Opinion - News Analysis

BJP’s fundamentals have become loose

— PHOTO: AFP

Everybody’s agenda: Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi at an election rally.

“Since 1980 this is the first time the ruling party and the opposition have the same agenda: Narendra Modi,” says Amit Shah, Minister of State for Home Affairs in the Modi Ministry in Gujarat and one of the few political hands who can be counted as part of the Chief Minister’s inner circle.

Never before has Gujarat witnessed this kind of a one-man show. One man’s strengths and weaknesses, his personality and persona, perfections and imperfections, have all come to overshadow the normal fundamentals of the State’s electoral economy.

The Bharatiya Janata Party’s sales pitch has got reduced to Mr. Modi — to the neglect of the party, its ideology or national leaders. The party released it manifesto only on December 7, and the Chief Minister did not even deign to attend the function.

A typical BJP advertisement in newspapers displays a full-length visage of a youngish Narendra Modi, with the adjectives, ‘hard-working,’ ‘enemy of terrorism,’ ‘nationalist,’ ‘courageous,’ ‘tested,’ ‘visionary,’ ‘fearless,’ ‘able administrator,’ ‘decisive,’ ‘friend of the poor.’ The advertisement ends with a question: who is the Congress alternative? This sales pitch is not without its takers. A former director-general of police reflects the upper classes’ view: “who are these people. Who is this Bharat Solanki? All district level politicians.”

Even Muslim intellectuals concede that the Chief Minister has managed to manufacture for himself the image of “marad admi” (he-man), an image that appeals to the young urban voter. However, there is perhaps a realisation that too much emphasis on the Chief Minister has its limits too. Only on Friday did a BJP advertisement appear carrying pictures of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and L.K. Advani.

But Mr. Modi’s personality has become an election issue. Says a Saurashtra businessman: “[The] Chief Minister’s arrogance is overweening. A couple of months ago, some of us businessmen went in a delegation to the Chief Minister; the local MLA was with us; Mr. Modi shouted at the MLA in a voice and tone I would dare not take with any one of my factory workers.”

Mahendra Trivedi, a four-time BJP MLA and a critic who has been denied the party ticket but who chooses to remain loyal to the BJP, wishes “the Chief Minister had not been so arrogant.” Even his critics acknowledge the Chief Minister’s “knowledge, oratory, and good administration.”

A senior official, close to Mr. Modi, paints a portrait: “Egoist, loner, has no friend. There is nobody close to him. An emotional person, who ends up creating enemies; one who has cut himself off from normal information sources and in the process has become prone to tale-carriers. He does not believe he needs to do any ‘favour’ to any of the established crowd.” The result? A divided sangh parivar.

Never before in the history of Gujarat has the BJP faced the election with so open and so bitter a split within the sangh parivar as in 2007. A clash of egos between the Chief Minister and the sangh parivar has remained unresolved. The sangh parivar apparatchiks, long used to dictating to the BJP brass, found Mr. Modi, especially after the 2002 victory, not amenable to any advice or suggestion.

Only the powerful Swaminarayan sect is reported to have extracted 10 seats for its nominees from a Chief Minister who otherwise totally ignored even the “high command.”

Efforts were made to bring in Mr. Vajpayee, even if for only a token appearance, to a Modi rally. But the Chief Minister remains friendless in the sangh parivar. His supporters say the RSS is over-rated and it is only Mr. Modi who can fetch votes. “Hegdegar Bhavan [the RSS headquarters] has lost its vibrancy. The leadership in the State is uninspiring,” asserts a Modi admirer.

Another antagonised element is the Bharatiya Kisan Union, the powerful farmers’ organisation that for two decades played a key role in the BJP’s emergence as the dominant political force in Gujarat. The BKU believes Mr. Modi has been hostile to the farmers’ interests. The opinion is divided. Mr. Modi’s supporters argue that farmers have experienced unprecedented prosperity these five years. For instance, says Vasanbhai Gopalbhai Ahir, a BJP candidate from Bhuj, farmers are getting electricity 14 hours a day.

But the most open and most disruptive break within the sangh parivar is between the Chief Minister and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the very organisation that created the energy, excitement, and euphoria behind Mr. Modi in the 2002 elections. Since then the Gujarat VHP’s strongman, Praveen Togadia, and Mr. Modi have become pronounced adversaries.

When the Modi camp let it be known that at the national level the VHP had endorsed Mr. Modi, reports appeared in the local media suggesting that 30 of 31 members in the VHP executive were against Mr. Modi and that only Ashok Singhal remained supportive.

The BJP election machinery was constrained to put out an advertisement, printing a November 21 resolution alleged to have been passed by the VHP national executive: “VHP stands for stable governments in Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat; stresses the importance of avoiding a division in Hindu votes so that anti-Hindu and pseudo-secularists be given a fitting reply.”

The State VHP unit questioned the authenticity of the claim. The Modi camp was finally constrained to form a new organisation — Rashtriya Nagrik Manch.

More than the split within the sangh parivar, it is the alienation of the Patel community that will impact the 2007 battle. Since 1980, the Patels have been the backbone of the BJP/Janata Dal constituency. This support base now stands disrupted, and the Keshubhai Patel factor has become the most unquantifiable and most unpredictable factor in the outcome.

Under the banner of the Sardar Patel Uttkarsh Smiti, the Keshubhai Patel-led rebels are working overtime. As the former Chief Minister says, “Smiti people simply say: ‘Modi’s defeat is the only way to save the BJP.’”

But Mr. Modi’s camp dismisses Mr. Keshubhai Patel’s influence. “He is a spent force, has had his innings; he may be able to win his own seat if he chooses to contest but cannot swing votes,” says a senior official close to Mr. Modi. Nonetheless, efforts were made to persuade Mr. Keshubhai Patel to leave for the United States on the eve of the elections; obviously the efforts have not paid off.

Mr. Amit Shah reflects the official mood: “It is a three-month-old factor; whatever damage was to be done had already been done — and discounted.”

The Keshubhai factor can be compared to another dissatisfaction of another veteran political leader. It was Jinabhai Darji, a vastly respected Congress leader of south Gujarat, who had got similarly alienated and marginalised by another [Congress] Chief Minister, Amarsinh Chaudhary. This Darji-Chaudhary feud in 1990 put an end to the Congress dominance in Gujarat; in fact, till this day, the Congress has not been able to recover the lost ground.

More than the Patels it is the division in the ranks of the Kolis, another powerful community, that would work to the BJP’s disadvantage for the first time in more than two decades. The rebels have acquired a momentum of their own. But Mr. Amit Shah remains sanguine and says “the worker sees his future with the party, not with these old leaders.”

The fact of the matter is that even sitting BJP Members of Parliament, Vallabhai Kataria, Kashiram Rana, Somabhai Patel (Surendranagar), are openly campaigning against Mr. Modi.

Added to these splits is the state of the BJP’s organisation. Because of the disproportionate and exaggerated accent on the Chief Minister and his personality, the BJP organisation has broken down. Mr. Modi has shown the same indifference to the organisation that Indira Gandhi showed to the Congress organisation after the 1971 victory. Cadres are deemed dispensable: the charisma of the Chief Minister, with a direct rapport with the masses, is thought to be sufficient to fetch votes.

The last two years in particular have seen a massive use of governmental machinery to manufacture the image of a “go-getter” Chief Minister. Collectors/district development officers are pressed to bring crowds in buses for the Chief Minister’s much publicised rallies. According to a political activist the going rate for attending the Chief Minister’s rally is “Rs.50, plus food packet, plus a water pouch.” The workers became inert; worse, they felt unneeded and unwanted; the workers’ capacity to bring in crowds became blunted.

Yet the upper middle classes remain enthralled of the man. As a banker in Bhavnagar put it, “no place is as safe as Gujarat. Mr. Modi is needed for another five years.” He fulfils the middle classes’ quest for “security” and law and order. But the difficulties of life at the lower level remain largely unmitigated. At the district level, corruption has not changed its colour or its ways.

The 2007 battle is taking place in a different institutional setting.

First, the BJP this time will be hard-pressed to use its time-tested rigging techniques. For example, the Election Commission has decreed that only locally registered voters can be agents in local booths. This puts paid to the party’s familiar technique of bringing in buses BJP activists from non-polling areas to man the booths.

To make the situation complicated, teachers, karmcharis and local police personnel are unhappy with the Modi administration, and not all of them will be all that enthusiastic about helping the ruling party in its rigging strategy.

Secondly, compared to the 2002 vote this time the minorities’ vote will be crucial. Says Yusuf Hakim, a respected Muslim leader: “Last time, the Muslims felt intimidated; did not vote; this time we will vote.”

On its part, the Election Commission seems determined to create conditions for the minorities to feel safe to be able to vote. It has appointed 9,000 special observers, with magisterial powers, to see to it that the minorities are not prevented from participating in the electoral process.

The popular mood in Gujarat is not infected with communal temper, especially in the rural areas. As a seasoned official says, “the communal card is not working, and rural areas are cool as a cucumber.”

The Congress, too, has aggressively answered the BJP’s “soft on terrorism” charge. It has reminded the voters of the Kandahar episode, attacks on Parliament House, Akshardham, Raghunath temple-Amarnath yatra. The Congress advertisement poses the question: the person who is always surrounded by commandos, how can he protect Gujarat?”

There is no wave. As one Gujarati professional put it: “The public is not arrayed against the Chief Minister; but there is no love affair. Unless there is a ‘big incident,’ it could be touch and go.”

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