Congress chief Sonia Gandhi’s and PM Manmohan Singh’s scant regard for alliance partners. The Congress wants to call the shots in a coalition government possibly because the party with 202 seats in the Lok Sabha — 74 short of a simple majority — suffers from delusions of being in the majority. Even its leaders speak as if it is a Congress government and not a Congress-led coalition government.

The drafting of the contentious Lokpal Bill is at the government level. The drafting committee comprising five ministers and five members of Team Anna has been set up by an executive order that makes it clear it is a government affair.

But the Congress core committee, comprising party chief Sonia Gandhi, prime minister Manmohan Singh, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, defence minister AK Antony, home minister P Chidambaram and Gandhi’s political secretary Ahmed Patel took more than two months to decide that they should get other parties involved in the process and announced it on Saturday.

One gets to hear of the UPA-II allies only when there is a cabinet reshuffle or when the 2G spectrum allocation scam breaks out. A senior UPA leader pointed out that the Congress believes it is running the government.

The decision to consult other parties in the drafting process should have been taken at the UPA’s level. Gandhi is also the UPA chairperson and she should have called a meeting of UPA partners even before the government had set up the joint drafting committee. The Congress, faced with a barrage of corruption charges, found a perfect excuse in forming the committee to show that the party is in the forefront of fighting corruption.

A party like the Congress, which does not have the numbers in the Lok Sabha, needs to be more skilful in its political manoeuvres if it wants to take credit for combating corruption. Congress ministers must speak for the UPA government and not for the Congress when it comes to government decisions.

The alliance partners too are to blame for the fact that the Congress is calling the shots in UPA-II. The major parties are rarely seen or heard. The DMK came in the picture because of the 2G scam and the Niira Radia tapes. The NCP’s Sharad Pawar and the Trinamool Congress’ Mamata Banerjee are more bothered about their states than what is happening at the national level.

Lalu Prasad’s RJD is supposed to be part of the UPA, though not the government. But all is quiet at the Lalu front. Unless the allies assert themselves and participate in the decision-making process, the Congress will continue to run the show.