For much of independent India’s history, politics was shaped by a sense of entitlement that confused inheritance with legitimacy. One family and one party came to believe they were born to rule. Over time, this mindset hollowed out institutions and conditioned generations to treat political privilege as a birthright. That assumption is now being challenged by a new political ethic rooted in merit, accountability and performance.
A recent report in The Indian Express (‘One Nation, a Few Parivars’, October 23) raises an important question about the persistence of dynastic politics in India. The issue it highlights is real, but the interpretation is incomplete. Dynasties do exist across parties, including within the BJP. What distinguishes the BJP is that family background does not translate into automatic leadership. This is a party where opportunity must still be earned, where an individual’s rise depends on work, commitment and public trust, not lineage. In the BJP, a family name may open a door, but it cannot keep it open.
This distinction is fundamental. Political kinship is not a problem in itself. Hereditary control is. When leadership becomes the property of a single family, when internal debate is replaced by fealty to bloodlines, democracy withers. The contrast between political cultures is stark. Since 2000, the Bharatiya Janata Party has had eight national presidents — Bangaru Laxman, Jana Krishnamurthi, Venkaiah Naidu, L K Advani, Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Amit Shah and J P Nadda. Each emerged from different regions and backgrounds, and each rose through the discipline of organisational work. During the same period, the Congress has had only three presidents, two of them Gandhis. Sonia Gandhi held the post for 19 years, and even today, the family retains the final word.
The Express analysis, by flattening these differences, ends up equating fundamentally different political realities. It counts the number of legislators with relatives in politics without distinguishing between incidental kinship and institutional capture. Out of 2,078 BJP legislators, 84 come from political families, about four per cent. The Congress has 857 legislators, 73 of them dynasts, nearly nine per cent. When measured proportionally, the Congress’s dynastic density is twice as high. Yet the article’s framing, by citing absolute numbers, creates a false symmetry.
Even beyond the Congress, the concentration of power in family hands defines several regional parties. The Samajwadi Party moved from Mulayam Singh Yadav to Akhilesh Yadav. The Rashtriya Janata Dal remains under the Yadav family. The DMK passed from M Karunanidhi to M K Stalin and seemingly to Udhayanidhi Stalin. The Trinamool Congress revolves around Mamata Banerjee and her nephew Abhishek. The Soren family continues to control the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha. These are not examples of plural leadership but of inherited command. Remove the family and the party collapses.
To understand why the BJP functions differently, one has to look at its institutional design. The BJP’s organisation is layered, collegiate and mission-oriented. Cadres are identified early, trained through structured programmes, and tested through responsibility at the booth, mandal, district and state level. Performance at each stage determines the next opportunity. Elections are contests to be won, but they are also audits of the organisation’s capacity to mobilise, persuade and deliver. This architecture creates a culture where service, discipline and delivery are the currency of advancement.
The leadership pipeline tells the same story. Since 2014, the party has elevated first-generation leaders who reflect India’s social mobility. Vishnu Deo Sai, the first tribal Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh, built his career through sustained grassroots work. Mohan Majhi in Odisha spent years in the organisation and the legislature before being entrusted with the chief ministership. Nayab Singh Saini in Haryana comes from a modest background, and Bhajan Lal Sharma in Rajasthan rose through years of constituency work and party responsibility. None of them inherited political office.
The BJP’s parliamentary and governmental experience also demonstrates the distinction between access and ascendancy. Many young leaders are given visibility and responsibility, but they are judged by delivery. Ministers are evaluated on outcomes, reforms and public communication. Party positions are time-bound and performance-linked. This does not eliminate error or ambition, no human institution can, but it creates incentives that privilege competence over pedigree.
By contrast, hereditary parties struggle to innovate because succession is predetermined. Talent is hemmed in by the need to protect the heir apparent. Internal debate is dulled by fear of contradicting the family line. Organisational networks come to revolve around courtiers and fixers rather than administrators and legislators. The result is not only political stagnation but also a corrosion of public trust. Voters eventually recognise the difference between leadership that is earned and leadership that is transferred.
It is important to acknowledge history. The Congress normalised political inheritance in the national imagination. Many regional dynastic outfits, from the YSR Congress and BRS to the Trinamool, are offshoots of the Congress and have replicated its hereditary structure. Over decades, this culture transformed political parties into family enterprises, where ideology yielded to loyalty and succession planning replaced leadership development. That model may deliver short bursts of electoral success, but it rarely builds durable institutions or a broad bench of capable leaders.
Critics sometimes ask whether the BJP is entirely free of dynastic figures. The honest answer is that it is not, nor is any large democratic party. The relevant question is different. Do such figures enjoy positions solely because of their lineage, or have they earned the trust of the organisation and the electorate through sustained work? The BJP’s record shows that family background can be a biographical fact, but it is not a sufficient credential. The pathway to leadership remains the same for everyone, karyakarta to leader, worker to representative, representative to minister, each step earned through performance.
This distinction also explains the BJP’s ability to expand its social and geographic base. A merit-oriented party can integrate new communities and regions because it offers pathways for participation that do not depend on proximity to a family. It can identify local talent, give it responsibility, and reward results. That is how a party becomes national in character while remaining rooted in local realities. It is also how a party translates ideology into governance, through leaders who have been trained to deliver rather than merely to inherit.
The electorate has recognised this difference. Voters are not impressed by surnames. They evaluate leaders by delivery, not descent. They can tell the difference between legitimacy earned through public service and entitlement acquired through lineage. That is why the debate on dynastic politics should not be framed as a numbers game alone. The deeper issue is the culture of leadership.
The Indian Express article asked which among India’s parties are run by families. The more significant question is which are not. The BJP remains one of the few where leadership cannot be inherited, only earned. The party will continue to have leaders from many backgrounds, including those with relatives in public life, but the terms of advancement are the same for all. In a democracy, there is no other sustainable route.
India’s democracy is undergoing a quiet transformation. Citizens are asserting their right to be governed by competence rather than pedigree. Institutions are recovering confidence as leadership becomes more accountable. Politics is beginning to look less like inheritance and more like service. The journey is not complete and never will be. Every generation must renew it. But the direction is clear. Merit matters. Performance matters. The people matter most.
In that sense, the BJP is a party with a difference, not because it claims perfection, but because it has built a culture that insists leadership be earned. That is the distinction worth preserving in India’s public life, for it aligns power with responsibility and ambition with service.
The writer is Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas
