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Charming is not a word one associates with Mayawati. Rather, she presents herself as gruff, blunt-spoken and demanding. So, the Third Fronters were quite taken aback by her affable behaviour in their recent interactions. They had heard tales about her imperious manner. And sure enough, before they met over the lunch Chandrababu Naidu hosted before the trust vote, her aides came to the venue, arranged a high-backed chair for her at a disdainful distance and covered it with the mandatory white towel that separates the Brahmins from the rest. But when she swept in with her full regalia of gun-toting security guards and mandatory fixture Satish Mishra, the first thing she did was to get the towel removed. Then, she moved her chair closer and insisted that the others sit with her in a casual circle. No head, no tail, we’re all equals here, she seemed to imply.

Amazingly, that one gesture melted the ice and paved the way for a frank and amiable discussion. Her geniality and instinctive grasp of politics surprised everyone. She was accommodative, ready to listen and eager to reach out. A Jat-Dalit alliance, she told western UP Jat chieftain Ajit Singh, is not just a winning electoral combination. It will serve a historical purpose in undoing centuries of social tensions. (Jats are traditional oppressors of Dalits and have never let the latter vote at election time.) Her readiness for a tie-up with Ajit Singh’s RLD marks a huge departure from her earlier politics. Mayawati has never favoured alliances and used to have violent spats with her mentor Kanshi Ram on this. Her argument always was that while the BSP’s Dalit votes transfer to the alliance partner, the latter’s votes don’t, leaving the BSP high and dry.

After the flurry of activity prior to the trust vote, the Third Front seems to have lost steam. This is partly because the creation of a new political alignment is fraught with contradictions and partly because there’s no urgency since elections are a good eight months away. Whatever shape the Third Front takes in the future, the round of lunch and breakfast meetings between Mayawati and the other non-Congress, non-BJP parties was an important milestone in the Dalit tsarina’s political education. So far, she’s played the role of a master backroom strategist and a vote catcher and established her electoral credentials. Now, it’s time for her to make a bid to sit at the political high table along with leaders of other parties. Kanshi Ram preferred to keep her away from his pow-wows, which is why Mayawati has been an enigma to most, except perhaps the BJP with whose support she ran three governments in UP. The parleys in the run up to the trust vote were like a debutante ceremony that introduced the BSP chief to the boys. Her conduct shows that she’s willing to learn the language of coalition politics. Time will prove whether she’s learnt it well enough to make the leap from Lucknow to Delhi.

TAILPIECE

Somnath Chatterjee and Prakash Karat couldn’t have anticipated that they would come face-to-face so soon after the recent fracas that led to the former’s expulsion from the CPM. But Harkishan Singh Surjeet’s death sprung an unexpected encounter on them. They met in the waiting room of the hospital. It was overflowing with comrades when Chatterjee rushed in to pay his last respects. There was a brief awkward moment while the crowd waited to see what would happen. But Karat’s innate courtesy saved the day. He rose from his chair and offered it with a smile to the man he had ruthlessly thrown out of the party just a week ago.

Email: a_jerath@dnaindia.net