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Four ex-PMs meet, Third Front may come up for Nth time

Tara Shankar Sahay in New Delhi

The meeting yesterday of four former prime ministers has fuelled incipient moves for the formation of the sputtering Third Front.

However, BJP leaders, who are rattled by this development, seek to downplay the significance of the move, and insist that their government is firmly in the saddle.

"You have to see who are the worthies at yesterday's meeting -- (H D) Deve Gowda, Chandra Shekhar, I K Gujral and Vishwanath Pratap Singh. All of them have had precious little to do for more than a year now. They need to be in the news, so what better way than getting together and having the media make a big splash out of it," BJP vice-president K Jana Krishnamurthy told rediff.com today.

He did not agree that the timing of the meeting was ominous for the BJP-led ruling alliance at the Centre in the light of some partners being dissatisfied over the recent cut in subsidies.

"We have already explained why prices of some commodities had to be hiked and why the move was unavoidable. Our allies are also aware of it. I don't think we have any cause for concern. The government is firmly in the saddle," Krishnamurthy pointed out.

BJP spokesman M Venkaiah Naidu was equally blunt.

"Yesterday, Gowda, Gujral and Shekhar met the prime minister to highlight the condition of slum-dwellers in Delhi - as if their condition was any better during the previous regimes. We are doing our best to help poor people but these former prime ministers have raised the issue because they are in political wilderness," Naidu pointed out.

Notwithstanding such vehement disclaimers from BJP leaders, sources in the ministry of home affairs underscored that "the government is not taking any chances and all movements of the major players are being monitored".

They pointed out that CPI-M general secretary Harkishen Singh Surjeet had enhanced his channel of communications with Opposition leaders soon after ruling partners like the Trinamul Congress and the Janata Dal-United had come out openly against the recent price hike of essential commodities. The activities of leaders like Yerran Naidu, Devendra Prasad Yadav and Sudip Bandopadhyay was being "monitored", according to these sources.

Although the ex-PMs have taken pains to explain that they were only highlighting the plight of the poor in the national capital, their claims have few takers.

Congress sources contended that at his meeting with party chief Sonia Gandhi on March 27, H S Surjeet had told her that the Congress party had commendably raised issues affecting the masses and had shown political wisdom in being a partner of the Rabri Devi government in Bihar. The sources hinted that the senior CPM leader "exchanged views" with their party chief that the present political situation was congenial for the Third Front to regroup and pull the rug from under the Vajpayee government.

According to the perception in the ministry of home affairs, the Congress, having forsaken its Pachmarhi declaration to go it alone in forming a government, would not hesitate to join hands with the Third Front. They pointed out that this was the signal which was being given out to various Opposition parties by the Congress leaders like Madhavrao Scindia and Pranab Mukherjee.

Senior BJP leader and central minister Pramod Mahajan felt that the "successful visit of president Clinton to India" was something which the Opposition parties found hard to stomach.

BJP MP Ram Tahal Chowdhary likened the efforts of the four former prime ministers as wishful thinking on the part of "political fossils" who had outlived their utility.

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