Both are minority governments, the former dependent on Independents who were Congress rebels and the latter on a group that broke away from the Congress and calls itself the Loktantrik Congress. There is a famous Chanakya saying: When a tree falls, the birds won't sit on it.

Sonia Gandhi may want to tread cautiously and test the waters in some more states before going for the kill. While there will be pressure on her from party MPs -- and also from potential allies -- to dislodge the Centre, she is aware that the Congress has to be ready to face a general election when it decides to strike.

The significance of today's elections lies in the extent to which the Congress is seen to reviveand this index will decide the party's strategy in the coming days. If the BJP manages to wrest Madhya Pradesh from the Congress -- as exit polls suggest -- the poll outcome will underscore an anti-establishment sentiment in the states. A Congress victory or a hung Assembly in Madhya Pradesh on the other hand will also point to a disenchantment with the Central Government.

As important as the polls in the four states, are the bypolls in Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, UP, Bihar, West Bengal, Assam and Gujarat. The outcome of these Assembly elections and of the lone parliamentary seat in Bharuch in Gujarat will also go to show which way the wind is blowing.

Though jubilant with power around the corner in Rajasthan and Delhi, Congressmen are not sure how the country will react to the projection of Sonia Gandhi as Prime Minister and they know that this will be an issue in the Lok Sabha polls. Even during the course of the four Assembly polls, Congress posters did not talk about Sonia as desh ki neta whichthe party tended to do with its leaders in the past, including Indira Gandhi and Rajiv.

Many of the 40-odd Independents who prop up the Shiv Sena-BJP ministry in Mumbai have been Sharad Pawar men. Pawar cannot be unaware that like Narasimha Rao, a strengthened Sonia may like to shunt him to Maharashtra with Assembly elections due there in 2000. One way to preempt that would be to ensure that elections to the State Assembly are held before the Lok Sabha elections and before the Congress forms a government here.

The Congress is expected to do well in Maharashtra with indications that the electorate is fed up with the Sena-BJP government and the alliance is under strain. State elections early next year would enable Pawar to keep his hold on the Congress in the state and use the results to improve his position at the Centre. But Pawar may choose both his timing and the issue carefully and strike possibly on the issue of the Pakistani cricket team's tour to Maharashtra on which Sena chief Bal Thackeray hasthreatened to break with the BJP.

The interests of Sonia Gandhi and Sharad Pawar may coincide on the question of early elections in Maharashtra.

It is widely held that the fate of the Kalyan Singh government is linked to that of the Vajpayee ministry here. The 177-member BJP in Lucknow depends on the 20-member Loktantrik Congress led by Naresh Aggarwal, Jantantrik BSP, a breakaway group of the Janata Dal and Independents. There is already a move to unite the splinter groups of the Congress and a meeting has been called here by Mamata Banerjee and Naresh Aggarwal on December 10. The breakway groups may not remain with the BJP if they see the Congress coming back to power in Delhi.

Kanshi Ram has already gone on record to say that his party would support the Congress and a Congress alliance with the BSP on the one side and with Mulayam Singh Yadav on the other hand cannot be ruled out.