JD (United) splits again

BY WALKING OUT of the Janata Dal (United) with his brother and two other MPs to form another party, Mr. Ram Vilas Paswan has indicated again that the Janata Dal was put together as a party in 1988 more to serve the interests of a set of leaders than for any lofty political principles. The enthusiasm that Mr. Paswan displayed in emphasising the rationale of the formation of this new party did not reflect differences over the JD(U)'s political line but was the result of the ``differences'' he had with the party's president, Mr. Sharad Yadav. Products of the churning that the political process went through in the late 1960s and the early 1970s, both Mr. Paswan and Mr. Yadav were emerging as the second line of leadership in the Janata Dal particularly after Mr. V. P. Singh began withdrawing from the mainstream. They were among those in the Janata Dal along with Mr. Laloo Prasad Yadav who were instrumental in committing the party completely to a political course emphasising social justice much against the wishes of such other leaders in the fold as Mr. Ramakrishna Hegde and Biju Patnaik; it is another matter that these three leaders reduced the Janata Dal to a single issue party and also rendered the idea of social justice a mere slogan.

And as had been the ``tradition'' of the anti-Congress political platform, these leaders were unable to stick together for long. If Mr. Paswan and Mr. Sharad Yadav got together in 1997 only in order to oust Mr. Laloo Yadav (a spill-over of the turf war in Bihar) the unity even at that stage was innocent of ideology; it was, indeed, a matter of convenience. Mr. Paswan was never at ease with Mr. Sharad Yadav as president of the party. And if it took him so long to walk out of the fold, it was only because he failed all these days to manage a third MP (apart from his own brother Mr. Ramachandra Paswan and Mr. Jainarain Prasad Nishad who had agreed even earlier to challenge Mr. Sharad Yadav's leadership) to accept his leadership. Mr. Paswan may have succeeded in managing the requisite strength to escape disqualification under the provisions of the anti-defection Act at this stage; but then, it remains to be seen if at least a couple of those who have left the Janata Dal(U) to join the Jan Shakti will remain in the new party for long. After all, such a coming together of MPs from the Janata Dal, only to break away once again (and thus manage to retain membership and the privileges of being a member of the Legislature), was seen in the past too; Mr. Ajit Singh walked out of the party with as many as 20 MPs in 1992 (a third of the 60-strong contingent in the Lok Sabha then) and a group of seven MPs from among them crossing over to the Congress at the next opportune moment in July 1993.

A matter for concern in all this is that it lends itself to the growing perception that the political process is becoming nothing but a tactical course adopted by a set of people bent on self- preservation. This retreat of politics, taking place at a time when corruption and malfeasance of public funds are widespread at all levels of the political structure and the civil administration is seen as becoming increasingly insensitive to the aspirations of the society, is certainly not in the interests of the democratic structure. It is one thing for such leaders as Mr. Sharad Yadav and Mr. Paswan to quarrel as to who among them can take on Mr. Laloo Yadav in Bihar. But the manner in which they have conducted themselves in the recent past does not hold anything to show that they were unduly troubled by the plight of the people of Bihar.

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