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PM puts his foot down, no more 'flippant complaints' from allies

Tara Shankar Sahay in New Delhi

Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee will no longer entertain "flippant complaints" from members of the ruling coalition, but will direct them to air their grievances in the co-ordination committee of the National Democratic Alliance, government officials said.

"The prime minister is fed up of being told by various coalition partners that they are not satisfied with one thing or another. He is running a government, not a recruiting agency, and the partners better understand this. They will be told to air their grievances in the NDA co-ordination committee meetings as the prime minister has an extremely busy schedule and cannot afford to give appointments to coalition leaders every now and then," officials of the prime minister's office told rediff.com

They indicated that though Vajpayee was "open" to discussing important matters pertaining to the government, he would discourage the "narrow-minded" attempts of some coalition partners to constantly engage his attention on their woes, real or imaginary.

They indicated that a few Cabinet ministers had begun to take things for granted and assumed that appointments with the prime minister were a matter of right. "This is not the case. The prime minister has a thousand and one important things on his mind. Henceforth, ministers seeking appointments with him will have to specify what it is about," the PMO officials pointed out.

In the previous NDA government, Vajpayee was swamped by requests from some coalition partners for exclusive appointments. Despite his tight schedule, some of the coalition politicians resorted to "bullying and blackmailing," often giving broad hints that they would break away from the alliance if Vajpayee did not attend to them. "This is what the prime minister does not want repeated in the thirteenth Lok Sabha," the officials said.

Annoyed by such conduct, Vajpayee had decided to step down if attempts to browbeat him continued. He, thereafter, gave a piece of his mind to the allies and stressed that he was quite willing to relinquish office if they continued to make unreasonable demands. Senior minister George Fernandes intervened to tell the allies that the prime minister was serious, after which they backed off, the officials pointed out.

The officials indicated that Trinamul Congress president and Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee's loud proclamations about meeting the prime minister soon to air her grievances over the first Cabinet expansion "might have had something to do" with Vajpayee's new resolve to keep his colleagues in check. They said the Trinamul chief was freely voicing her disenchantment over the expansion, causing concern in BJP circles that wrong signals were being sent out.

Banerjee is upset that neither the prime minister nor the PMO bothered to take her into confidence before appointing the BJP's Bangaru Laxman as the second minister of state in the railway ministry. She was already peeved that the other minister of state in her department, the Janata Dal (United)'s Digvijay Singh, had been clamouring for some responsibility and complained about lack of work to his party leadership. After Laxman's appointment, Banerjee fumed that "nobody can pull wool over my eyes, Laxman in my ministry is superfluous, but the important question is why has he been sent here at all".

But BJP activists were quick to underscore that "Vajpayeeji is our leader of tall stature, the NDA does not need any prima donnas". They said the railway ministry was not the only ministry to have junior ministers and that if the prime minister gave a certain responsibility to any minister, nobody could question it.

Banerjee's other grouse relates to party colleagues, especially Minister of State for External Affairs Ajit Kumar Panja, not being upgraded to Cabinet rank. But given Vajpayee's new-found determination not to be cowed down by pressure tactics, the BJP and the Trinamul Congress appear set on a collision course.

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