LAST week, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani threw a challenge at Mian Nawaz Sharif, a day after the PML-N president had called for early polls to help Pakistan overcome its grave problems.

The confidence that the statement betrays is rooted in anything but existing conditions or the public sentiment highlighted in the media. Mr Gilani`s challenge to Mr Sharif stems from the PPP`s much-celebrated position at the top of an alliance and a couple of other even more meaningful alliances with power brokers at home and abroad.

In his reply, Mr Gilani told the PML-N leader he stood alone in making the demand for a snap poll, referring to Mr Sharif`s own little failure to drum up a potent enough opposition to shake the PPP government.

Effectively, he was asking Mr Sharif to go and come back when he had the required backing. Everyone is waiting for Mr Sharif to return from his visit to Saudi Arabia and respond, with some ardent supporters urging him to take the government head on.

It is not rare for one to run into people in Lahore who are irritated by Mr Sharif`s leniency with the government in Islamabad along with a few who are all praise for his politics of restraint. In any case, his ability is not in doubt.

Mr Sharif, who has been meaning to go all out for a change for a while now, needs allies. An effort to give the idea a national colour and then hopefully turn it into a public campaign of threatening magnitude was dashed when the PML-N failed to get the support of a sufficient number of allies some weeks ago. Its flirtation with the MQM ended early. Other parties have also maintained a safe distance from the promised Sharif drive so far.

It is a break from the past when a seemingly timely rallying cry by Mr Sharif against the `perennially corrupt` and `inherently inept` PPP administration provided him with ready brothers in cause. Some past allies of the PML-N who are equally critical of the PPP this time around have so far not joined hands with Mr Sharif. These include the PML-N`s `natural` partners.

The Jamaat-i-Islami, a natural PML-N ally, would be waiting for such an opportunity. Previously, it never needed a second invitation to jump on the bandwagon. As the situation stands, it is waiting for the first invitation.

Neither of the two parties has actually flaunted an eager desire to restore the old anti-PPP front.

Especially in Punjab where these two parties have successfully fought many a battle together the absence of an effort on the PML-N`s part to woo the Jamaat is kind of a giveaway for many. Going by convention, such an effort would have blended well with Mr Sharif`s visible warming up for a popular onslaught against the PPP.

These are important little details for political pundits. In the event, they, again, by force of habit, are compelled to view the Sharif gestures more as an attempt to reclaim his title as the establishment`s favoured alternative to the blundering Bhuttos and their remnants and retinue. If and when the alternative has been re-established, the old allies would quickly come together, goes the folklore.

Mr Sharif`s call for early elections has come amid the spawning of new realities. The old method factors in a vote bank of political parties that may be subject to shrinking but one that is thought to have stayed more or less intact over the years.

And the old method is based on recognition of the powerful candidates with votes in pocket to turn an electoral race in their favour. There is something in the air to suggest that these formulas may be rendered a bit ineffective. the

There is no bigger indicator of this change that is at work than Mr Sharif`s inability to promote himself as alternative to Mr Zardari`s setup. For the first time in three decades, other options — which may be acceptable to the establishment — are at least part of the public discourse, even in Lahore.

Also, in the enthusiasm generated by `democracy`s` triumph against Gen Musharraf, some lessons thrown up by the 2008 election are often ignored. It is forgotten that the Musharraf party lost to the PML-N and PPP despite stuffing itself with candidates who under the old method of understanding had the clout to win a vote on their own.

Today, PPP appears to be hooked on to the idea of the famed `winning candidates`, just as it has inherited so much else from Gen Musharraf, at a cost it may live to rue.

It is intriguing as to how it disregards chapters from its own history; how it had to time and again resort to new candidates to contest in general elections. At the same time, its emphasis has been on widening the breach that has come to exist between Lahore and some parts of Punjab, making it even more difficult for the party to win over areas in central Punjab where it once thrived. This is more than just baffling for a party which boasts of its longest reign in power at the centre since the days of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

The PPP has left unexplored the very areas it needed to snatch back from the PML-N, while in contrast Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif is busy in his efforts to consolidate his base and is also taking the battle to some if not all parts of Punjab where the PPP did well in 2008.

With the opening of bridges in Lahore and Bahawalpur, with public meetings addressed by the PML-N president, with routine announcements of people joining them in various places in Punjab, and by flaunting a hospital of their own the Sharifs are preparing for an election. The plan is to ensure that some other actors in Punjab may find the election, whenever it is held, too early.

The writer is Dawn’s resident editor in Lahore.