Commentary/Janardan Thakur

Kanshi Ram's priority in UP is to 'dance on Mulayam Singh Yadav's grave'

Come September, Mayawati, chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, is supposed to pass the baton to Bharatiya Janata Party leader Kalyan Singh.

But will she?

Doubts are being expressed in political parlours, the basis for these being the untrustworthiness of the lady and of her mentor, Kanshi Ram. The rank and file of the Bahujan Samaj Party makes no secret of its disapproval of the bizarre 'arrangement' with the BJP.

Some partymen even make bold to assert in private that 'Mayawatiji will continue to remain the chief minister even beyond the six-month period.' Such is the political scenario in Uttar Pradesh and in the country as a whole, they tell you, that the BJP leaders would have 'no choice' but to agree to Mayawati's continuance.

Handing over the gaddi to Mayawati even for a period of six months was undoubtedly a big wrench for the BJP, but it was done as a last resort -- there was no other way to form a government. An extremely frustrated Kalyan Singh had put up a bold front saying that 'being the chief minister is a trivial issue.' A much bigger priority for the party, in Uttar Pradesh, was to destroy the edifice of Enemy No 1: Mulayam Singh Yadav. This was about the only agenda on which the coalition partners were in total agreement. It was even more important for the BJP, for once Mulayam was contained the party could be far more sanguine about its political future.

For the BJP central leadership, a bigger priority was to seal an alliance with the BSP all over the country so that it would, in alliance with some other regional forces, increase its percentage of votes and get closer to power at the Centre. The BJP already has a tie-up with the Samata Party and with Bansi Lal's Haryana Vikas Party. It has been striving for an alliance with Ramakrishna Hedge, which could give it a big boost in Karnataka where it has already made a considerable dent.

The party had also been trying for a breakthrough in Orissa on Biju Patnaik's shoulders. Patnaik, it had hoped, would break away from the Janata Dal and float a regional party. With Patnaik's passing away that hope has perished.

A country-wide alliance with the BSP would certainty give the BJP a cutting edge, but Kanshi Ram is a slippery customer. He has a finger in every political pie and nobody knows which way he will go at the last minute. He has already made it plain that his arrangement with the BJP is confined to Uttar Pradesh.

In other words, he is free for marriages elsewhere.

The effort to transform the BJP into a dalit-friendly party is perhaps a good electoral strategy, but there are more hurdles than just the unreliability of the Kanshi-Mayawati duo. The Sangh Parivar is itself divided over the alliance. Some hard-core Manuvadis have not stopped frowning at the 'degeneration' of Hindus. They find it hard to reconcile themselves to the fact that people who were 'even forbidden to write from left to right or to use the right hand for writing are now rubbing shoulders with twice-born brahmins!'

If you persist they are imagining things, these pundits would quote chapter and verse from the great Shastras: 'The third edict of the Avadana-Shastra ordains that the only nourishment permitted to the chandala shall be garlic and onions, in view of the fact that the holy scripture forbids one to give them corn or seed-bearing fruits or water or fire... The same edict lays down that the water they need must not be taken from rivers or springs or pools, but only from the entrances to swamps and holes made by the feet of the animals.'

Whew! One begins to understand why Kanshi Ram keeps fuming against Manuvadis.

But then Kanshi Ram is governed entirely by the 'compulsions of realpolitik.' He now makes friends with team A of the Manuvadis to fight team B, and with team B to fight team A. His logic is often too convoluted to understand, but he insists he is working to a 'well-formulated game plan.' Like 'Periyar' E V Ramaswamy Naicker, Kanshi Ram believes the foremost task of the dalits is to finish the brahmins because they were the agents of the Aryans who had driven the Dravidians away from the Ganges plains.

To transform the social equation, Kanshi Ram first joined hands with Mulayam Singh Yadav, then embraced the BJP to "wreck it from inside." Soon after Mayawati became the UP chief minister for the first time, some Congressmen claimed the then prime minister Narasimha Rao was the "rightful claimant to Mayawati's hand." Rao had been the "author of the miracle of democracy," they said; he was bound to win the race for dalit votes.

Rao's successor Sitaram Kesri tried hard to woo Kanshi Ram & Co. He even wept at the United Front steering committee for the dalit cause in Uttar Pradesh, but to no avail. At the first opportunity Mayawati broke from the tether and jumped into the arms of the Bharatiya Janata Party, leaving the others high and dry.

The BJP leaders were again claiming 'absolute unanimity of views' with the BSP. Reminded of his differences with Mayawati during their first tie-up, Kalyan Singh said "biti taahi bisar de (forget the past)."

The BJP strategy, once again, was three-pronged: first, draw the maximum advantage of the party's magnanimity toward Mayawati, not only in Uttar Pradesh but elsewhere too; second, widen the gulf between the BSP and other parties which were wooing it; and last, join forces with the BSP to demolish Mulayam Singh Yadav.

The BJP, however, knows only too well the BSP has no real love for it. Indeed, Kanshi Ram keeps telling his supporters that to crush the BJP it would have to be crushed first in Uttar Pradesh. Half the strength of the BJP is in this state. Kanshi Ram also knows too well all political parties are increasingly wary of the new socio-political forces that are asserting themselves. Kesri, A K Antony and several other Congress leaders have been bemoaning that their party had not given enough thought to the emerging social forces. By their sheer number, the dalits and the backwards would prevail in future electoral battles. Uttar Pradesh alone has over 150 million dalit voters.

The importance of Kanshi Ram is obvious to everyone, but what the political parties can't decide is how to deal with the man. On the other hand, Kanshi Ram is himself extremely wary. Right now his priority in UP is to 'dance on the grave of Mulayam Singh Yadav,' but he fears that in the process the BJP Manuvadismight get the upper hand. That is the last thing he would like happen.

Come September, there could well be some fireworks.

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