Goa is set to get a new government this week, but it is definitely not one that was expected after the results trickled in on Saturday. There have been many instances in the past when Goa has been a silent and horrified spectator to governments being toppled and loose coalitions of parties and individuals with no ideological agreement taking shape and governing the State.
That is not new to Goa, but the manner in which the Bharatiya Janata Party has now managed to cobble together a coalition so as to muster the strength to form a government though it is not the single largest party in the assembly is a first.
The election results were declared on March 11 and the BJP got 13 MLAs elected, its strength falling sharply from the 21 it had got in the previous election. The Congress won 17 seats and though it too fell short of a majority in the House of 40 it is the single largest party in the State and under the Westminster model followed by India, should have been allowed the first attempt at forming a government.
There are precedents for this and the BJP itself has been the beneficiary of one such instance. In the 1996 Lok Sabha election, no party got a majority and then President Shankar Dayal Sharma invited Atal Bihari Vajpayee of the BJP to form the government, as the BJP was the single largest party with 161 seats in the lower House of Parliament. Vajpayee took office but resigned 13 days later because he was unable to put together a majority and so would have lost the trust vote in Parliament. Congress, with 140 seats, was the second largest party in that election but it preferred to support a minority government led by Deve Gowda rather than leading a government.
Why then this sudden thirst for power from the BJP, when it is well aware of the Indian Parliamentary norms? This race to retain power, after its Chief Minister and seven ministers lost the election and the numbers not being in its favour, has a desperate tinge to it
It is seen as an unseemly and a crass attempt to subvert the mandate of the people. Even if the manner in which BJP has managed to forge ahead in government formation is within the law, there are certain norms in government formation and these have to be respected and adhered to.
Not only is what has happened against Westminster norms, but BJP’s argument that its vote share has increased and is higher than the vote share of any other party does not hold water. The Parliamentary model that India follows decides a winner by the number of seats that a party has won and not by its vote share.
A show of strength called in the Legislative Assembly is decided upon by the number of MLAs that vote in favour of the government and is not decided by a government showing the Speaker or the Governor its vote share in the election. Proffering the argument of vote share to defend its hunger for power is akin to a football team that having lost the game claims that is won because it held possession of the ball for a longer period than the opposing team. So, just as in a football game the team scoring the most goals is the winner and not the team that holds possession of the ball longer, in an election in India the party winning the most number of seats is the winner and not the party that gets a higher vote share.
But, Congress cannot be exonerated wholly. It too needs to accept that its delay in getting its act together after the election results were declared and in electing a leader, allowed BJP to forge ahead and stitch together a coalition. That, however, does not in any away diminish the display of greed for power from the BJP and its new allies who are masking it in the garb of promises of stability and development.
