Aditi Phadnis: The purge of the disloyals

PLAIN POLITICS

Madhya Pradesh CM Babulal Gaur thinks his survival depends on getting rid of Uma Bharati loyalists.

Make no mistake. If former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Uma Bharati had had her way, he wouldn't even have got a Vidhan Sabha nomination.

The story goes that current Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Babulal Gaur (who is actually a Yadav and answers to Gaur because when he was in school his teachers used to say: "Babulal, gaur sey suno" [pay attention]) was set to contest the Govindpura Assembly constituency from Bhopal.

Bharati, who was a rising star of the BJP at the time and the sole arbiter in handing out Madhya Pradesh tickets, wanted to give the seat to one of her favourites, Bhagwandas Sabnani.

Gaur went to highers ups "" reportedly Atal Bihari Vajpayee "" and managed to secure the ticket. Once he became an MP, Bharati had no choice but to accommodate him in the Cabinet.

He was given the urban development ministry, but Bharati's efforts to clip his wings didn't end there. As minister when he launched an aggressive anti-encroachment drive, MLAs complained to Bharati that their voters were being harassed.

So Bharati shifted Gaur from urban development to home. By now, he had become the logical number two to her. So she named him as her successor.

If Bharati thought that with Gaur in the saddle, she was going to be super chief minister, she should have realised how wrong she was. Once he became CM, Gaur's first action was to grind Sabnani to dust. He got his chance when Sabnani sought to contest the local elections in Bhopal as mayor. All BJP candidates won that election. Except, guess who? Sabnani in Bhopal, the chief minister's Vidhan Sabha constituency.

Gaur might not have much to show for his chief ministership by way of administration. There isn't a trace of originality in anything he's done. To give the devil her due, at least Bharati thought about governance, coining slogans around the totality of Madhya Pradesh's socio-economic reality "" Jan, Jal, Jangal and Jamin.

Gaur, however, appears to be quite sanguine chasing the unfinished agenda of the Congress.

Take roads. During the Digvijay Singh government, contracts for road building were given to locally powerful business houses with media interests.

They couldn't complete the job and their earnest money was forfeited. Some road-building activity has begun now. Gaur has not sought to tinker with the build-operate-transfer (BOT) model.

He appears to be interested only in results on the ground. As a former urban development minister, he understands the importance of road building and the stakeholders it creates "" both among those who build them and those who use them.

The power situation in Madhya Pradesh continues to be terrible. Although there is no scheduled loadshedding in Bhopal "" therefore, no admission by the government that it is responsible for the power shortage "" rural areas continue to face gruelling power cuts.

Most villages have to go without power for 18 to 20 hours a day. The demand-supply gap ranges from between 800 to 1,200 MW during peak hours.

What has been happening, however, is the resumption of the anti-encroachment drives in Bhopal and other cities, ordered by the CM. Slums that Digvijay Singh as chief minister wanted to remove in 2001 but couldn't, were removed and resettled outside the city.

What is more, slum-dwellers themselves agreed to demolish their quarters in the knowledge that they would get better houses on the outskirts.

Therefore, Gaur's tenure as CM is stolid and uninspiring. What does bear a mark, all his own is his special brand of politics that has ensured his survival as a parallel pole to Bharati in the state.

A few strategic moves have ensured this. He has the support of the organisation "" both the RSS and the BJP. This is not very difficult because of the egos Bharati manage to hurt during her short stint as CM.

In Madhya Pradesh, the RSS is a solid presence very evident in governance. Bharati managed to alienate both. The sangathan mahamantri, Kaptan Singh Solanki, couldn't stand Bharati and has a good equation with Gaur.

In fact, Solanki was crucial in ensuring Gaur got the job. One of Madhya Pradesh's seniormost leaders, Kailash Joshi was also rubbed the wrong way by Bharti. Gaur has Joshi's backing as well.

But Gaur has obviously decided that his problems do not stem from unimaginative administrative policies or lack of resources, but are rooted in his ministers who are working to a script directed by someone else.

Therefore, he feels his first priority is to ensure he has a team that is personally loyal to him.

All politicians know how hard it is to have a reshuffle. Those you induct always think they've got less than their due and those whom you drop don't need an excuse to work against you.

In the reshuffle Gaur, effected earlier this month, the ruling criterion seemed to be: get rid of the Uma Bharti men.

The reshuffle was proposed and postponed four times. Gaur asked four of his ministers to resign. Only three did (Child Development and Higher and Technical Education Minister Archana Chitnis continued as minister apparently after the Sangh's intervention).

However, the reshuffle riled Bharti so much that she called L K Advani in Pakistan and complained to him.

This is what Gaur did: he targetted not only individuals loyal to Bharati but also their portfolios. When the central BJP cleared a Cabinet reshuffle, they told him whom he could drop and keep.

But they didn't tell him what portfolio to give to whom. So Himmat Singh Kothari and Kusum Mehdele were sworn in as Cabinet ministers.

But Kothari was given forests and cooperatives. The forest department was earlier with one of Bharati's supporters who has now been given the jails portfolio.

Similarly, Archana Chitnis was retained but her portfolio was given to Kusum Mehedele. One of the three of those who have been dropped owe allegiance to Bharati.

Harnam Singh Rathore demanded Gaur's resignation following the killing of two people in police firing at a mob in Banda in Sagar district a few months ago. He's been sacked.

This may not bother Gaur immediately but the storm clouds against him are building up. Unless he can post significant administrative successes, the newly appointed state BJP chief, Shivraj Singh Chauhan is waiting in the wings to replace him.

Bharti may have made herself so unpopular that she will be unacceptable as CM. But replacements are not hard to come by. There's only so much longevity that the politics of manipulation can achieve.