Ally puts BJP fault lines back in focus
New Delhi, April 14: Nitish Kumar has resurrected the fault lines in the BJP that Rajnath Singh desperately tried to cover with a de facto projection of Narendra Modi as the party’s presumptive prime ministerial candidate for 2014.
The BJP president’s strategy in foregrounding the Gujarat chief minister, albeit indirectly, was seen essentially as a response to the clamour from the ground to declare him as the frontline person in the post-Atal Bihari Vajpayee era.
Rajnath sidestepped the other thorny issues arising out of Modi’s projection that included the competing ambitions of the BJP brass and potential objections from the NDA.
BJP sources conceded that Nitish’s comprehensive critique of Modi, covering every aspect of the debate around him, was a “timely reality check”, although nobody spoken to was prepared to state at this stage who the leaders would choose: Modi or the Bihar chief minister.
The top leaders — who looked unsettled on stage when Rajnath extolled Modi at the BJP national council in February — prevaricated like Rajya Sabha Opposition leader Arun Jaitley did when a journalist went up to him.
Those down the hierarchy did not.
Uttar Pradesh leader Kalraj Mishra said Nitish had no business dictating terms to the BJP, while Bihar minister Giriraj Singh contended that an individual could not be singled out in a party and dubbed “communal” or “secular”.
In Chhapra, general secretary Rajiv Pratap Rudy rued the tendency of “regional” outfits to set conditions to national parties without naming Nitish’s Janata Dal (United).
Late in the evening, the BJP issued a release, defending Modi against Nitish’s allegations and regretting the propensity of “Opposition parties and allies” to “dilute the focus on removing the UPA”.
The statement, a source said, was “unanimous” and had been drafted after a meeting attended by senior leaders at L.K. Advani’s residence.
The emphasis on Advani was ostensibly meant to dispel speculation that he was on Nitish’s “side” in the Bihar leader’s anti-Modi offensive.
The release said: “The need of the hour is to defeat the non-performing and corrupt UPA. The Congress-led UPA government is leading this country on a downslide in every field. The BJP expects Opposition parties and allies to keep their main focus on that. However, it is unfortunate if they concentrate their energies on our chief ministers…. We reject all unfounded inferences against Shri Narendra Modi.”
There were hints of how the BJP’s internal power play was at work in the reactions that came in.
A senior MP said: “Those who are being evasive nurse ambitions for themselves. By chance, if the BJP emerges as the largest party but without a consensus on Modi’s candidacy, these leaders fancy themselves as more acceptable because of their supposed secular antecedents.”
The MP said
those like Mishra, whose stakes were confined to a state, reflected the “feelings” of the cadre and the “inability” of the Delhi cabal to “read the writing on the wall”.
Nitish’s pot-shots at Modi came as a handy ruse to the Delhi coterie. Summing up the BJP’s dilemma,
a source close to one of the Delhi bigwigs argued: “Can we jettison the Dal (U)? No, the consequences will be serious. Today, with or without Modi, nobody can claim the BJP will get a majority on its own. Sure, there is a positive groundswell for Modi in the cities and towns. But we have to ask, ‘are we positioned to convert the sentiment into votes’? Perhaps we are. But what about villages and kasbas that vote in big numbers?”
If the Dal (U) walked out, this source feared, the perceived pro-BJP “build-up” among floating voters might peter out simply because the BJP would be seen as a “weak” nucleus of a possible anti-Congress coalition.
Nitish revived the debate on what would serve the BJP better: less dependence on the allies and more reliance on its own cachets that include Modi, or spreading the net by catching more allies and humouring the existing ones?
Last night, hope flickered briefly in the BJP when Nitish made back-to-back calls on his old friend, Jaitley, and then Rajnath. Sources claimed the Bihar leader told Rajnath his “rhetoric” on pro-minorityism and inclusion was pushed by state compulsions.
Rajnath replied that even the BJP had its political imperatives but hinted that it did not intend unveiling its Prime Minister candidate yet.
The opening speech of Dal (U) president Sharad Yadav today sounded “appropriately conciliatory” to the BJP. Nitish’s attacks on Modi dampened the mood, a source said.
The BJP’s main carp is at a time when the NDA ought to “unitedly” take on the UPA on issues like corruption and price rise and serve itself up as the alternative, Nitish was deflecting attention on Modi.
“It’s as though Modi is the issue for 2014.
Nitish’s strategy might fetch for him Muslim votes in Bihar. But on the national canvas, it looks like he is bent on consolidating the minority votes for the Congress by harping on Modi. He has as good as abandoned the NDA,” a source said.
The question is who will cast the first stone: Nitish or the BJP?
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