J&K government: BJP will have to stoop to conquer and accept a CM from Valley

The ongoing four-way backroom discussions on government formation in Jammu & Kashmir indicate that all parties – the PDP, the BJP, the National Conference and the Congress, not to speak of the seven independents who got elected to the assembly – have all the making of traditional bargaining for the loaves and fishes of office.

The way the numbers stacked up, the BJP, with 25 seats, is key to any government. The Kashmir Valley’s two main contestants – the PDP and the NC, with 28 and 15 seats – are the obvious choices for partnership. A coalition without the BJP is possible only in one circumstance – the PDP allies with Congress and ropes in all independents. Since that would be unstable, it is considered the last option.

The party with the most to gain from the next government is the BJP, while both PDP and NC have much to lose if they tie up with the BJP. Whichever one ties up with the BJP will automatically be painted as having compromised with a “Hindu” party by the other.

It is upto the BJP to ensure this does not happen. Partnership with a Kashmir party that is automatically going to lose traction with its core voter will ensure that the next government will be short-lived.

The BJP thus has two choices: a mature one, and an immature one.

The immature choice would be to use its 25 MLAs as some kind of crude bargaining lever to constantly ferret out concessions from the Kashmir-based alliance partner, which will then be seen as having sold out to the BJP.

The mature choice for the BJP would be to agree, upfront, that the Chief Minister will be from Kashmir, given its larger size relative to Jammu. It can, and should, insist on a fair deal to Jammu and Ladakh – which no one will grudge it.

It is all right for Arun Jaitley, who is the BJP’s point man in J&K for government formation, to state the obvious – that the party has “veto power” . But this kind of assertion is precisely what will undercut the Valley-based parties.

So even “veto power” needs to be wielded sensibly, and away from TV mikes and cameras. Broadcasting the impotence of the two Kashmir-based parties is the surest way to make one of them self-destruct, which will make way for the more rabid separatists to emerge as the authentic voices of the valley.

In fact, the BJP, despite the drubbing it got from the Valley with just 2 percent of the popular vote, will win brownie points by stating clearly that it would like some party in the valley to head the government – even before an alliance is formed. This will not only go down well with the valley’s Muslims, but will underline the point that the BJP will not play big brother.

Jaitley’s other statement of intent, however, is just what needs to be consistently emphasised. The BJP’s agenda, Jaitley said, was to form a government “with three principles based on national and state interest - strengthening of national sovereignty, development and regional balance,” reports The Economic Times.

While the first goal (national sovereignty) may jar on some separatist sensibilities, it is still fine if the BJP is not expected by anyone to allow J&K to go its own way. No national party can allow that. But that said, the BJP would gain if it added a fourth principle to the three Jaitley enumerated: a belief in more powers to states, which is often said in the context of India, but never J&K. In J&K, we want to reduce the state’s powers.

The only way the BJP can square its known position on article 370 with its need to emerge as a majority party in J&K some time in the future is by emphasising Narendra Modi’s belief in federalism and more powers to states.

BJP need not abandon its Mission 44 just because it did not work this time. It needs to work on it by making its mission more inclusive, so that the separatists are sidelined forever and it begins to find traction in the valley.

The BJP’s long-term goals ought to be to find enough credible faces in the valley to join it – just as the Congress has done.

For that, the BJP must be willing to stoop to conquer. In the immediate context of government formation, it means the BJP must yield prime space to a Kashmir party this time. Logically, it ought to be the PDP, since the mandate in the Valley is for it. But the NC too would work, but not if the BJP wants the chief ministership.