Heirs apparently

The irony is unmistakable. It has long been a BJP boast, and for good reason, that it is a party with a teeming second rung leadership. It has an array of leaders, talented and ambitious, unlike its main rival — the Congress — which has traditionally only the singular high command and its courtiers, and the odd chief minister from the party who might acquire a good reputation in this state or that one. The BJP’s crowded second rung has generally been good news in a political system where whole party organisations are routinely nothing more remarkable than the private property of one leader or a family. Sadly, even the scandal has long gone missing from these incestuous political equations. But the irony, now, is this: Ever since the BJP lost the vote on May 13, it has been visibly a party in disarray and the deshabille is becoming most glaring on the second rung. At a time when the party seems to have lost its bearings, its Young Turks appear to be pulling it in different directions. So far, the contest is personality-driven and factional, it has no redeeming policy-ideological implications.

Over the past few days, reports have hectically fluttered out of the in-house discord. Tantrums and churlishness over the phone, a satyagraha led by one leader set up against a yatra piloted by another, a contest for eyeballs between agitational campaigns run by the same party. It does not take the politically discerning to note that the battle for the leadership in the post-Vajpayee, post-Advani scenario has been joined in the BJP. After all, should this government defy its proliferating obituaries and last out its full term, and if the next Lok Sabha polls are indeed held on schedule, a space will be vacated at the top. But it is beginning to appear that the maturity and steadfastness at the highest level that has marked the Vajpayee-Advani years may not outlast their stewardship. The younger ones in the BJP line-up — Uma Bharati, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley, Pramod Mahajan, Venkaiah Naidu, not necessarily in that order, and, intriguingly, not including Narendra Modi — show no signs of the accommodation and patience that so distinguishes their seniors.

Perhaps these are early days. Perhaps the pushing and the jostling will settle down into a more political contest after all. It could be that in the coming days what looks like factional strife today will mature into competing claims to define the party platform. In that case, of course, it will be welcome. Then, it will be said of the BJP again that its second rung is a robust place.