By Amlan Home Chowdhury
Patna: The formulation of new political equations just before the Legislative Assembly polls in Bihar has repeated itself this once again with the state going to elect its Lower House in less than three months’ time.
The forming of new political equations, by and large, denotes the forming of a Third Front or Mahagathbandhan. Such poll misadventures, however, have always ended in political fiascos for Assembly or Parliamentary polls since the first Janata Party Coalition (1977-79).
It now remains to be seen how the ongoing hectic efforts of the Mahagathbandhan by the RJD, Left parties, Congress and others, succeeds till the poll results are declared.
This uncertainty of the poll results further enhances the importance of analyzing the ongoing efforts in the light of the failures of such political misadventures spanning around 42 years in Bihar.
Before we recall these failures, let us have a look at the current efforts being taken to formulate the Third Front with the opposition RJD, Left parties, Congress and others.
The newsiest part of the current Third Front efforts emanated from the proverbial “Shylock-like Pound of Flesh” attitude of the Left parties who earlier had strong bases in Bihar, but went to the political cold storage some 35 years ago.
The current “never say die” attitudes of the CPI and CPM, in regards to coming the Legislative Assembly polls slated to take place either in October or November this year, proves that the Left Bloc again aims to recapture its lost grounds with the help of a Mahagathbandhan. Certainly this, by all political parameters, may create troubles for the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in Bihar.
New Third Front Formula in Bihar Style
As yet, we still do not have a crystal clear picture of the current Third Front Formula without the statistics of seat-sharing, so, let us have a look at it in the form of the following statistics:
Political Party Demand for Seats
i. RJD of Laloo Prasad 135 to 140
ii. Congress 50 to 55
iii. RSLP 23 to 25
iv. CPI-ML 05 to 10
v. CPI 03 to 05
vi. CPI-M 02 to 03
vii. Vikassheel Insan Party 08 to 10
Before we delve deep into the Mahagathbandhan of Bihar, it is time to logically argue why this political misadventure is a jinxed one.
This jinx, very interestingly, has just played with the former chief cinister of Bihar and chief of the Hindustani Awam Morcha, Jitan Ram Manjhi deserting his past political cronies to join the NDA.
We do not need to be political experts to guess that it very adversely affected the Third Front efforts, as it has taken a decision to contest in all the 243 Legislative Assembly seats.
Soon after the announcement of the Assembly polls for October-November this year, feverish efforts for pre-poll political equations again started getting formulated with the RJD-Congress-led Opposition parties ceaselessly trying for a “new combination” to come to power.
Now, a question crops up: Can a Mahagathbandhan really emerge? Would the jinx be broken this time in Bihar?
To find the answer to this question, we must have a look at the political history of the Third Front in India.
Is Mahagathbandhan or Third Front Really a Failed Political Idea?
We can answer this question only with the help of the Gathbandhan’s history in the national perspective. It always became a hotchpotch.
As they say, history always repeats itself. The Third Front, in which foes joined hands in an apparent bid to turn temporary friend, did not succeed either in the Parliamentary or Legislative Assembly polls earlier.
Let us analyse it!
The most recent example is the General Elections of 2019, where the pre-poll fever of the political leaders culminated in the Third Front efforts, but, as we all know, that failed miserably.
Since 1977, such political Fronts had been taking birth and dying soon after the polls. On monitoring it, the readers themselves will find the birth of several coalition political ‘babies’ ending in last minute miscarriages.
Some political babies were born but they were rickety. The names of those short-lived rickety-babies were Janata Parivaar, Third Front, National Front and United Front.
Each of them had an inglorious saga of failures. Mind you, in Indian politics the failures are not pillars of success as one political experiment’s failure leads to another.
The warning of M. Veerappa Moily was right: the Third Front for the 2019 general poll will be a “stillborn child”. Forming a political alternative to the Congress or BJP by smaller regional parties is not an easy task. Moily was very right.
To delve deeper into the sad tragedy of such these “stillborn political children”, we have to peep into a nearly four-decade-old saga of poll-time political misadventures.
Since 1977, at least six major attempts were made to create Third Fronts or Janata Parivars. But, every time, the political joint families crumbled like a house of cards within a very short time with some of their leaders even floating their own parties.
The Janata Parivar mainly comprised of the Samajwadi Party, Janata Dal (U), Janata Dal (Secular), Rashtriya Janata Dal, Indian National Lok Dal and Samajwadi Janata Party.
The first Janata Parivar, led by former prime minister Morarji Desai, could last only from March, 1977 to July, 1979. It collapsed due to internal squabbles and contradictions. After the Moraji Ministry collapsed at the Centre, Chaudhary Charan Singh formed another coalition that continued from July, 1979 to January, 1980.
The Janata Parivar experiment made by V. P. Singh (National Front) also lasted only for a year, beginning in December, 1989.
An attempt at a fourth Janata Parivar was made in November, 1990 by Chandra Sekhar. But, his Samajwadi Janata Party collapsed in June, 1991. We find the same scenario in the case of the United Front of HD Deve Gowda that was formed in June, 1996 and ended in April, 1997.
After Deve Gowda, Indra Kumar Gujral formed the Ministry at the Centre under the banner of United Front in April, 1997. But what happened? The Gujral Ministry collapsed in November, 1997.
It is crystal clear that the ongoing attempts at for forming Fronts may follow the earlier examples. Will pre-poll political marriages of convenience ever last long? We can only wait and watch to find out.
