Mayawati's gesture to BJP

BHARATIYA Janata Party leaders often talk about "coalition dharma", but now it is the turn of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati to give them a lesson or two in coalition politics. She is indebted to the BJP for making her Chief Minister for a third time though she does not have a majority of her own. Now, she has reciprocated the gesture by letting Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani, Union Human Resource Development Minister M.M. Joshi and Union Coal and Mines Minister Uma Bharati off the hook in the Ayodhya case, at least for the time being, by refusing to issue a fresh notification for their prosecution. This she did at the risk of antagonising her Muslim vote bank, which was instrumental in taking her party to the number two position in the State Assembly. Even otherwise, given Mayawati's unscrupulous pursuit of power, it was unrealistic to expect her to do anything else.

Even before formally announcing the decision not to issue a fresh notification, Mayawati had declared that the Deputy Prime Minister would attend her "dhikkar rally" (condemnation rally against the Samajwadi Party) in Lucknow on September 28. This was ample evidence that she did not want to sacrifice her government yet.

However, aware that her decision was fraught with political dangers, Mayawati has put the onus on the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), saying that if it wanted to prosecute the guilty, it could still do so in a court in Faizabad. While announcing her decision in Lucknow on September 17, Mayawati took pains to explain that non-issuance of a fresh notification would only mean that there would be no special court to try the accused, but that did not mean that the case itself had become invalid and the CBI, which was the investigating and the prosecuting agency, could go ahead with the prosecution in the "ordinary court" of Faizabad, under whose jurisdiction the crime was committed.

Mayawati was forced to make her government's stand on the issue clear following the Supreme Court's directive to her in this connection on July 29.

The Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad high court had on February 12, 2001, declared invalid the notification for the prosecution of Advani, Joshi, Uma Bharati and several senior Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Shiv Sena leaders in the case relating to the December 6, 1992 demolition of the Babri Masjid. The High Court had taken this decision because the notification to constitute a special court for their prosecution had been issued without its mandatory permission. The court, however, ruled that it was a "rectifiable" technical error and the U.P. government could issue a fresh notification paving the way for their prosecution. The then Rajnath Singh-led BJP government, however, refused to issue a fresh notification, saying that it was for the CBI to decide. The CBI, on its part, has remained content with merely filing a revision petition in the High Court and writing a letter to the U.P. government to issue a fresh notification. In the present context too it seems improbable that the premier investigating agency will initiate steps for the prosecution, among others, of the Deputy Prime Minister.

For the moment, the BJP leaders can heave a sigh of relief, until of course, the Supreme Court considers the U.P. government's reply and takes a decision.

Purnima S. Tripathi