The drama and suspense following the declaration of results of the 15th legislative assembly election in the southern state of Karnataka on May 15, has aroused much comment, most of it derisive. Certainly, the initiative of Vajubhai Vala, appointed governor of Karnataka by the BJP government at the Centre, to invite B.S.
Yeddyurappa, president of the state BJP to form the government despite the party not getting a clear mandate from the electorate, and granting him a suspiciously long period of 15 days to cobble up a majority, was less than parliamentary. Yeddyurappa would have had sufficient time to engage in ‘horse-trading, i.e, induce some newly elected members of the legislature to cross over to the BJP.

The contention of Congress and Janata Dal (S) parties, which won 78 and 38 seats respectively in the newly-elected 222-strong legislative assembly (cf. BJP’s 104), and had quickly announced a post-poll alliance, was that H.D. Kumaraswamy, leader of their coalition, should have been called upon to form the government because it had a clear majority. In the event, on the night of May 16 they woke up the chief justice of the Supreme Court who constituted a three-judge bench to hear their writ requesting an injunction to forbid the governor from swearing in of Yeddyurappa the next day (May 17). The apex court declined to stay Yeddyurappa’s appointment as chief minister, but sagaciously reduced the time granted to him to produce a majority from 15 days to 24 hours.

Clearly, this reduced time window was too tight for Yeddyurappa to coax, cajole, induce or seduce MLAs from the other two parties to cross the floor to the BJP. Particularly because leaders of the Congress and JD (S) corralled, spirited away and sequestered their MLAs to distant hotels and resorts, temporarily confiscating their mobile phones to insulate them from blandishments and inducements of the BJP. A new Congress-JD (S) coalition government of Karnataka was sworn in on May 23.

This unseemly sequence of events — misuse of the governors office by the BJP and shepherding of MLAs against the inducements of the cash-rich BJP — has caused much despair and anguish among political pundits and constitutional purists lamenting that the electoral system has been reduced to such a sorry pass. However, its important to discern the silver lining of these sordid events.

The point to note is that all actors in this admittedly unseemly drama, observed constitutional proprieties. Although it is often castigated for being dictatorial, the same must be said for the BJP/NDA government at the Centre. The prime minister respectfully attends Parliament and the government despite its overwhelming majority in the Lok Sabha, shows due deference to law and parliamentary convention. In a world in which judges are often assassinated, Parliaments are abolished and opposition leaders imprisoned, post-independence India’s achievements in constitutional governance and rule of law — however slow and obsolete its processes — are a matter of some pride.