Click to play videoNew Delhi: All efforts to resolve the standoff between BJP president Rajnath Singh and general secretary Arun Jaitley seem to have failed.
Jaitley has reportedly refused to attend Tuesday’s BJP meeting on elections unless Sudhanshu Mittal, who has been appointed in charge of Northeast affairs, is removed from the post.
Mittal, the biggest tentwallah in Delhi who makes a killing in the wedding season, was married to Pramod Mahajan's style of politics as a quiet backroom operator for two decades.
Mahajan's dramatic death changed his fortunes. But Mittal wasn’t one to lie low for long.
First with ex-Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje and now with Rajnath Singh-Sushma Swaraj duo, he's made a political comeback. But he hasn’t been able to impress his senior from college, Arun Jaitley, someone he claims helped him climb the political ladder.
“I was brought to DUSU by Arun ji himself. He was a senior of mine there. It's been a long association,” says Mittal.
Every party needs a Mittal in the election season. As funds dry up in times of a slowdown, he has emerged as the BJP's most wanted.
He had faded away the night Pramod Mahajan’s son Rahul Mahajan was rushed to Apollo Hospital and Mahajan's other aide Bibek Moitra died of a drug overdose.
But using his money power and networking skills, he has slowly returned to favour, this time as the party's co-in-charge of the Northeast
“I was appointed by the party. I was working in Assam on a party assignment,” he says in his defence.
So where does all this leave BJP’s rising star Jaitley?
“It may make for a good copy but it’s not true – these reports of differences,” says BJP’s prime ministerial candidate L K Advani.
But if there are no differences in the BJP, why is Jaitley still missing in action? Call it the Mittal effect.
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