Monday, December 17, 2007
Shift Rajnath Out
It looks like Modi will return to power in Gujarat, albeit with slightly less seats, and with no thanks to the lacklustre efforts of the BJP hierarchy or the RSS. The uncharismatic Rajnath Singh needs to be shifted out. These months with him in the top job have been lost months, and time is wasting. There's no point in keeping this guy on as leader, when he can be shifted to the back room, like some sombre-faced Japanese LDP honcho. Time to get some of the better faces from the next rung in there to reinvigorate the party. Naidu looks like a reasonable choice for the near future, and once Modi has done all he can in Gujarat, it would be nice to see him take a shot at national leadership, since he's a strong campaigner and doesn't back down.
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5 comments:
San,
Can you mail me offline at kashyapa.kumarila AT gmail ?
Consider where BJP was when Rajnath took over. I think there is more stability today. Remember, this is a party with two opposing camps on economic matters - the swadeshi camp and capitalist camp. Friction is bound to be there and it is a challenge to keep it cohesive.
Also, Naidu could not get the BJP any foothold in his own state.
Rajnath Singh is lacklustre, but Venkiah Naidu cannot be a serious candidate for leadership. At best, he could be a media manager. It's unfortunate, but the mass leaders like Kalyan Singh and Uma Bharti etc have their own problems complying with organisational discipline and do not necessarily
make good administrators. Good administrators and incisive minds like Jaswant Singh, Jagmohan, Arun Shourie do not necessarily make good campaigners or mobilisers. The right needs to strike a balance between party organisation, media management and governance. I don't understand why, for example, someone like Murli Manohar Joshi has been sidelined for so long.
The biggest thing BJP needs is a media makeover.
It needs to outsource this to a professional management firm. For all it's faults Congress and Sickulars know how to use media. They have some decent on-screen on-TV faces.
BJP has that lame Javdekar and Shankar Prasad. Jaitely is only saving grace. But he is over stressed. He cannot be a spokesperson and managing elections at same time.
Elections are becoming increasingly media drive. Congress understood this, the left understood this, even Lalu understands this.
BJP needs to "suck it up" and restore the imbalance. Till we get our own "FOX" we need to keep "polishing it up"
70% of voters less than 35 age get easily swayed by media. Good faces, articulate people are needed who can lie through their skins like the pinkos.
Unless BJP gets this straight we will have Moron Singhs ruling us.
BTW i am still keeping my fingers crossed on Gujarat. We need the Lion to win. But only time will tell if his exceptional hard work finally appealed to the voters.
We cannot be Over confident on this. Notwithstanding Exit polls finding , the fight is still not over.
More importantly BJP should have plan B and C ready , whatever be the outcome.
Kalyan Singh and Uma bharti did surely not make good administrators. Their electoral record also makes their status as 'mass leaders' suspect - both failed miserably when they quit BJP to float their outfits. Kalyan singh failed miserably even after returning to BJP in 2007 UP assembly elections. Uma Bharti's party candidates polled under 4% in recent by-elections in Madhya pradesh.
For Uma Bharti and Kalyan Singh, their 'backward caste' status definitely played a role in their elevations. There is a flaw right there. BJP of all parties has no business playing caste politics. And Javadekar...
There was another post here critical of sudheendra Kulkarni's article. It is definitely stupid of him to suggest that BJP should address 'legitimate' concerns of muslims.
But there is also another issue. Gujarat has 9% muslim population and negligible christian population. There are other states with 15,20, even 25% minority populations. This population may turn out in full strength to vote, election after election, with the sole idea of defeating the BJP. And regardless of the opposition's performance or leadership or anything else. Such a situation is surely not in BJP's interest - and they need to make sure atleast this does not happen. A 20% vote bank turning out to vote, election after election, only to vote against you - that is something BJP can not avoid reflecting on and doing something about.
Now, that is not to say that the BJP should take the kulkarni route. In a way, a strong administrator like Modi who ensures power, water, terror free administration and basic infrastructure to all of his population - regardless of majority/minority divisions - is a good enough way to try and break that 'secular' vote bank.
Advani's speech in the Chennai national executive in 2005 is worth reading. I could only find a online link at The Hindu :-) -
http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/nic/lkconclude.htm
At the risk of making this already lengthy comment even longer, I will paste a portion of that speech here -
"But lately an impression has gained ground that no political or organizational decision can be taken without the consent of the RSS functionaries. This perception, we hold, will do no good either to the Party or to the RSS. The RSS too must be concerned that such a perception will dwarf its greater mission of man-making and nation-building. Both the RSS and the BJP must consciously exert to dispel this impression.
...
But the BJP as a political party is accountable to the people, its performance being periodically put to test in elections. So in a democratic, multi party polity, an ideologically--driven party like the BJP has to function in a manner that enables it to keep its basic ideological stances intact and at the same time expand itself to reach the large sections of the people outside the layers of all ideology."
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