Vertical mobility of BJP

‘Who says there is no alternative to Congress? I see the alternative in the form of BJP,’ Chagla had said.

From two Lok Sabha seats in 1984, the first election contested with the Lotus symbol, to 303 seats in 2019, and a membership base of 18 crore—the history of the Bharatiya Janata Party, which observed its 40th foundation day on 6 April, is a study in vertical mobility. Till March 2015, the Communist Party of China was the largest organisation internationally; today its declared membership of 9.59 crore is almost half of the membership claimed by BJP. Evolution of the party has sustained the declaration made by former Bombay Chief Justice and a Jawaharlal Nehru-era minister, Muhammadali Currim Chagla from the foundation day dais: “Who says there is no alternative to Congress in this country? I see the alternative in front of me in the form of BJP. And in Atal Bihari Vajpayee I see an alternative to Indira Gandhi. ” Chagla had served in the Indira Gandhi Cabinet as well and had fallen out later when Emergency was imposed in 1975. (One of the first acts of Vajpayee as Prime Minister in May 1998 was the Pokhran testing, taking to fruition the process started by Indira Gandhi in May 1974; Narendra Modi, who was not in Chagla’s radar as he was then a junior functionary, has replicated Indira Gandhi’s electoral success and emerged as a strong PM, reminiscent of her era. BJP has provided India with an alternative ruling party. )

BJP was formed by former Bharatiya Jan Sangh (BJS) members, who decided to quit the Janata Party, into which they had merged in 1977, when their “dual membership” of Janata Party and of the Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh (RSS) became a bone of contention. BJP was launched by them with a broader base—many nonbjs elements from Janata Party and former Congressmen opted for BJP. Apart from jurist Chagla, former Congress(o) leader Sikandar Bakht backed the new party. Bakht was appointed a general secretary along with Lal Krishna Advani, with Vajpayee as president of BJP. While retaining the BJS doctrine of “integral humanism”, enunciated by Deen Dayal Upadhyay, BJP declared “Gandhian Socialism” as its dogma. In his first speech in Lok Sabha in 2014, Narendra Modi took it a step forward by declaring that his talisman was implementation of the “Gandhi, Lohia, Deen Dayal” blueprint. BJS was formed with Hindu culture as its central theme. BJP inherited this, but coalition politics restrained it from implementing its core agenda when it came to power in 1998. Thanks to the court verdict on Ayodhya and the 5 August 2019 abrogation of Article 370, promises made by BJS in 1951 have been largely fulfilled. The Modi regime has significantly overturned the ideological fabric that guided India’s national and international politics for a long time.

The journey of BJP can be traced back to 21 October 1951 when Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, who quit the Nehru Cabinet, became the first president of BJS. After leaving Congress, Mukherjee had approached RSS Sarsanghchalak, M.S. Golwalkar, for setting up a political party which would be an alternative to the Congress. Golwalkar said RSS would not enter active politics but its cadres would be made available to form the backbone of the new party. Thus RSS pracharaks like

Deendayal Upadhyaya, Balraj Madhok, Vajpayee, Sundar Singh Bhandari and Advani became faces of BJS. The formation of BJS was in two stages—the West Bengal unit was launched in March 1951. In May, Balraj Madhok, a Praja Parishad activist from Jammu & Kashmir, who had been externed by Sheikh Abdullah in 1948 as he sought integration of the state with India, formed the Punjab and Delhi units of BJS. The national party was launched in October, with Mukherjee as president, Upadhyaya the secretary. In the first general elections in 1952, it polled 3% votes and won three Lok Sabha seats— Mukherjee being one of the MPS.

In 1957, the party won four seats—vajpayee made his debut as a parliamentarian. In the first three elections, the Communist Party of India (CPI) emerged as the largest party after Congress and its leader, Sripad Amrit Dange Leader of Opposition. In 1962, Vajpayee emerged as the face of the Opposition when he demanded a special session of Parliament to discuss the Chinese aggression; a demand that Nehru conceded. The session saw the Opposition unite with the Government at that hour of national peril. (A far cry from the reaction of the residual Congress led by Sonia Gandhi today which takes pot-shots at the government—be it on Doklam, Balakot or the ongoing battle against coronavirus.)

The decline of Congress in the 1967 elections saw BJS emerge as the second largest Opposition group in the Lok Sabha. It formed governments in states in coalition with non-congress parties, including CPI. In May 1964, Upadhyay had joined hands with Socialist leader Ram Manohar Lohia to create a framework of anti-congress unity. The

“Lohia-deendayal declaration”, which came a few days prior to Nehru’s demise on 27 May 1964, came in handy in 1967 and later during the Emergency and in 1977 when Indira Gandhi lost the election. The Janata Party regime, which followed, had former Congress(o) leader as PM and two other former Congressmen, Charan Singh and Jagjivan Ram, as deputy PMS. Vajpayee and Advani were in the Cabinet. BJS had disbanded itself to merge with other parties to form the Janata Party in 1977.

Soon after the formation of BJP post the Janata defeat and Indira Gandhi’s triumphant return in 1980, other non-congress parties including Communists began a parallel effort to provide an alternative to Congress. The victory of Telugu Desam led by N.T. Rama Rao in Andhra Pradesh (then one state) and formation of a Janata Party government led by Ram Krishna Hegde in Karnataka in early 1983 gave fillip to this move. NTR organised a conclave of non-congress, non-bjp parties in Vijaywada in 1983. This was followed up by conclaves in Srinagar hosted by Farooq Abdullah and in Calcutta (as Kolkata was then called) under the umbrella of CPM’S Jyoti Basu. Two conclaves were hosted in New Delhi as well: Prakash Singh Badal, Biju Patnaik, H.N. Bahuguna, Jagjivan Ram, Janata leader Chandrashekhar, Sharad Pawar, besides CPI and some other party leaders, attended these meets. BJP, meanwhile, had formed the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) with Charan Singh’s Bharatiya Lok Dal and decided to stay away from these jamborees, which did not yield much except rhetoric. Indira Gandhi’s unfortunate assassination in October 1984 acted as an estoppel. The bid for an alternative to Congress was abandoned. Under Rajiv

due to drop in pollution levels and fall in demand for power and fuel, but that’s the difficult trade-off humanity has, willynilly, had to compromise with— clean air and water versus human activity, commerce and growth.

Gandhi, Congress swept the 1984 poll, winning 414 seats. BJP, contesting its first election, won two seats; finished second in 101 seats. TDP emerged as largest Opposition party—a new phase of regional parties playing centre stage in national politics was heralded. (This was to last till Modi’s decisive victory in 2014 when a national party regained supremacy.)

The Bofors imbroglio brought the Rajiv Gandhi regime down. While joining the Opposition campaign against the howitzer deal, BJP began charting its course with the passage of the Palampur resolution in early 1989 demanding a Ram temple in Ayodhya. It was described as an “expression of national sentiment” by the party and its opponents were dubbed “Babri parties”. BJP president Advani said after the resolution was passed: “I hope it will translate into votes.” It indeed did. BJP won 83 seats in 1989, 120 in 1991, 161 in 1996 and 182 each in 1998 and 1999. Atal Bihari Vajpayee became PM as a result of Palampur and the Rath Yatra undertaken by Advani on the temple issue.

The formation of NDA with 26 parties in 1996 helped BJP consolidate on the centre stage. After a 13-day short stint as PM in 1996, Vajpayee returned in 1998 to lead a government which made India a nuclear power and also won the Kargil War with Pakistan. The withdrawal of support by AIADMK saw Vajpayee lose the confidence test by one vote. Like Winston Churchill, who was ousted after victory in the Second World War, Vajpayee went out after the Kargil triumph. But unlike Churchill, he staged a comeback with his NDA and formed a government which lasted five years from 1999 to 2004, when the “India Shining” campaign did not bring him back to power.

After the 2004 defeat, the then BJP chief, Venkaiah Naidu quit. Advani assumed leadership of the party. A year later, Advani visited Pakistan and his praise for Mohammed Ali Jinnah, whom he described as “secular”, drew flak. Observers say that the younger leadership in the party was uncomfortable with the way one of them, Naidu, had been made to quit. This combined with the Jinnah episode began the process of search for alternative leadership. Narendra Modi, who had been a driving force behind the Rath Yatra, had, meanwhile, emerged as a successful Chief Minister in Gujarat. The abysmal performance of BJP in 2009, when it finished with 116 seats, four less than what it had won in 1991 when its journey began, sharpened the feeling that a new face was needed.

The Goa session of the party in 2013, in which the blueprint for 2014 was put on the anvil, saw Advani say that there was no need to project a face. The younger leadership rallied round Modi, who was elected campaign committee chief. A year later, when he led the party to a clear majority, providing India with the possibility of a stable government after three decades, he emerged as PM. From 7. 66% votes and two seats in 1984 to 38% votes with 303 seats in 2019 has been a fascinating story of upward mobility. In this Modi has been ably assisted by his trusted lieutenant from Gujarat, Amit Shah, during whose tenure as BJP president the party surpassed the membership numbers of the Communist Party of China on 30 March 2015. In his 6 March video message to party men Modi listed five virtues: Sangathan, Samarpan, Sangharsh, Sewa and Sanskar—these values have made the 40year odyssey of BJP a fascinating fable.