Grand Old Party suffers another body blow

As for the Congress, it is now up against a predatory poacher who is ever eager to woo into its parlour those looking for greener pastures. Before Scindia and Co became willing victims of a takeover game known as Operation Lotus, the BJP has been engaged in such acts of winning legislators and ideological fencesitters in Arunachal Pradesh, Goa and Tripura

The unexpected departure of Jyotiraditya Scindia, one of the closest aides of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, may be a body blow to the 134-year-old party, but how politically beneficial will be the new career of the 49year-old scion of Madhya Pradesh’s princely family in the BJP is open to question.

Much depends on the number of his loyalists among the Congress legislators who will be ready to join him in his new venture. If the number is large enough to bring down the Kamal Nath government of the Congress in the state - one of India’s largest - then Scindia will have won the first round. But fingers will remain crossed in both the BJP and the Congress camps till the floor test in the Madhya Pradesh assembly is over.

However, even if Scindia is victorious, it is difficult to say how smooth will be his “fresh start”, to use his words. If he had walked out of the Congress because he felt claustrophobic in a party where the NehruGandhi family called the shots, he may soon find out that the Sangh Parivar is no less domineering.

It is also a tightly controlled parivar like a Hindu joint family whose patriarchal mindset ensures that the “karta” or the head of the household has the last word. As is known, the Sangh parivar’s karta is the chief of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), who has the remote control in his hands (it’s always a man) in Nagpur.

Since a number of Scindia’s kith and kin have been and still are in the Jana Sangh-BJP, the present BJP’s ideological forerunners. he will be aware of this role of the BJP’s friend, philosopher and guide. As he settles down in his new party, his aunts like former Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje and former Madhya Pradesh minister Yashodhara Raje will tell him how it is. Jyotiraditya’s father, Madhavrao, too, was once in the Jana Sangh before he switched to the Congress, as was his grandmother, Vijayaraje. But the two Raje sisters and their brother, Madhavrao, as well as their mother, Vijayaraje, grew up in a Jana Sangh-BJP which was somewhat different from the present party which is firmly under the thumb of the Narendra Modi-Amit Shah duo. It is unlikely to take long for Jyotiraditya to discover that the Nehru-Gandhis are not the only ones who have their party on a tight leash. In fact, he will even find that the control of Modi and Amit Shah is far more stringent if only because they constitute the ruling dispensation at the centre. Scindia may get a ministership and a heritage bungalow in New Delhi’s prestigious Lutyens’ zone, but he will have to abide strictly by the rules set by the prime minister and home minister in the first place and by Nagpur at one remove.

In this process, Scindia will also realize that he is destined to be no more than a No 3 or a No 4 whether in his old party or in the new. That may not be his only uncomfortable brush with reality. Both he and those who follow him into the BJP will have to come to terms with a political environment which is totally different from that of the Congress or the other “secular” parties. Scindia may well be aware of this fact of life because of his various earlier connections with the Jana Sangh-BJP. But his camp followers who will be switching sides mainly for the sake of a bit of power and pelf may not find it easy to make the adjustment although opportunism can be an effective guide. However, as they try to make space for themselves in the BJP, some of the latter’s karyakartas or ordinary workers can become restive. Such uneasiness has been noticed in Karnataka where the BJP inducted a sizeable number of Congressmen and even made them ministers.

But given the manner in which the BJP is aiming at dismantling the Congress by acquiring the loyalty of ambitious Congressmen in various states – there is speculation about Maharashtra and Jharkhand being the BJP’s next targets – the karyakartas will have to live and learn.

As for the Congress, it is now up against a predatory poacher who is ever eager to woo into its parlour those looking for greener pastures. Before Scindia and Co became willing victims of a takeover game known as Operation Lotus, the BJP has been engaged in such acts of winning friends and influencing people in Arunachal Pradesh, Goa and Tripura.

However, the BJP’s targeting of the Congress is a kind of a left-handed compliment to the tottering no-longer Grand Old Party, for it shows that the BJP cannot hope to achieve its dream of ruling from panchayats to parliament unless it makes India Congress-mukt (free).