Balance is tilting against UPA after the DMK pullout

The Congress-led UPA-2 is facing another threat to its survival. After dithering for long, the DMK, with 18 MPs in the Lok Sabha and five ministers in the Union cabinet, finally indicated today that it is willing to pull the plug on the ruling coalition at the Centre. It comes exactly six months after another Congress ally, Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress, with 19 Lok Sabha MPs, had severed ties with the UPA.

Though Mamata’s withdrawal of support had reduced the Manmohan Singh government to a minority, the latter managed to survive due to the continuing support of other allies, the DMK in particular, and outside support from the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party.

But this time around the numbers are loaded against the Congress-led government and the Samajwadi Party is peeved with the Congress. The latest provocation is Steel Minister Beni Prasad Verma, known for his proximity to Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, calling Mulayam Singh names, and declaring him a benefactor of terrorists. Mulayam Singh had earlier told his party workers to prepare for parliamentary elections in September this year. That complicates matters for the Congress, since early polls means parliamentary elections will get mixed up with assembly elections to five states.

Finance Minister P Chidambaram, the most articulate voice in the Manmohan Singh government, told the media that the UPA is fine even after the DMK announcement. “There is no crisis. There is an ally who has withdrawn support. The government is stable and enjoys majority in Parliament.” The appropriation bill has been passed by the Lok Sabha and is pending in the Rajya Sabha, but he did not comment on the fate of the Finance Bill. But the numbers as they stand in the Lok Sabha suggest that Chidambaram’s confidence may be a bit misplaced.

Though DMK chief M Karunanidhi has not written to the President as yet conveying his decision to withdraw support, he told the media after an emergency meeting of his party executive that there was no point in continuing with the UPA government or giving it outside support as it was not sensitive to the demands for Sri Lankan Tamils. Though Karunanidhi has left a window open for a review of the decision in case the government moves amendments to the American-sponsored resolution at the UN Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) by referring to the “genocide” of Sri Lankan Tamils and seeking an independent probe into human right violations there, this is unlikely to happen by 21 March, the day of the vote. In the alternative, Karunanidhi has called for a vote in our own Parliament to the same effect, but this would be even tougher for the Congress to accept since it would mean interfering in the affairs of a neighbour.

The formal letter to the President from the DMK, breaking off the nine-year-old relationship with the Congress, could come any time after the UNHRC vote. Sources said the DMK has already sought an appointment with the President.

With 18 members of the DMK pulling out of the UPA, the numbers stack up like this: Congress 203, NCP 9, RLD 5 and others 16. That makes it 233, which is 39 less than the half-way mark. Congress sources claim that the number of others supporting the government is 22 and not 16. But even then the government is in a precarious situation and dependent completely on the whims of the Samajwadi Party with 22 MPs, BSP with 21, RJD with 3 and the JD(S) with 3. The government would fall if either of the two Uttar Pradesh-centric parties, SP or BSP, chooses to play truant. If they choose to support it, then they can surely drive a hard bargain with the UPA.

To add to the UPA’s troubles, the Samajwadi Party is already on the warpath against the Congress over the hugely insulting remarks made by Beni Prasad Verma  against Mulayam Singh. The Samajwadi Party has so far been supporting the government in name of protecting secularism and halting the onward march of the BJP, and Narendra Modi in particular. But that could be public posturing to keep its Muslim support base intact. The SP was also angry with the UPA over Congress President Sonia Gandhi’s open tilt towards Mayawati on quotas for SC/STs in promotions. The SP has been the only party to oppose it strongly.

The Samajwadi Party is celebrating one year in power in Uttar Pradesh and has been claiming that it has already fulfilled its major poll promises by paying unemployment allowance to youth and giving laptops to students. It may like to maximise its numbers in the Lok Sabha before its honeymoon with its incremental support base starts withering away.

Thankfully for the government, the ongoing budget session of Parliament will go into a month-long recess a day after the UN vote on Sri Lanka. But the gathering political storm may make life for the Congress in “recess” far too difficult to just sit pretty. It has its work cut out for it between now and Parliament reopens on 22 April.