NEW DELHI, 22 September 2007 — Just a week ago it was not averse to snap elections. Now the Congress party is unsure how it will fare in the wake of the unsavory row over the Sethusamudram shipping canal project that has ignited religious passions among a section of Hindus.
With the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) cashing in on the controversy, and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi’s aggressive comments against Ram adding fuel to the fire, Congress finds itself on the back foot.
The BJP’s decision to launch a campaign over Ram’s existence being questioned in the government’s controversial affidavit in the Supreme Court appears to have shattered the earlier confidence of Congress to go for early elections and return to power with more seats in the 545-seat lower house of Parliament.
According to party sources, the Congress leadership has been struggling to formulate a strategy if elections become necessary in the event of the left withdrawing its support to the government over the India-US nuclear deal.
The sources admit that party chief Sonia Gandhi’s hurried intervention leading to the withdrawal of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) affidavit was not enough. When the Congress-Left battle erupted over the nuclear deal, the ruling party was confident that business and middle class anger vis-à-vis the communists on the issue would help it gain more seats in any future election.
At that time many Congress leaders had tried to convince Sonia Gandhi that it was the right time to plunge into elections even though she was not sure about the prospects of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA).
But the swift developments in the past few days over the Sethusamudram project, which Hindu groups are opposing on the ground that it would destroy the so-called bridge Ram Sethu, built during Ram’s time, has left Congress confused.
And the DMK’s decision to also question Ram’s existence has pushed Congress into a corner. The DMK is a key Congress ally, and the BJP is taking full advantage of the Congress discomfort. “We were ready for elections until the other day. But now we need some time to assess the situation,” a minister in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s council of ministers admitted to IANS on condition of anonymity.
Karunanidhi has deepened the highly sensitive row. He said the government was justified in making a half-billion dollar canal that would allow ships to save more than 30 hours by skirting around the southern tip of India.
The shipping project involves dredging a lane through Adam’s bridge, a chain of islands between India and Sri Lanka. At the moment, ships moving between the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal need to travel around Sri Lanka.
The Hindu epic Ramayana says the geographic feature was built by an army of monkeys to allow King Ram to cross the narrow strip of sea and rescue his kidnapped wife from a demon.
“Ram is as big a lie as the Himalayas and the Ganga (Ganges River) are true,” Karunanidhi told reporters on Thursday.
He was repeating comments earlier this week which led right-wing Hindus in the neighboring state of Karnataka to attack his daughter’s house and torch a bus, killing two people. Police said 10 people have been arrested.
The controversy erupted after the Archaeological Survey of India, acting on behalf of the federal government, filed a statement to the Supreme court saying there was “no tangible material evidence” to prove Ram ever existed.
