Hindu nationalists on brink of power in India

Atal Behari Vajpayee

March 10, 1998
Web posted at: 8:52 p.m. EST (0152 GMT)

NEW DELHI, India (CNN) -- India's Hindu nationalists appeared on the brink of power Tuesday after President K.R. Narayanan met the party's leader to find out if he has enough parliamentary support to form a coalition government.

During their meeting, Narayanan asked Atal Behari Vajpayee, head of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), to furnish documents to prove his claim of controlling enough federal lawmakers to survive a confidence vote.

Vajpayee told reporters after the meeting that he has the backing of 252 lawmakers in the 545-seat lower house of parliament and that evidence was being sent to Narayanan.

"Some documents have already reached him. ... By tomorrow all documents supporting the claim will be sent," Vajpayee said.

The presidential palace said Vajpayee had told Narayanan he was "in a position to form a stable government which would command the confidence of the house."

The centrist Congress Party and its allies command 167 seats, and the center-left United Front, which was toppled from power last November, has 98 lawmakers. But they have failed in their efforts to revive a political marriage that foundered after the Congress withdrew vital backing from the Front's government.

The president's meeting with Vajpayee ended a week of suspense, during which the BJP bargained to ensure a majority in the legislature following inconclusive elections.

The BJP apparently passed the threshold this week when it won pledges of support from independents and lawmakers from small parties. Some regional parties have hinted they will abstain from a confidence vote.

Narayanan wants to minimize the chance of yet another government collapse. In the last year and a half, India has seen three different prime ministers.

If the BJP leader gets the nod from Narayanan, it will be the second time in two years that Vajpayee will have assumed the post. He was prime minister for 13 days after the 1996 election, but his government collapsed when it failed to find allies for a parliamentary majority.

Vajpayee, a 71-year-old poet-politician, was more confident this time after pledges from a patchwork quilt of regional parties.

"Everybody knows we are short of a clear majority but we are in contact with other (parliament) members. We're confident of making a majority," he said.

The BJP remains about 20 seats short of a majority in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of parliament. The gap is likely to be filled by more regional groups that offer conditional support.

But political experts wonder how stable a BJP coalition could be, because it would depend on the support of more than a dozen different parties -- raising the prospect of even more political instability in India.

New Delhi Bureau Chief Anita Pratap and Reuters contributed to this report.

Related stories:

• Politician holds sway in who will govern India - March 6, 1998
• Coalition strategies take shape in India - March 4, 1998
• First exit polls in India put BJP in lead - February 28, 1998
• India's Hindu nationalists win local confidence vote - February 26, 1998

Related sites:

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• Bharatiya Janata Party,India
• Press Trust of India
• Indian Politics: The Economic Times
• Hindustan Times

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