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Blatant partisanship

After falling short of a majority in the election to the Meghalaya Assembly, the Congress found itself friendless among the other political players in the State and needed to pull the levers of power in New Delhi to get D.D. Lapang sworn in as Chief Minister. Despite emerging as the single largest party with 25 seats in the 60-member House, the Congress was in no position to piece together a majority as the regional parties in the hill State gravitated towards the National ist Congress Party. Nothing in the Constitution bestows on the “single largest party” an automatic right to form the government. And in a situation where the post-poll coalition Meghalaya Progressive Alliance, formed on the initiative of the NCP, was able to demonstrate the strength of numbers, the proper course for Governor S.S. Sidhu would have been to give it the first opportunity to form the government. But in an act of blatant political partisanship, the Governor swore in Mr. Lapang as Chief Minister and gave him 10 days to pass the floor test. The Constitution makes no distinction between a pre-election alliance and a post-election alliance; what matters is the ability to secure the confidence of the House. Thus, the Governor had no business to privilege Mr. Lapang’s claim to form the government over that of the newly formed coalition.

The coalition that gets the first chance to form the government has an obvious advantage: it can promise the loaves of office to members who are undecided or who are willing to switch loyalty for some political or personal gain. But allowing a party or coalition that does not command a majority in the first instance to form the government after overlooking the claims of an alliance that has been able to put together a majority goes beyond concerns about ‘horse-trading.’ More often than not, governments so formed fail to pass the confidence vote, and therefore last no more than a few days. A classic case was the 13-day government of the Bharatiya Janata Party headed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee, which was formed after President Shankar Dayal Sharma went by the “single largest party” principle overlooking the claim of Deve Gowda who had with him letters of support that clearly pointed to his majority support in the Lok Sabha. Meghalaya seems likely to experience some ugly political twists and turns whether or not Mr. Lapang survives the confidence vote. If he wins the confidence of the House, he would have done so because of having secured the office first with the help of the Governor. If he loses, Meghalaya would have been witness to a farce that lasted a mere 10 days, bringing the credibility of the Governor down to a new low.

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