India yesterday got its second prime minister in two weeks as President Shankar Dayal Sharma asked United Front nominee H. D. Deve Gowda to form a new government.
The move came within two hours of the resignation of Atal Bihari Vajpayee after just 12 days as prime minister, and before a vote of confidence his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was doomed to lose.
Mr Deve Gowda, 63, said he would be sworn in on Saturday. He has until June 12 to establish a majority in the lower house of Parliament.
The nominee of the United Front, an alliance of leftists, lower caste Hindu groups and regional parties, has been promised the support of former prime minister P. V. Narasimha Rao's Congress Party.
Together, the United Front and Congress control a majority in the lower house of Parliament, but V. N. Gadgil, the Congress spokesman in New Delhi, said it would not be an active part of the new government, merely supporting it from outside.
Nevertheless, a cross-section of MPs said the United Front, riven by internecine rivalries and contradictory policies, and united only in getting rid of the BJP government, would crumble once it assumed office.