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Kalyan Singh in do-or-die mode

Sharat Pradhan in Lucknow

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Kalyan Singh learnt his lessons in politics the hard way. And it has been his survival instinct that has always kept him going.

It was this motivation that enabled him to move heaven and earth to engineer a coup on both the Congress as well as his then coalition partner, the Bahujan Samaj Party, and ride to power. When it came to ensuring fool-proof loyalty from the defectors from both the BSP and the Congress, he found a novel way of appeasing one and all -- offering a ministerial berth to each of them.

Once again under threat from different quarters including Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the UP chief minister is busy manouvreing to stick to the hot seat. He knows there was no way he could shirk his responsibility for the party's debacle in UP where its all time high tally of 57 seats (in 1998) plummeted to a paltry 29 this time.

And with his detractors gunning for him survival this time around is going to be really tough. The 67-year-old diminutive leader is leaving no stone unturned to ensure yet another lease of power. The exercise commenced with wooing the BJP's allies, some of whom sounded the bugle of protest on behalf of Kalyan.

"The BJP should not affect a change of leadership without consulting us," was the common refrain of certain leaders of the Loktantrik Congress Party as well as the Jantantrik Bahujan Samaj Party. "We had extended support to a BJP government led by Kalyan so we may have to review our support in case BJP central leadership chooses to replace him," was the warning issued by yet another ally the Samata Party.

Chaudhary Laxmi Narain and Vivek Singh led the support move for Kalyan on behalf of the LCP. It was Markanday Chand, the minister for minor irrigation, who gave the call on behalf of the JBSP, while forest minister Raghubar Dayal Verma of the Samata issued the veiled warning.

Though the strong anti-Kalyan lobby within the BJP, led by a scheming Kalraj Misra, the minister for public works, managed to rope in the likes of LCP chief Naresh Agarwal as also a faction of the JBSP, the pro-Kalyan lobby emerged stronger. Prime Minister Vajpayee, who had made up his mind to get rid of what he considered an "insolent" Kalyan, was compelled to put his plans on hold.

Vajpayee was also forced to give second thoughts to his obvious choice as Kalyan's successor -- Kalraj Misra -- when Vivek Singh fished out a long list of corruption charges against him (Misra). The young LCP supporter of Kalyan even claimed to be in possession of sufficient documentary evidence to establish Misra's unholy nexus with the slain mafia don Shree Prakash Shukla .

Naresh Agarwal who played smart by making an ambiguous remark that "change of leadership was an internal matter of the BJP," was forced to eat his words as a strong lobby of younger leaders in his party rebelled against him.

With the situation turning volatile once again, Vajpayee had to defer his scheduled visit to Lucknow for the second time. The prime minister, who had made it a regular practice to pay a thanksgiving visit to his electorate in Lucknow, at the conclusion of past three successive elections, has earlier planned a visit on October 20, which was subsequently changed to October 31, only to be deferred once again. Evidently, he wanted to take a decision on the Kalyan issue before paying a visit to his political constituency.

Meanwhile, Kalyan Singh is making full use of the time he has got. He has ordered a major reshuffle of Indian Administrative Service and Indian Police Service officers. And it was clearly evident from the changes made that most of these were aimed at appeasing the disgruntled party leaders who would often blame the chief minister for ignoring their recommendations for transfers and postings.

Sure enough Kalyan's policy of ''divide and rule'' through ''appeasement'' seems to be paying rich dividends at least for the time being . And if Kalyan manages to survive once again it would be hats off to his unquestioned skill in realpolitik.

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