Crisis Has Taught Parties Valuable Lessons: Chidambaram

There has been a sea-change in political equations among parties in the last 20 days of crisis, and all sections have learnt valuable lessons, former finance minister P Chidambaram said during a short but meaningful speech during the debate on the confidence motion.

It was also a political speech coming from a man whose party had come to the Lok Sabha not fighting the BJP. Chidambaram said in the era of coalition, regional parties would get around some 8-9 national parties to run the government on the basis of the prospects of a better practice of cooperative federalism.

In this situation, the BJP would also have to get power only through allies. But in the present situation, the BJP had no hopes to get new allies unless it had ways to create new political parties, he said.

Keeping the debate on a very high level, Chidambaram did not trade charges with anyone but did make his displeasure on sub-standard debate clear.

In an apparent oblique reference to defence minister Mulayam Singh Yadav, who concentrated on BJP bashing in the name of secularism, Chidambaram said all parties must learn to respect the verdict of the people and must learn to work within that.

Chidambaram made it clear that what the regional parties were looking for at the national level was cooperative federalism and appealed to the Prime Minister to pledge to run the government on this principle. He expressed happiness over the Prime Minister making clear at the very beginning that he was not anti anybody. Chidambaram said he was sure Gujral would find some issues to work even with the BJP.

Appealing to the Prime Minister to adhere to the UF programme of providing an alternative government, a government not based on confrontation but consensus, Chidambaram appealed for a five-point agenda to be adopted for the current year: Pass the Lok Pal Bill, amend the Constitution to provide one third reservation to women, empower panchayat bodies by giving them financial powers, rewrite Official Secrets Act, and bring an Information Act.