New Delhi, December 7
The big-wigs of the Gujarat unit of the BJP like a former Chief Minister, Mr Keshubhai Patel and a former Home Minister, Mr Haren Pandya, may be down but are definitely not out as the Chief Ministership for Mr Narendra Modi may not come his way even if the BJP were to win a comfortable majority.
Well placed political sources told The Tribune today that the BJP high command had decided that if Mr Modi was able to muster a clear majority but less than 100 seats in the 182-member Assembly, a scenario which was not unlikely, he would not be made the Chief Minister.
The Prime Minister, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee, and the Deputy Prime Minister, Mr L.K. Advani are understood to be peeved with Mr Modi over his unrelenting stand on not only the Haren Pandya issue but host of other issues.
Both the Prime
Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister were in favour of Mr Pandya being given the party ticket from Ellisbridge in Ahmedabad district, but Mr Modi remained defiant and he did not even listen to the RSS Joint Secretary, Mr Madandas Devi, who had to camp in the Gujarat Capital for persuading the Chief Minister to give in.
When the pressure on Mr Modi from New Delhi further mounted he got himself admitted in a hospital and conveyed to the high command in unambiguous terms that if Mr Pandya contests he would sit out of the elections.
It is understood that Mr Keshubhai Patel and Mr Pandya have been specifically told by the BJP top brass that they should focus on ensuring BJP’s victory in the December 12 poll and should not consider themselves out of reckoning.
The argument being given is that now that the BJP has projected Mr Modi as its undisputed leader in Gujarat and openly declared him as the next Chief Minister, the party should fare better than what it did in the last elections fought under the leadership of Mr Keshubhai Patel.
Under Mr Patel, the BJP had garnered as many as 117 seats. The BJP high command’s argument is that now that the party has put up a brave front and not succumbed to pressures from within and outside the country for removing Mr Modi for his alleged sins of omission and commission post-Godhra, it expects Mr Modi to do better than Mr Patel. If that does not happen and the party still gets simple majority, Mr Modi should not take for granted that he would become the Chief Minister, the sources said.
Besides, Mr Vajpayee and Mr Advani are understood to have taken note of Mr Modi’s increasingly “defiant” attitude. Political circles are already agog with reports of Mr Modi gaining in political stature in the post-Godhra developments, not dissimilar to Mr Advani’s meteoric rise after his famous Somnath-to-Ayodhya rath yatra in 1991.
It is not incidental that a vociferous section within the BJP wants Mr Modi’s wings to be clipped. It is also not incidental that both Mr Patel and Mr Pandya have plunged themselves whole-heartedly into the election campaign. Given this scenario, Mr Patel and Mr Pandya should not be counted out of the Chief Minister’s race if the BJP wins.
If Mr Modi does not manage more than 117 seats, then not only he would have to lose the Chief Ministership but even his staunch friends like the party General Secretary, Mr Arun Jaitley would have to face the wrath of the party high command, the
sources said.
