A lost cause for Advani

BJP: The war within!

Raju Korti
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has become grammarless these days. The party that never stopped throwing it in the people's face that it was a "party with a difference" has turned into a "party with differences."
While the party is harboring dreams of capturing power at the Centre -- a distinct possibility endorsed by surveys and an inept Congress extending its mite to the cause -- its is also lending itself to ridicule the way the old guards are regularly taking swipes at each other and making a public spectacle of their disenchantment.
To even the most politically naïve, it is becoming increasingly apparent that it is actually a prestige war being played out between the new generation leaders and the old timers. There are no prizes for guessing whose gambit has triggered this cold war between Narendra Modi and the party's patriarch Lal Krishna Advani.
Advani, a known hawk and an astute politician, almost came whisker close to being the country's prime minister when the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) was swept to power but it was the moderate face of Vajpayee as the unanimous choice. There was a talk, not entirely unfounded, that Advani nursed an ambition to be the PM. Given that he was majorly responsible for the upsurge of the party in the country, it was a case of paradise lost for the veteran leader after the NDA dispensation lost in spite of the "Feel Good" and "India Shining" factors.
There is no doubt that Modi has captured the imagination of the new generation with his no holds barred aggression and making out a grand case of his home state's revival and growth. Advani, however, with all his political acumen was unable to see what was itching behind the Gujarat CM's greying beard. If Modi was a potential threat to the Congress, he was as much so for Advani who could see the political ground slipping from beneath his feet. It was a lost cause when he fired his first salvo, not attending the party's conclave where Modi's leadership was upheld without many murmurs. The Modi "juggernaut" had rolled on already. If the Advani saga is to be serialized in this game of one-upmanship, it must be said to his discredit, he has blinked first. His anguish at being cold-shouldered first and then not given the constituency of his choice (Bhopal) has given way to two different interpretations. First, his influence in the party --for right or wrong -- is waning and second, his frustration stems out of the inevitable writing on the wall that it is the end of the lifetime's ambition for the 86-year-old avowed RSS man.
While Modi at 63 may look like a schoolboy in comparison, veteran Jaswant Singh at 76 is also being effectively marginalized -- that is considering he hasn't quit the party by the time this blog surfaces on my Facebook wall. But while Advani only kept sulking, Singh was more forthcoming and actually threatened to contest as an independent if he was not offered the party ticket. From all available indications so far, his threat hasn't got him anywhere.
At a personal level, I feel genuinely sorry for Advani. I have known and met him enough number of times to know that the man has polish, charm and articulation unlike a patent rabble rouser like Narendra Modi. When I last met him at the release of his biography "My Country My Life", the man who gave political connotation to the Rath Yatra, Advani, among other, things told me "The limits and boundaries of the party should not be crossed." He cannot be accused of not practicing what he has preached.
It is altogether another issue what signals Advani or for that matter Singh are sending to the bewildered people except that they are nursing their personal ambitions -- an argument also extended to others of their ilk in other parties including the incumbent Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at 81.
It is also not germane to the issue labored over here just how much this show of disgruntlement will affect the party's chances at the hustings. The Indian voter has reconciled to the proclivities of the country's politicians long back.
Yet, one hopes ageing politicians gracefully concede the reins to the younger brigade. It would be no less a master-stroke. But grace and politics? That's asking for the moon.