The question, however, is: Will the opposition’s and the ruling Akali-BJP coalition’s current actions be able to outsmart each other to win the 2012 race to victory stand? We start with the opposition moves.

The Peoples Party of Punjab floated by the former Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal and the CPI and the CPM have decided to form the “Third Front”. The Longowal Akali Dal led by the wife of the former Chief Minister Surjit Singh Barnala who recently retired as Tamil Nadu Governor is also slated to join the Front. Although Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj party was sounded it has declared it would go it alone in the elections.

On the other hand, the Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal has declared that his party would welcome other groups including the BSP, to join hands with the Akali Dal for fighting the polls. He knows that the Akali Dal’s alliance partner BJP will suffer a big blow to the advantage of the Congress as its ally has lost much of its urban base in the last five years to the advantage of the Congress.

Although unforeseen developments in Punjab and at the national level may radically change the scenario during the four months to the polls, an analysis of the latest developments in Punjab can give an idea about the trends that may emerge to influence the electoral fates of the contesting parties.

Leaders of the PPP have been predicting that they would form the next government in Punjab. Their claim is obviously based on the audiences Manpreet is drawing at his public meetings and the Third Front the PPP has formed. No doubt, the visionary Manpreet is popular among sections of the educated middle class and intelligentsia. But the crowds at a leader’s public rallies do not always make voters.

The two Left parties support bases in Punjab stand deeply eroded because of their central leaderships dogmatic policies on national issues and their ignoring India’s emerging middle classes. The two Left parties now have only small pockets of influence in the state. They can not ensure their electoral survival without joining hands with the like-minded parties.

The crucial issue before the Third Front will be whether it will be able to emerge as the king maker in forming the next government. For the PPP the important issue will be to attain the status of the official opposition party in the 117-member Assembly which makes it imperative for a party to have 12 MLAs. Manpreet’s base is mainly in the Akali Dal’s stronghold of Malwa region which the ruling party had lost to the Congress in 2007 elections primarily due to the massive support extended by the Dera Sacha Sauda’s followers to the Congress. The ruling father-son duo has been trying to win back the Malwa region using all possible political and government resources. Cases were also registered against some of Manpreet’s leading supporters for irregularities they had allegedly committed before extending support to Manpreet. People are not aware about the fate of these cases after their readmission into the Akali Dal – whether they stand withdrawn or are still hanging like the Damocles Sword on their heads.

As the situation prevails today, the main fight will be between the ruling Akali-BJP alliance and the Congress with the Third Front playing a peripheral role more to the disadvantage of the Akali Dal than the Congress.

At long last, the Congress party has started closing its ranks. Regaining its fighting form it is now in an offensive mode to take full advantage of the snowballed anti-incumbency sentiment. It is not without reason that the Badals are desperately trying to meet the anti-incumbency challenge by resorting to no-holds-bared populist measures. That these measures have taken a desperate form is reflected in the pasting of the Chief Minister’s pictures on the free bicycles being given to school girls and also on the ambulances being given to the district health authorities. The government now plans to distribute in the state utensil kits – each costing Rs.26,000 - pasted with Badal’s picture. The scheme will cost the government’s empty coffers about Rs.50 crore.

The most disturbing development is the ruling leadership’s attempts to infringe upon the fundamental right to peaceful protest and curb freedom of expression. It was under popular pressure that it had to drop during the last week’s Assembly session two controversial Bills -one making the peaceful protest a non-bailable offence and the other giving legal immunity to specialist cops- of the Home Department headed by Sukhbir Badal. These Bills were passed a year ago.

Another deplorable development is what the PCC President Capt. Amarinder Singh says is denying the right of free access to sources of information by the Sukhbir-patronised cable mafia. Sources in electronic media which has come to play a significant role in making of public opinion, say that the mafia has monopolized TV telecasting and cable networks in Punjab and Chandigarh. It blacks out TV channels whose news coverage the ruling leadership finds unfavourable. During the Emergency, the Indira Gandhi government had gagged the Press by imposing censorship. This is now being repeated through subtle measures. The victims are the “recalcitrant” TV channels. Paradoxically it was Parkash Singh Badal who had pioneered the agitation against Emergency in 1975 by launching a morcha but who has now allowed his ruling coterie to resort to such draconian measures of curbing free access to information. What a fall!

To sum up the situation, if a non-Akali government comes to power in 2012 it will have to deal with the Akali-BJP government’s legacies of mis-governance and a bankrupt Punjab. A stupendous task. (IPA Service)