New Delhi:
Mamata Banerjee may have done irreversible damage to her relationship with the Congress by ordering the dismissal of her own party's Dinesh Trivedi as Railways Minister.
Some within the Congress say that it is time to consider a coalition without Ms Banerjee, who has 19 Lok Sabha MPs. Senior leaders have reportedly talked to Mulayam Singh Yadav of the Samajwadi Party to accept a cabinet post and join the UPA with his 22 Lok Sabha MPs. The senior-most leaders of the Congress - the party's core committee - will meet tomorrow to review a possible partnership with Mr Yadav.
In Kolkata, Ms Banerjee has said the crisis around the Railways Minister is "the work of the Congress." Her party described Mr Trivedi as "a traitor" for raising passenger fares in the Railways Budget without consulting Ms Banerjee.
The mistrust expressed by both sides is not new. Ms Banerjee has given the government serious heartburn over economic reforms, forcing it to suspend crucial policies and initiatives. But the Congress believes she has now gone too far, and may no longer be indispensable.
The latest Mamata-quake struck yesterday just after Mr Trivedi presented his Railways Budget and announced an increase in passenger fares. Ms Banerjee said this was unacceptable and stressed she had not been consulted about the budget. Mr Trivedi said that was correct. The Prime Minister who had praised the budget as progressive and modern was embarrassed by Ms Banerjee's fierce opposition to it. Last night, Ms Banerjee sent the PM a letter asking for Mr Trivedi, who she had picked as her nominee to the cabinet, to be replaced by close confidante Mukul Roy. Speaking to NDTV, Saugato Roy of the Trinamool Congress said tonight that the government has till the end of day tomorrow to remove Trivedi.
Sudip Bandhopadhyay, a senior leader from her party, said today that Ms Banerjee's Trinamool Congress will not quit the government and that the UPA coalition remains solid. But the Congress is working on a Plan B that would depend on support to the government from Mr Yadav, or his formal induction, and support from outside from Mayawati. "Netaji will decide on support at the Centre," said Mr Yadav's son, Akhilesh, today, after he was sworn in as chief minister of Uttar Pradesh. The presence of senior Congress leaders at the ceremony suggests political alignment.
In the past, both Mr Yadav and Mayawati have often rescued the government by having their MPs walk out of Parliament, lowering the overall strength of the House and making it easier for the government to hit the numbers needed to win its vote.
The government also has to decide whether it can ignore Ms Banerjee's demand for a rollback in the passenger fare hike. If the government reverses the hike, it will be seen as incapable of introducing reforms and policies key to economic growth, which has slowed to its lowest in nearly three years.
Dr Manmohan Singh's government has repeatedly been unable to implement policies needed to lift economic growth, which has slowed to its lowest in nearly three years. The row over railway fares follows a series of policy flip-flops.
Last year, Prime Minister Singh attempted to allow foreign retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc to invest in the country's supermarket sector, but his move was blocked by the Trinamool Congress.
Earlier this month, a flip-flop over whether India would ban cotton exports plunged global markets for the commodity into uncertainty.