Whichever way you look at it, Mamata will have the last laugh

So what was Mamata Banerjee’s gameplan during the last few days when she first warned against an imminent petrol price hike, followed it up with a very public grandstanding about withdrawing support from the UPA, and ended with a whimper along the lines of “don’t do it the next time or else?”

So is it a case of the prime minister and the UPA leadership finally getting its political act together in some small measure? Well, most of the New Delhi newspapers seem to think so. Newspaper headlines thunder about a rollback of Mamata rather than of petrol prices, with a none too subtle message about the UPA leadership daring and succeeding, for a change, in calling the ally’s bluff.

Those propounding this logic argue that Mamata overplayed her hand. She did not consult other UPA allies before launching her broadside against the government. Maybe she thought she would bring the government to its knees on the issue giving further fillip to her profile that seems to have emphatically arrived on the national stage.

But she failed to take into account the machinations and strategy of one of India’s most seasoned and shrewd political campaigners. The Maratha strongman and NCP chief  Sharad Pawar sensed the opportunity — and grabbed it with both hands — to mend his relations with the prime minister and take  a rain check. Remember: a recent statement from Pawar about there being a governance deficit in the central government had not gone down well with the congress leadership. With his gesture on the petrol price hike issue, when he referred to the PM as a great economist, Pawar has ensured more than a truce with the UPA leadership.

The other major ally with numbers in the Parliament is DMK. Again, with issues like the bail plea of his daughter still hanging fire in the 2G case, DMK supremo M Karunanidhi is hardly in a position to play bluff and bluster games with Delhi.

So Mamata may have actually miscalculated and overplayed her hand on this occasion.

But equally plausible is another theory about Mamata using the issue to kill two birds with one stone.

Ahead of an important round of local elections in West Bengal, she has re-established her connect with the aam aadmi by raising an issue linked to inflation. She has also re-asserted her image as a temperamental, whimsical and unpredictable rebel, attributes which may invite ridicule among the powerful and intellectual elite of the national capital but endear her to her core constituency in the state.

She has also ensured that the alliance with the Congress party is not rocked too much as that would expose her flanks and allow the Communists to exploit the differences between the TMC and the Congress. At the same time, she has managed to keep the Congress party nervous and edgy about her future intentions.

Her spokesperson issued another warning to the Centre on a TV news channel on Tuesday night when he said that any hike in the price of kerosene, diesel and LPG would make the continuance of the TMC in the UPA government “untenable”.

Mamata is not the one to ease pressure without extracting her pound of flesh. She is keeping the balance of convenience in her favour and her eyes are set on securing a good bargain for her people on the real bread and butter issues through a Rs 19,000 crore financial package for West Bengal. Though the TMC chief herself has denied any connection, there are many who believe she upped the ante on the petrol price hike issue only to put pressure on Delhi and secure a better package for the state.

To my mind, it does not really matter much whether Mamata has won or lost this round to Manmohan Singh. The fact of the matter is that in the game of numbers in the parliamentary democracy, right now it’s the TMC leader who holds most of the aces as the UPA needs her more than she, them. Till the time this basic equation remains, one can be sure of Mamata giving more such scares to the UPA leadership in Delhi.

And if her past track record is any indication, only a very thin line will separate her threats from reality. Her mercurial temperament will also ensure that her political moves take the form of a suspense thriller, keeping everyone on the edge of their seats.

Each time she will hold a gun to the UPA’s head, nobody will really be able to tell whether or not Mamata will pull the trigger.