Mehbooba’s Shakespearean dilemma and the number game

Following the death of Mufti Muhammad Sayeed, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is left with 28 MLAs and even if the party allies with Congress for government formation and gets the support of all independent MLAs, who are not backed by the rightwing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), they would still fall short of one seat.

Following Mufti’s death, PDP, which had won 28 seats in the 2014 Legislative Assembly polls and added one more to the kitty with the nomination of Anjum Fazili as one of the two nominated MLAs, is left with 28 seats in the 89-member Legislative Assembly.

With south Kashmir’s Anantnag assembly segment being vacated after Mufti’s death, PDP is 29 minus one on the seat tally.

As the suspense over government formation continues in the State, the numbers with different political parties suggest that PDP does not have any other option but to ally again with BJP or stay out of power.

Presently, the numbers with the political parties do not suggest any other permutations and combinations other than PDP and BJP once again coming up to form the government.

If PDP decides to divorce BJP and enters into a relationship with Congress, it will have to prove its majority but with only 28 seats including one nominated MLA Anjuma Fazili, PDP, even with the support of 12 Congress MLAs and the unlikely case of four independent candidates MLA Langate Engineer Rashid, MLA Khan Sahab Hakeem Yaseen, MLA Kulgam Muhammad Yusuf Tarigami, and MLA Zanskar Syed Mohammad Baqir Rizvi, who has already thrown his weight behind PDP, the alliance would be one seat short of the magical 45 seat mark in the 89-member Jammu Kashmir Legislative Assembly.

There is also a possibility of PDP forming the government with this combination if Mehbooba decides to sever ties with BJP, and then stakes claim to the Governor with 44 seats and asks for sometime before passing the floor test to come up with the majority figure.

Hypothetically, assuming there is another remote possibility of National Conference (NC) which has 15 seats, joining hands with BJP, which has 25 MLAs and one nominated MLA Priya Sethi, staking claim for the government formation, and also getting the support of an independent MLA from Udhampur, Pawan Kumar Gupta and two MLAs of Peoples Conference (PC), which have so far backed BJP, but that alliance too would be one short of 45 mark.

In this case too, the alliance would need to seek support of Engineer Rashid, Hakeem Yaseen, or Muhammad Yusuf Tarigami.

In such circumstances, it appears that PDP is using the delaying tactics in government formation to assert itself considering the party’s credibility had been dented during the past one year when New Delhi either forced it to reverse its decisions like the release of senior Hurriyat leader, Masrat Alam Bhat or declined to assist the State in rehabilitating the September 2014 flood victims.

Meanwhile, the three visits of Congress President Sonia Gandhi to Mufti’s family after the former chief minister was taken ill and admitted at AIIMS suggests that the two parties are already cozying up.

In contrast, the cold shoulder given by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the Muftis by not even paying a single visit to the two-time Jammu Kashmir chief minister at AIIMS and staying away even from his funeral and last rites has sent strong signals that the very foundations of the “North Pole-South Pole” alliance have been shaken.

PDP’s image in Kashmir was left in tatters after the rightwing activists in Udhampur killed a Kashmiri Muslim truck driver in cold blood by lobbing a petrol bomb on the false pretext that he was ferrying bovine animals and also after the most recent standoff with its alliance partner over the issue of State flag.

Mehbooba will have to be content with the Shakespearean dilemma either to once again shake hands with BJP or take the unsure route.