Downhill, Mahajan eyes Himalayas

After the formal press conference, TV crews gathered around him for exclusive soundbytes. How would the Maharashtra polls impact on his personal future, they asked. Always quick with a repartee, Mahajan told a couple of reporters: 8216;8216;If we win, I will be going to Rashtrapati Bhavan; if we lose, then Kedarnath.8217;8217;

In other words, a BJP victory would give the party the necessary brio to bring down the UPA. A defeat would mean political sanyas, at least for him.

For Mahajan, this defeat is a double blow. As the man in charge of the BJP8217;s LS campaign, he was the fall guy when the BJP got a drubbing. At the party8217;s post-debacle national executive meeting in Mumbai in June, A.B. Vajpayee even ticked him off for relying too much on hi-tech, for fashioning a campaign that was too high-profile.

For the Maharashtra polls, Mahajan went to the other extreme 8212; no flashy advertisements, no telephone calls, no SMS campaigns. Instead, it was 8216;8216;grassroots8217;8217; all the way, as he went from door to door, house to house, village to village.

His 8216;8216;double defeat8217;8217; has ensured that he will be no threat to Venkaiah Naidu and Arun Jaitley just yet. But Mahajan is no pushover. A spell in Kedarnath might just result in new inner-party equations, and help Mahajan find the 8216;8216;middle path8217;8217; between hi-tech and low-tech.