Four lessons for BJP, Modi from the LK Advani episode

In the end Lal Krishna Advani had his way -- he was granted the privilege of deciding his parliamentary constituency.

But then the fact that he opted for Gandhinagar after around 30 hours of brinkmanship from both sides, as proposed by Narendra Modi and approved BJP central election committee, makes for another conclusion – it is actually the BJP prime ministerial candidate and not the patriarch who prevailed. All that happened was that the party once again publicly acknowledged the reverential position that the latter occupies.

In the process, Advani suffered some fresh bruises and the BJP temporarily lost some of the momentum in its focused campaigning against the Congress.

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Modi's rivals got new ammunition to launch an attack against him – which was that he does not even respect his own mentor and elder. Even as there have been hours of tense parleys, exasperation and even despondency, an amicable settlement to the building crisis has brought a huge sense of relief to leaders and workers at large. "We all knew that Advani would eventually have the larger interest of the party in mind. The hiccups that came and controversies generated were entirely avoidable", a BJP leader said.

From the perspective of the BJP, thankfully this time around, unlike on two previous occasions, it did not become an Advani versus Modi story, as the situation was contained before was blown out of proportion. Senior party leader M Venkaiah Naidu said, "We are happy that Advaniji is contesting from Gandhinagar. Our critics are disappointed."

More than anyone else, it was Modi who was acutely aware of the potential damages. After all being the prime ministerial candidate and also the central issue in these elections, Modi's stakes are the highest. His one time mentor shifting his base from his home turf Gandhinagar to Bhopal, into the domain of a humbler Shivraj Singh Chouhan could have caused a deep dent to his image. This was something neither the party nor he could afford, at least in so close to the polling dates.

He thus landed at Advani's residence to convince him that a delay in the announcement of his candidature was only inadvertent. Modi's visit and an hour long candid chat smoothened Advani's ruffled feathers. The rest was a matter of further detailing, to work out an honourable settlement.

Advani's candidature from Gandhinagar, which he has represented since 1991, was otherwise considered a routine announcement. However, the way it unfolded in that last two days, having some of its genesis in a certain trust deficit at the top and a tentative move to shift him to the Rajya Sabha last month, made big news.

A generational shift has taken place in the party. His one time protégés who now occupy top positions in the organisation expect Advani to play the role of mentor, a benevolent patriarch, an ideologue, and even a moral authority rather than an active participant in the actual power play. In plain words, be in a semi-retirement position.

He on the other hand, does not think its time yet to call it quits in active politics, electoral or otherwise. Even this round of internal conflict over his nomination for next month's parliamentary polls was guided by this clashing perception. Only, this time it was not a high stake issue but more to do with personal egos and internal management.

It could not boil down to anything more basic than this. Didn't he have a right to choose his constituency, one among the 542 that goes to polls?

It all began with an endless wait which Advani was seemingly put on despite him repeatedly saying he wished to enter the electoral arena from Gandhinagar. He had said that as late as 28 February in Gandhinagar. But there was no confirmation or denial. It was in Modi's domain and apparently no one in the party explained to him that the announcement of seats relating to Gujarat would be delayed, because Modi first wanted the announcement of his Varanasi candidature to fully sink in.

Four broad conclusions came out of this episode.

First, The BJP which claims that it has excellent communication skills – setting clear agendas for the polls, convincing voters to make a Congress Mukt Bharat and selling of a dream of Modi's vision – does not have an effective in-house communication system. The problems relating to Murli Manohar Joshi in Varanasi, Lalji Tandon in Lucknow and even Jaswant Singh in Barmer arose because they were not informed of coming decisions, and instead got to know of their changing political fate through media or though sources.

Second, the internal structure of the party has become Modi centric. Though he and Rajnath Singh are indeed working as a team, the fact that Modi is still based in Gandhinagar and does not have a secretariat of his own in Delhi has its pitfalls. No senior leader has a plausible reason as to why the announcement of tickets of top leaders, most of whose preferences were known for months, including Varanasi, Lucknow, Vadodra, Gandhinagar, Amritsar and so on were delayed for so long.

Third, the RSS despite all it's penchant for micromanagement of party affairs, did not interfere. Though Modi did meet Mohan Bhagwat in Delhi on Wednesday after an Election Committee meeting, the RSS brass steered clear of finding a resolution to the crisis. If that were to continue in future also, it is a healthy sign for the BJP, particularly when it is preparing to grab power at the centre.

Fourth, even though Modi has gained control over the party he is not the sole authority yet. Advani even with diminished authority and bruises was capable of standing as a counter to Modi's brute force and he had some willing influential allies within both the party and Parivar. It is jsut that Advani, for both his own and the BJP's sake, needs to be very judicious in raising the flag.