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Between the Yadav and Sonia

One of the most unusual roads in Delhi is Bhai Bir Singh Marg. It begins at one end with the offices of the Catholic Bishops Conference and the Sacred Heart Cathedral, and ends with the Galina restaurant and the Gujarat Fisheries at Gol Market. And between the bishops and the butchers lies the A K Gopalan Bhavan, headquarters of the Communist Party of India-Marxist.

Fate, assuming that the good comrades believe in such an archaic superstition, could not have arranged for a better location, given that the Marxists are caught between Sonia Gandhi and Laloo Prasad Yadav today. Throwing all principles to the winds, the men behind the closed doors of the CPI-M offices are feverishly trying to negotiate a way to make Sonia Gandhi the prime minister of India. It is a situation that would have made A K Gopalan weep for despair.

Gopalan, now all but forgotten, played the part of leader of the Opposition in the first Lok Sabha. (The office wasn't given official recognition, however, until the Morarji Desai ministry gave Y B Chavan the title.) He was, to put it mildly, no friend of the Congress.

In those days the Communists pretended they were the natural alternative to the Congress. The delusion persisted even after the Jan Sangh (precursor to the Bharatiya Janata Party of today) started growing in strength, and then Rajaji formed the Swatantra Party. In the course of time, the Communists conceded their primacy on the Opposition benches to the Swatantrists, first Minoo Masani and then Dr Ranga. But this didn't bring them any closer to the Congress, though both sides publicly swore by socialism. (Rajaji was the first to damn the "permit-quota-licence raj" -- a phrase he coined.)

Things changed after the undivided Communist movement split into the CPI and the CPI-M. The parent party, at S A Dange's urging, moved closer to the Congress, so much so that the CPI even backed Indira Gandhi during the Emergency. Naturally, the Congress debacle of 1977 also affected the CPI, and it tried to return to the bosom of the Left Front. But the CPI-M insisted on a formal apology, and this was duly rendered at the CPI conference at Bhatinda. Supporting the Emergency was declared to have been the second great mistake (the first being backing the British during the Quit India Movement).

Pardon this rather lengthy journey into yesterday, but my point is that the Marxists have always been at their venomous best when denouncing the Congress. Yet here is the CPI-M now doing its best to bring that same party back to power, even if it means swallowing yet another member of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty as prime minister.

It is, perhaps, understandable if Sonia goes down on her hands and knees to pluck the thorns from Rabri Devi's royal road back to Patna. She might have some sense of being in the same union as her -- wives of politicians who were suddenly pitched into office. She might also have calculated that Muslim votes -- supposedly all in Laloo Prasad Yadav's pocket -- matter more than dalit votes. But does all of that hold equally true of the Left Front?

While campaigning for the last general election, Jyoti Basu grouchily described Sonia Gandhi as little better than "a housewife." I would have been glad if he were supporting her today by way of apologising for this appallingly sexist slur. But he isn't, it is just a ploy. The aged chief minister of West Bengal is still on record that his party made a "historic blunder" by not permitting him to become prime minister. In other words, he wants to saddle India with a prime minister who he himself believes is not out of the top drawer.

Is the veteran Marxist a fan of Laloo Prasad Yadav? If so, this is news to me. I clearly remember CPI-M leaders swearing that they would never have anything to do with the Rashtriya Janata Dal chief. He was corrupt, his ambitions had shattered the Janata Dal, he had made a mockery of politicians in general by pitchforking his wife into the chief minister's chair, etc, etc, etc...

At the end of his career, Jyoti Basu is a frustrated man. His cherished economic theories have been proved to be bunk, his party is stuck in a ghetto, and his only hope of political relevance is the formation of a weak Congress government. Not much to show for 60 years in politics, is it?

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