April 27, 1998

The Vajpayee Government treads the political path.

By Harish Gupta

Last Thursday evening, a white Ambassador with a single passenger drove slowly from North Block to Rashtrapati Bhavan. In his new avatar as private secretary to the home minister, L.K. Advani's major-domo Deepak Chopra was entrusted the task of carrying eight files to the President's secretary. President K.R. Narayanan's signature and an official notification were all that remained of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Government's first major political decision: the appointment of governors and lieutenant-governors.

As is by now becoming customary for a government that has as many sensitive egos as coalition partners, the appointments took nearly three weeks in coming. They were also preceded by the customary lobbying and backbiting. However, there was an important point of divergence. The appointments came after wide-ranging consultations. Even then, the final list of eight left out the gubernatorial appointments in Bihar, West Bengal, Rajasthan and Jammu and Kashmir. The Government's preoccupation with image made it play strictly by the book.

When Vajpayee assumed office on March 18, there were at least 12 governors and lieutenant-governors who were deemed vulnerable. There were five -- Baliram Bhagat in Rajasthan, Raghunath Reddy in West Bengal, P.C. Alexander in Maharashtra, General (retd) K.V. Krishna Rao in Jammu and Kashmir and Mohammed Shafi Qureshi in Madhya Pradesh -- whose five-year terms had ended. Then there were two -- T.R. Satish Chandran in Goa and A.P. Mukherjee in Mizoram -- whose appointments were effected by the I.K. Gujral government after the dissolution of the Lok Sabha. Finally, there were those governors accused of either political partisanship or constitutional misconduct.

Heading this list was Uttar Pradesh's Romesh Bhandari, described as a "Constitution history-sheeter" by the BJP. Then there was Krishnapal Singh of Gujarat, a man perceived to be more than partial towards former chief minister Shankersinh Vaghela. Also included was Delhi's Lt-Governor Tejinder Khanna, a former IAS officer who retired as commerce secretary. Khanna, who apparently enjoyed the patronage of CPI(M) leader H.S. Surjeet, was charged by the local BJP Government of undermining its authority.

The Government was fortunate that some of the problems resolved themselves. Bhandari resigned on March 17 rather than face the sack. Singh hung on for a call from Union Home Secretary B.P. Singh and then opted out on April 13, complaining bitterly. Satish Chandran and Mukherjee also took the hint as did the lieutenant-governors of Pondicherry and Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

The other problem was more complex. Having won power for the first time, there was no dearth of BJP old-timers to be rewarded with sinecures. Ultimately, only a handful made it. Bhai Mahavir, a one-time Jana Sangh MP, now better known as a newspaper "middles" writer, was sent to Madhya Pradesh. Suraj Bhan, former Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker who lost in the recent election, has gone to Uttar Pradesh, while Anshuman Singh, former judge of the Rajasthan High Court, is the new Gujarat governor. V.K. Kapoor, a former bureaucrat who was a member of the BJP manifesto committee, was appointed lieutenant-governor of Delhi and Rajni Rai, a doctor and BJP functionary from Nagpur, of Pondicherry. P.C. Alexander, often described as a "permanent" governor had his contract renewed in Maharashtra. War hero Lt-General (retd) J. Jacob, a Jew who joined the BJP in 1991, will be the new Goa governor.

To keep the troublesome AIADMK in good humour, A. Padmanabhan, a former chief secretary of Tamil Nadu under M.G. Ramachandran, was accommodated as governor of Mizoram. The name of J.F. Ribeiro, former Punjab police chief, and Farooq Abdullah's initial choice for Kashmir, ran into problems and was not cleared.

A negative fallout of doling out jobs for the boys was avoided by Advani by following the Sarkaria Commission prescription and involving chief ministers in the appointments. The elaborate consultations delayed the final announcement. This apparent act of propriety also gave Advani an opportunity of scoring a point over the West Bengal chief minister. Though bent on avoiding contact with the BJP Government, Jyoti Basu was forced to schedule an appointment with Advani to discuss a replacement for Reddy. He could hardly wriggle out of this one.

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