Debate: Can BJP move on without Advani?

L K Advani would rather retire after being resolutely defeated in the Lok Sabha elections but the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won’t let him.

Advani is believed to have offered his resignation as Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha but the party persuaded him to stay on. He was the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate in the elections and was projected as a strong and decisive leader.

The BJP lost no occasion to compare Advani, “the iron man”, with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was accused of being weak and ineffectual. Advani himself accused Singh of taking his cues from Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

The strategy didn’t pay off and on May 16 it was Singh who was king. Advani accepted BJP’s defeat with grace and has not given a major statement since then. Political analysts say he now must play the role of a guide and stop being the BJP’s helmsman.

Is it time for BJP to look at life beyond Advani? Who are the BJP leaders who can replace Advani?

CNN-IBN’s senior editor Sagarika Ghose asked this to senior journalist and political commentator Swapan Dasgupta, senior journalist and columnist Ashok Malik, and historian Ramachandra Guha.

Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, party general secretary Arun Jaitley, party president Rajnath Singh and Vidisha MP Sushma Swaraj are seen as possible successors to Advani. Each has strengths and weaknesses but can they equal Advani’s stature in the party?

Guha said BJP was passing through “transition time” and till there is consensus Advani would be projected as its leader in the short run.

“I say short run because who knows what names may emerge in the long run. There is (Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister) Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who has run his government efficiently and is not controversial in the way Modi is. There may be yet other names when we consider a successor to Advani,” said Guha.

But the issue goes beyond Advani: the BJP has to reflect what kind of party it wants to be, said Dasgupta. The elections were a “political defeat” for the BJP because it lost out its traditional political constituencies and now has two alternatives to deal with the crisis.

“One is to retreat into the ghetto (return to Hindutva) and take comfort in the insularity. Otherwise you go what is called modern, on which views may differ. I think it is time the BJP has to look beyond the symbols with which it was identified in the eighties and nineties,” said Dasgupta.

Times have changed and the question was not who after Advani in the BJP but what, said Malik. “Many of the currents and energies that propelled BJP to power in the nineties are no longer relevant. India is thinking in one way and the BJP is completely frozen and thinking another way,” he said.

The BJP needs a leader who does not talk about Hindutva but development and who has a mass base, said Guha. “Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley may be appealing to certain people in Delhi but they don’t have a base. To stake a claim in the BJP you have to come from a state unit which you have managed well.”

The RSS factor

But would the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) would allow the BJP or a leader to dilute Hindutva?

Guha claimed RSS is “very important” to the BJP and there should be no misconceptions about that.

RSS is a “stakeholder” in the BJP but it doesn’t micromanage it, said Dasgupta. “RSS is an input into the BJP but it is not the only input. If it were only RSS values then the BJP would be down to 25 seats. The RSS is a very important adhesive but the adhesive is not the only attraction,” he said. “To say RSS is at one hand and modernity another is too simplistic.”

Moving on without Advani

Advani’s political legacy is that he created a strong alternative to the Congress and made the country’s political bipolar. Pseudo-secular, minority appeasement and cultural nationalism are political terms he brought to vogue.

Why does a politician of such achievements think of retirement now? Is Advani outdated?

“More than being dated, the Hindu has moved on,” said Dasgupta. Hindutva was alternative view of India which filled in the eighties, a time of political uncertainty and economic stagnation.

“It was a view of India which moved Hindus from a position of defensiveness. But after uninterrupted growth of 10 years you have a far more globalised Hindu, a far more cosmopolitan Hindu--victimhood is no longer there,” he said.

“The language of politics must reflect that, even in Hindus. The BJP’s problem is that it got stuck in that beleaguered mindset and it has not moved on,” said Dasgupta.

Guha said Advani was reflective of that beleaguered mindset. “What he did in the eighties and the nineties--create bipolarity--was positive for the BJP but left them a legacy of divisiveness, religious polarization, animosity towards minorities.”

Malik’s advice was the BJP elect its next leader. “The BJP in the last five years lacked a leader who commands everyone’s respect and can enforce discipline. I think what the BJP should do is elect its next leader, maybe through a process of primaries. Whoever wins then should command the party,” he said.

The BJP must make robust and honest analysis of its defeat, said Dasgupta. “The BJP has to articulate the positive impulses of the nation, which includes Hindus and non-Hindus. You cannot have a completely sectarian view of the nation,” he said.

SMS poll on ‘Is it time for BJP to look at life beyond Advani?’

Yes: 68 per cent, No: 32 per cent.

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