United Progressive Alliance

The Indian communist parties (popularly called the Left Front, the Samajwadi Party with 39 (now 33) MPs and the Bahujan Samaj Party with 19 (now 17) MPs were other significant blocks that opted to support UPA at various phases of its 50 month rule.^[2]^[3] The UPA did not enjoy a simple majority on its own in the parliament, rather it has relied on the external support given by these parties to ensure that it enjoys the confidence of the Indian parliament similar to the formula adopted by the previous minority governments of the United Front and the NDA.

An informal alliance had existed prior to the elections as several of the current constituent parties had developed seat-sharing agreements in many states. However, it was only after the election that the results of negotiations between parties were announced. The UPA's policies were initially guided by a common minimum programme that the alliance hammered out with fruitful consultations with Jyoti Basu and Harkishan Singh Surjeet of the 59 member Left Front^[4]. Hence, government policies were generally perceived as center-left, reflecting the centrist policies of the INC and the Left.

At present the UPA is no longer supported by the Left parties. It survived a vote of confidence in the parliament on 22 July 2008 and is expected to last at least till its term expires in 2009.

Initial support

Initially, the United Progressive Alliance was given external support from the Left Front which totaled 59 MPs. Similar external support was also promised by several smaller parties that were not a member of any coalition, including the Samajwadi Party with 39 MPs, the Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam with 4 MPs , the Janata Dal (Secular) with 3 MPs, and Bahujan Samaj Party with 19 MPs, who promised to support the government if it faced a vote of confidence. Nevertheless, these parties were not a part of the government. The UPA thus had at least 335 MPs out of 543 supporting it at the time of its formation.

The Left parties, despite ideological differences with the Congress, supported the UPA to ensure a secular government and avoid a BJP-dominated government.^[6]

Withdrawals

Telangana Rashtra Samithi

The Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) was the first party to quit the alliance, first when its ministers quit the Andhra Pradesh government, and finally when an official withdrawal was done at the national level by its president K. Chandrashekar Rao, who resigned his Lok Sabha seat.^[7]

Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam

Bahujan Samaj Party

On 21 June 2008, the Bahujan Samaj Party, or the BSP, with 17 seats, announced withdrawal of its support.^[10]

Left Front

Current constituents

Due to the volatile nature of coalition politics in India, the constituents of the UPA have been wavering. As of July 15, 2008 they were:^[12]

Cabinet ministers in the government

As of 26 July 2008 the UPA has the following cabinet ministers in the Indian government^[16]:

Vote of confidence

The UPA faced it's first confidence vote in the Lok Sabha on 22 July 2008 after the CPI (M) led Left Front withdrew support over India approaching the IAEA for the Indo-US nuclear deal. The vote was so crucial that the UPA and the opposition parties summoned MPs from their sick beds and even from prison cells to take part in the vote.^[17]

Voting

In the 543 member Lok Sabha, the UPA needed 272 votes for the government to enjoy a simple majority.^[18] The UPA won the confidence vote with 275 votes to the opposition's 256, (10 members abstained from the vote) to record a 19-vote victory.^[19] ^[20]^[21]^[22]

Abstensions

Ten members abstained from the voting despite some of them having recieved strict contrary instructions from their parties.^[23]. Among the 10, 2 MPs followed their party decision of abstaining so as to not be seen as supporting the UPA or the BJP, Left led opposition. Those two were:

Cross voting

Conversely, there were four members of the opposition who cross-voted in favour of the government proposal. These 4 were

Allegations of bribery

Three BJP MPs – Ashok Argal (Morena), Faggan Singh Kulaste (Mandla) and Mahavir Bhagora (Salumber) amidst discussion walked towards the Speaker Somnath Chatterjee and placed two brown and black leather bags on a table. They pulled out bundles of Rs. 1,000 (US$ 23.21) and alleged that Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh had tried to offer them bribe to vote in favor of the government.^[26] The BJP MP Kulaste, alleged that Amar Singh and Congress leader Ahmed Patel, an aide to Sonia Gandhi tried to offer bribe of Rs. 9 crore (US$ 2.09 million) to remain absent from the confidence vote. Amar Singh denied the charges.^[26] Speaker Somnath Chatterjee asked New Delhi's police chief to investigate the bribery issue.^[27]Indian news channel CNN IBN which carried out the sting operation by recording using hidden cameras agreed to share the material with Indian authorities.^[28]

Expulsions

Contents

History