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HD Deve Gowda, chief of the Janata Dal (Secular) and former prime minister, is prepared to forgive all past humiliations, all intended slights -- in the interest of the nation.
For the 76-year-old "humble farmer", even the raw deal that his party recently got in Kerala is not important anymore. Even after the grand endeavour of the Third Front was initiated, the Communist Party of India-Marxist denied the JD-S any ticket in Kerala, including the latter's sitting constituency.
The JD-S minister in the state's Left Democratic Front government had to resign in protest. Yet, Deve Gowda is now ready to kiss and make up with the Left, provided the front helps him in attaining his aim.
"First of all, we are in the Third Front. In Karnataka, when we launched our alliance, Veerendra Kumar, the sitting JD-S MP who was denied support in Kerala by the Left, was also present. It (Left's stand) might have hurt him. But we have all taken some responsibility to create an alternative government to the NDA and UPA. We will sort out the problems at the state level," the JD(S) supremo assures.
The Left, too, has forgiven the fact that Gowda's son, HD Kumaraswamy, decamped with the entire JD-S legislature party to tie up with the BJP to form a government in Karnataka. Deve Gowda, at that time, claims that the decision "broke his heart" but later took up with the BJP, justifying the decision.
Some of his local party leaders had already raised flags of rebellion against the CPI-M in Kerala. But the senior JD-S leader is unfazed. "Please, please, no one is leaving my party. All of them have worked hard to build it. Everything is ok. We are a part and parcel of the Third Front."
"You can ask me what I am doing at this age of 76. My desire is to see my party in power. I have worked very hard, taking all sorts of risks to build this party. I want to see that JD-S is in power by 2011," the former PM says. "Right now, my main concern is April 23 and April 30 - the polling dates in Karnataka."
Kumaraswamy would contest the Lok Sabha elections from the Bangalore (rural) seat, Deve Gowda tells Business Standard.
At the same time, he didn't forget to claim that the Congress, in its manifesto, had actually hijacked his ideas. "Tell me who first took the decision to go to the needy people? The Congress had ruled for 42 years. They didn't do this before. I was the first one to introduce rice at Rs 3 per kg and kerosene at Rs 2 per litre for poor people. The same 'humble farmer' was the first man to assess what poor people need in this country. I can give you many more examples," he says.
Deve Gowda also gives little importance to the change in the Congress stand and declaring Manmohan Singh as its prime ministerial candidate before the polls. "Why didn't they project Manmohan Singh in 2004? What had stopped the Congress from projecting him at that time?"
The 76-year-old politician is currently devoting all his energy for the Third Front. He, however, is yet to find a suitable alternative name of this political group after the Left rejected the much-maligned name "Third Front". He is yet to find time to think about the group's Common Minimum Programme as well.
"Everything will be decided after May 16, when the results of the Lok Sabha elections will be declared," he says. Clearly, the former PM wants to see what the country has decided before taking up further responsibilities in the interest of the nation.
