March 9, 1998

An assertive President reins in a truant Gujral

Prabhu Chawla

It had all the trappings of a high-powered political confrontation. With the Head of State poised for a head-on collision with a lame-duck prime minister, the stage was set last week for some more rewriting of constitutional conventions. After a brief spell, during which he seemed to follow the dictum "live and let live", President K.R. Narayanan decided to be assertive. Strangely enough, the chasm between the President and the prime minister increased not on the issue of any appointment or extension, but on the very vital subject of dealing with burgeoning cases of constitutional delinquency which began with Uttar Pradesh.

So far, Narayanan and I.K. Gujral had shared a cozy relationship but the chain of political convulsions last week seems to have snapped the links. With the outgoing prime minister playing truant, it turned out to be just another lesson in political dynamics for the rule-book President. For the past seven months, Raisina Hill has literally been behaving like a rubber stamp of the minority government. And when Uttar Pradesh's wily Governor Romesh Bhandari dismissed the Kalyan Singh government without even pausing to think of the reactions at the Centre, the prime minister expected the President to either cave in or ignore it altogether. Narayanan, it seemed, had some other ideas.

It was for the first time since last July that Gujral's plans misfired. Not only did the President summon him to Rashtrapati Bhavan a day after Bhandari's misdemeanour, but he also told him to consider the possibility of recalling Bhandari. Instead of taking the presidential advice seriously, the prime minister took off on a four-day election tour. In the absence of any legitimate government, Gujral's defiance was enough ground for the President to show the door to Bhandari. Yet, Narayanan waited for a judicial verdict on Bhandari's conduct. In an unambiguous indictment, a division bench of the Allahabad High Court, comprising Justice Dilip Kumar Seth and Justice Virendra Dixit, observed: "It cannot be ruled out that the power has been exercised for purposes not warranted by law."

Such a judicial order would be reason enough for any prime minister to act. But Gujral, over whom each one of his Cabinet minister has a virtual veto power, spurned a politically and constitutionally correct suggestion of the President seeking his advice on Bhandari's continuation in office. For three days, the President was denied even the basic courtesy of advice from Gujral's council of ministers on an issue which was agitating the entire nation. Instead, many of the UF constituents, led by the CPI(M), launched a virulent attack on the President.

This is the second time that the President has come under fire from the UF. Earlier, he earned its wrath when he returned the Cabinet's recommendation for the dismissal of Kalyan's government in October 1997. But at that time, the UF swallowed its pride and accepted the presidential assertion because of a massive surge in favour of the BJP government although it survived only by adopting dubious methods.

The latest standoff between the President and the prime minister, however, underscores yet another point -- both of them should stay within arms distance and not hug each other, at least not in public.

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