Kathmandu: The one political player that is heavy on the rest of the others is surely Madhav Kumar Nepal, the strongman of the UML.

While on the one hand Koirala is a political creature who knows no hanky-panky and is a straightforward personality, on the other, his archrival Sher Bahadur too is a known lame-duck sort of political animal who could well be cheated or misled by his colleagues even on minor political issue.

The one who is now left with is Madhav Kumar Nepal having communist credentials. He is a shrewd political leader whose manoeuvrability remains par excellence.

He is with Girija Prasad Koirala in the agitation. He is not with him at all. He is with Sher Bahadur Deuba, not included in the agitation. He is not with him because Deuba is not in the agitation.

Madhav for his own unexplained reasons supports Deuba’s agitation against regression. But equally true is the fact that he is not with Deuba’s agitation for fear of facing Koirala’s wrath.

He is with the King and prefers a solution that is acceptable to all including the King. He is not with the King for he is currently one of the major constituent that is up against the King through the agitation.

If Madhav is so, then what he is in effect?

Undoubtedly, he is playing politics with such a finesse that each of the constituents in the five-party agitation believe that Madhav and his party were with them.

The presumption of the rest of the four-party alliance against regression could be wrong should the UML is provided a political chance to rule the country.

That Madhav Nepal is playing his cards with the rest of the members of the coalition against regression came to the fore when his two strong political “aides” bluntly declared that their party, the UML, would not mind even if Deuba were elevated to the post of the next prime minister.

Later clarifications emanated from the UML quarters that the very special “two” leaders spoke on their own and favoured Deuba’s candidature and that the party not necessarily agreed to what they spoke off-the-cuff.

Politics never goes straight, it is said in the discipline of political science.

If politics is not obliged to move straight, then why should Madhav Nepal and his party be tied and not allowed to explore other available options to their benefit?

The fact is that Madhav Nepal got irritated when some Congress stalwarts declared that the Communist leader once upon a time was their consensus leader and he was not at the moment. Ram Chandra Poudel, Shailaja and Chakra Bastola were the ones who dismissed the prospects of Madhav Nepal being elevated to the ranks of the country’s next prime minister.

A highly irritated Madhav Nepal apparently could have concluded that if he is not the Prime Minister then none in the coalition deserve the right to become the prime minister. He then appears to have pushed the name of Sher Bahadur Deuba with whom he continues to enjoy comfortable “working relations”. Madhav Nepal ventilated his inner feelings that he and his party would not mind if Deuba is the man the King wanted through the kind courtesy of his two exclusive friends, Ishwar Pokhrel and Jhal Nath Khanal.

The clarifications that were issued later denying this possibility were done so in order to calm down Koirala. It was and is a ploy of the UML, maintain analysts. Logic also suggests that Mr. Pokhrel and Khanal could not dare to speak such sensitive matters unless they were told to do so. The two were seasoned leaders of the UML and were in no way political-fools, as one would consider them.

The idea of the UML could be that if the party’s leader is denied the lucrative post, then still the party could accrue political benefits by sending its men in the second rank of the would-be cabinet and face the elections.

Koirala presumably sensed UML secret alliance with Deuba and appears to have hinted the UML that the party had been drifting from its earlier commitments.

The fact is also that Koirala, the commander of the agitation against the King, will tolerate neither Deuba’s elevation to the Prime Ministerial chair nor he will provide his nod in Madhav’s favor. If Koirala is not the recipient of the post, he will not allow others to occupy the post so easily. Rather, he would in that case favor his own chums like Chakra Bastola or Shailaja or even Poudel for the post of the prime minister.

To provide a tit-for-tat to Koirala’s impending moves, Madhav Nepal too has been sending signals that if Shahana Pradhan or K.P.Woli are made the consensus candidate, he would remain grateful to the rest of the coalition partners.

Lost in the process is the India factor.

Neither Koirala nor Madhav Nepal have taken this factor into account. It was not for nothing that former Indian Ambassador K.V.Rajan made a secret trip to Nepal only recently. Certainly he would have not been here if the country were not in the threshold of a change.

What the other side of the border prefers will have to be watched. Keep fingers crossed.