An old business magnate owning an IT giant couldn’t control his bowels and farts in a party to which his young wife objects and leaves him. Dejected husband donates all his stakes to charity and goes to Nepal, in search of life. Share value collapses and the business turns pink and so some employees working in India get pink slip.
Though the story was from the opening scene of a Tamil movie, may be ‘Neram (Time)’, it is quoted only to explain how some incidents that are connected so remotely may influence one’s life.
The fate of the ‘other Gandhi’ may be another example. May be he is the only person who doesn’t define how his political career turns out.
And we are talking about Varun Gandhi presently a member of parliament, from Sultanpur constituency, representing the ruling party, BJP.
His father was expected to inherit the power from the iron lady of Indian politics, Indira Gandhi. In fact, it was rumoured Sanjay was more powerful than Indira Gandhi. And his deeds during emergency are folklore amongst those who suffered, even today. However, fate played major role and his untimely demise and assassination of his mother pushed the ‘other’ Gandhi of those times to the all-powerful position in Indian polity and administration. Before he recovered from the shock of becoming the Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi completed his term due to internationally reported Bofors scandal.
By that time, Maneka Gandhi, who was thrown out by her mother-in-law, for being politically ambitious, had learned a lesson or two in politics, by experimenting with Sanjay Vichar Manch and merging it later with Janta Dal. It is a sort of irony played by the destiny that politically active Maneka Gandhi was relegated to being a minister in various Governments, while the docile daughter-in-law of Indira Gandhi went on to became the most powerful woman of India. If not for Abdul Kalam, she might have even ended up being the Prime Minister of India, the position once occupied by her mighty mother-in-law. Maneka might have realised the futility of her immature fight against Indira, for she could have grabbed the lime light, post Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination, had she remained in the good books of Indira. Had she been favoured by Indira, Rajiv would never have been in politics, for he was pestered to become heir, only to the legacy of Sanjay, that Maneka started claiming. May be Sonia Gandhi studied the mistakes of Maneka and learnt her lessons well. In public eye, she never was seen clamouring for power and she famously renounced it.
Seems destiny is still playing its role, albeit a mischievous one – again.
The genes of Sanjay Gandhi and the ferociousness of Maneka Gandhi made Varun Gandhi a better person, especially compared with his elder cousin. In BJP, the party that stood against for everything what his father represented, he grew to be a leader, mostly on his own though his mother always supported him. When he went overboard with his hate speech, he represented the extreme psyche of his father, for only Sadhvis and Maharajs in BJP spoke in such language. But, the ever growing ambition of Maneka wanted her son to succeed – and more than that of his cousins.
To be fair to him, Varun worked hard and gained acceptance of most of BJP. But, he forgot one point that he could not stake candidacy to the position of chief minister (or prime minister), for his father’s name and legacy inhibits winning chances of the party, for it was Sanjay who was discredited more for the atrocities committed during Emergency. Unlike Congress, BJP is a cadre base party, where the family names are secondary, while the party and its image is considered primary.
Varun Gandhi might have realised this, but he pushed his case too far, may be considering that BJP may select him as CM candidate, considering he is their best bet. But, BJP’s goals are far bigger than Uttar Pradesh. And even in Uttar Pradesh, there is the strong possibility that Mulayam Singh, another politician borne out of the emergency would go for Varun Gandhi’s head during the election campaign. And the shrewd Amit Shah could not afford Varun as CM candidate. Varun shall choose to remain as one of the big leaders of the party, but never as its – head. All his attempts to get noticed by the leading leaders of BJP have failed miserably and in the matter of a week, he was removed from the scene, much to the disappointment to his mother, who expressed the same by attacking another innocent target – Prakash Javadekar over the culling of vermin.
So, what the ambitious Varun can do? And what destiny has in store for him?
It is now in the public knowledge that Prashant Kishor wanted one of the Gandhis to be declared CM candidate for UP elections. Congress, which considered Rahul as the national leader cannot afford him to become CM candidate, for fearing his career would end, in case he fails to win the state. In all probability, he would fail, given his track record and his party’s record in the last two decades in the state. There is a clamour to bring the glamourous Priyanka, but she is too lazy to rule the state, but chances are better for the party to put up their best show, if she is the candidate. Robert may be too enthusiastic to lead, but Congress may run away from him as he himself is considered as a – baggage, with all his real estate business empire that has now expanded to UK and Dubai.
Though Congress is considering to sacrifice the grand old granny, Sheila Dixit, after her failed Delhi fiasco, given her age and her political acumen, one will expect Sheila Dixit not to work hard for the sure failure. It appears from the back rooms of his office, Prashant Kishor started moving pawns.
One Umesh Pandit, apparently one of many general secretaries of Congress in Uttar Pradesh had openly argued to bring back the ‘other’ Gandhi into family fold. “Varun Gandhi has the potential to revive the Congress in UP. After all, he is a member of the Nehru-Gandhi family and the son of Sanjay Gandhi,” Mr Pandit said. Considering many leaders who left after spewing vitriolic charges against the high-command, only to come back later, to his credit Varun Gandhi never spoke against his cousins in the public. If the old news was any good, when he wanted to go to Congress in ’14, Priyanka wanted to know why he is considering the switch, for which Varun Gandhi didn’t have an answer. Maybe it was his mother’s foresight who might have seen the future course of Congress under Rahul and an ailing Sonia, he considered to move to Congress.
Priyanka, who otherwise have all qualifications to lead the party and has more acceptance in the party and the public in general, never aspired to be in politics. May be the fact that there were two assassinations in the family, has an impact on her decision. She, in all probability will prevent even Robert Vadra from entering politics, for it is known he secretly nurtures his political ambitions and she understands the futility of it.
May be Prashant Kishor is testing the waters, for his credibility is at stake. His two successes, of 2014 general elections and 2015 win in Bihar were heavily factored by BJP. If 2014 had the wave of Narendra Modi that was helped by the corrupt Congress, the Bihar win was the result of BJP’s own mismanagement and corporate style campaign depending heavily on the head office. UP elections are going to be the first test for the skills of Prashant Kishor. And in the eyes of analysts, PK had tasted his first failure when he could not convince Rahul Gandhi for a coalition in Assam. And Punjab, even if chooses to overthrow the current government, may go to the film makers of Udta Punjab. Ultimately, UP is going to test all his skills and depth of political engineering, in the next year.
In the current phase, all he do is observing. The reaction of Varun Gandhi would be measured and gauged against his mother’s stance in politics – within the family and without. Rahul may privately feel relieved of the headache, albeit temporarily, but he will be the guy to lose more, if Varun establishes himself in the party. Given his earlier stint with BJP, and the well-known sycophancy of the party workers, Varun Gandhi will be a success in the party and may lead the party to put up a fight that they were not capable of doing in the last two decades. Even winning above 60 or 70 seats may make Varun a big time leader in Congress. Though she may not give a damn for herself, Priyanka would be worried for Rahul, for he has no alternative career to ‘Politics’. And, how much the powerful Sonia, though ailing now, would concede to her one time nemesis – Maneka.
But, if Varun Gandhi delivers a bit good results, it would raise hopes of the workers and leaders of the party and by 2019, he may emerge a power centre within the Congress. Can Rahul afford this? Unless, he genuinely hates power (which I feel is the truth), he cannot afford allowing entry to Varun in the Congress. And, out of BJP, Varun Gandhi may very well play the victim card and cry in public, how BJP had turned out to be a party that opposes natural evolution of leaders. Whether it is fact or not, it is a catchy line to attract votes. And so it seems, the destiny had chartered its course for Varun Gandhi, the same way it favoured Rajiv Gandhi three decades ago. May be his mother smiles, despite failing to hide those unpleasant memories from the past.
In such case, i.e., Varun Gandhi becomes the CM candidate of Congress, where BJP stands?
Options of BJP would be limited and the party shall not foray into experimenting. This forces the leadership to fall back on the tested formulae of choosing the popular leader. Considering the current lot of leaders and the moods of the nation, and the state in particular, the choices would be limited.
If the party is considering Mayawati as their main opponent, Ram Shankar Katheria, the Dalit face of the party in the state may be better choice. But, if the party chooses Hindutva as centre theme, it would be none other than the Yogi Aditya Nath. However, if BJP tries to venture into the elections with a ‘development’ slogan, its choices can be Mahesh Sharma or Mahendra Singh.
So, by choosing the candidate BJP will be declaring their electoral strategy. Though it is known that the otherwise ‘sanyasi’ Yogi Aditya Nath is trying seriously to become the face of next elections, may give little room to the central leadership, for he was backed by the most stable vote bank of the party. But, it would be up to the Yogi to decide how well he is going to take other contenders into confidence. If Yogi could gain confidence of at least two other candidates, he would not only become the CM candidate, but CM as well. Now, it is up to Yogi, I mean within BJP.