The real Advani legacy: Reaping what he sowed

by Sutanu Guru

The failed revolt by LK Advani reveals the deep fissures within the BJP that cannot be wished away even by self proclaimed Modi fans. And most important, it raises questions on the ability of Narendra Modi keep the flock together and respect the sentiments and importance of senior leaders with a mass base. The related issue is the oft repeated claim that Modi is authoritarian and doesn't tolerate differences and dissent.

LK Advani. AFP

It is early to deliver any verdict on Modi's leadership style, but ironically, Advani's current plight is reminiscent of his own track record as a leader; his ability and willingness to accept differences and dissent and his respect for senior leaders with a mass base. And while we can sympathize with Advani for his perceived humiliation, a look at his own history reveals that his own track record on this score has been abysmal. Both when he was one part of the Advani-Vajpayee duo who controlled the party till 2004 and when he was the undisputed leader between 2004 and 2012, Advani succeeded in alienating, humiliating and sidelining lots of senior BJP leaders.

Let's start with Kalyan Singh, former chief minister of Uttar Pradesh. Even greenhorn analysts of politics in Uttar Pradesh know that the circumstances that forced Kalyan Singh to leave the BJP is one reason why the party lost the plot in UP to regional chieftains like Mulayam Yadav and Mayawati since the late 1990s. Kalyan Singh has rejoined the BJP, but the magic is gone and the Uttar Pradesh BJP still doesn't have a credible leadership with a grassroots base.

Something similar happened with the late Madan Lal Khurana who was chief minister of Delhi. The manner in which the BJP-controlled by Advani humiliated and sidelined this grassroots leader has destroyed many BJP bastions in Delhi. It is yet to recover and could well lose the future assembly elections to Arvind Kejriwal.

After the shock of 2004, when the NDA lost the Lok Sabha elections, former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee faded into the sunset. Advani was the unquestioned and undisputed Boss of the BJP. And how did he tackle senior leaders with a mass base? The firebrand leader Uma Bharati who decimated Congress heavyweight Digvijaya Singh and became the chief minister of Madhya Pradesh was humiliated and hounded out of the party. It is BJP's good fortune that it found an able replacement in Shivraj Singh Chouhan who has managed to keep the BJP support base in tact in the state.

The party has not been as lucky in Jharkhand. Babulal Marandi was the BJP chief minister of the state and immensely popular because of his clean image. And yet, this grassroots leaders was compelled to leave the BJP and form his own party, the JVM, that has considerably eroded the BJP vote bank in Jharkhand.

Two more shockers were awaiting in the run up to the 2009 Lok Sabha elections and its aftermath. In 2008, Advani did nothing to quell or even manage a revolt against the Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje Scindia. The result: the BJP narrowly lost the assembly elections to the Congress. So divided was the Rajasthan BJP after that narrow loss that the Congress won 21 out of 25 seats in Rajasthan in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections. There was enormous pressure on Scindia to relinquish her role as the main Opposition leader in Rajasthan. It is no secret that there was a time when Scindia was contemplating a separation from the BJP. Vasundhara bounced back into contention only in 2013 when Advani had started reluctantly making way for Modi.

Something similar happened in Uttarakhand where Major General BC Khanduri, like Babulal Marandi in Jharkhand, was immensely popular because of his clean image and reputation as an efficient administrator. Yet, the infighting within the state unit of BJP and the spectacular failure of Advani to manage it helped the Congress win all 5 Lok Sabha seats of Uttarakhand in the 2009 elections. How did Advani and his team react? They sacked Khanduri as the CM. A frustrated and humiliated Khanduri was contemplating a separation from BJP until a few months before the 2012 assembly elections when a desperate BJP wooed him back into the fold. The BJP still lost. Worse, Khanduri lost his own seat. Interestingly, the difference between the BJP and the Congress tally then was just one seat!

And then there is BS Yeddyurappa in Karnataka. He toiled for more than four decades to build the BJP as a formidable force in the southern state. And his efforts were finally rewarded when he became chief minister in 2008. Problems cropped up soon when Yeddyurappa faced serious allegations of corruption. He was forced to resign as chief minister as a result. Some BJP leaders claim the high moral ground over the manner in which the party compelled an old BJP hand like Yeddyurappa to quit because he faced corruption charges. But really that is nonsense because the party has never hesitated to welcome and retain " tainted" leaders. When a bitter Yeddyurappa was forced to leave the BJP, he singled out Advani as the man behind his betrayal.

While the media may be portraying Advani as the aging patriarch being humiliated by the new dispensation, he is surely reaping the bitter harvest of what he himself has sowed.