A Little Less Latitude

How Gadkari Has Injured His Own Cause

• Wrong choice of candidates for Rajya Sabha nominations. NRI businessman Anshuman Mishra, close to Gadkari, made allegations of corruption against BJP leaders.
• Over-dependence on surveys (carried out by Gadkari confidant Arun Narendranath) for ticket distribution in UP polls, resulting in party’s poor performance.
• Near-autocratic style of functioning. Takes decisions without consulting senior leaders. Has no open meetings or discussions over issues. Even core committee meetings are no more sacrosanct.
• Inability to control corruption-tainted, ousted CM Yediyurappa’s antics in Karnataka
• Failure to bring Narendra Modi out of his perennial sulk.

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If this was last month, a little before the Rajya Sabha nominations had taken place, few in the BJP would have doubted party president Nitin Gadkari’s lucky run and future in the saffron brigade. The RSS was still pretty much standing by its swayamsevak from Nagpur and had even made up its mind on him getting a second term as BJP president. In fact, the Sangh had even held a meeting with senior BJP leaders instructing them to ensure a smooth run for Gadkari.

But all that seems to have changed now. Sources confirm that, singed by the corruption allegations made by NRI businessman and Rajya Sabha hopeful Anshuman Mishra, the Sangh is no more in the mood to let Gadkari have a second go at the party’s top job. Mishra, who was supported by a section of the BJP as an independent nominee from Jharkhand, had to withdraw at the last minute after the party’s central leadership directed its MLAs not to vote for him. This, after senior party leaders like Yashwant Sinha had objected to Mishra’s candidature. A jilted Mishra had then gone on a tirade making allegations of corruption against senior BJP leaders.

“Senior leaders in the Sangh have taken a stand on the matter,” sources reveal. “The popular opinion in the RSS holds Gadkari directly responsible for the Mishra episode. After what has happened, there is little chance that he will come back a second time.” Sources further confirm that a “closed-door meeting of the top leadership of the RSS will be held around Mar 31-Apr 1, where everyone will be formally informed about the Sangh’s decision. For now, the Sangh is sure that Gadkari should not be given a second term as BJP president”.

This is after the Sangh had in February this year told senior BJP leaders to begin groundwork for Gadkari’s second term. Sources confirm that the Sangh’s top leadership had held a meeting with senior BJP leaders Arun Jaitley, Sushma Swaraj and Rajnath Singh and instructed them to “start building consensus within the party over a second term for Gadkari and to ensure that an amendment to the BJP’s constitution regarding the same could be introduced smoothly, first in the party executive and then in the national council”.

“Things have changed too fast,” explains a senior Sangh pracharak. “No one could have thought that the same Nitin Gadkari who found unequivocal support from the Sangh leadership is now being criticised by the Sangh itself. The RSS has been getting complaints about Gadkari and his style of functioning from the BJP but had decided to ignore it given the fact that Gadkari had done well at pushing the RSS agenda in the party—for instance, with the reinduction of Sanjay Joshi, a former general secretary of the BJP who had been eased out of the party in 2005 after a sex CD scandal involving him hit media headlines, the reinduction of Uma Bharati and opposing FDI in retail in Parliament.”

Quiz them on what brought about the change in affection for Gadkari now, and the answer comes without a moment’s hesitation: “Three corruption taints, back to back. Kushwaha, Ajay Sancheti and Anshuman Mishra. All three decisions, whether it was inducting Babu Lal Kushwaha into the BJP before the UP polls, giving Ajay Sancheti a Rajya Sabha ticket or backing Anshuman Mishra for an independent Rajya Sabha nomination from Jharkhand, were Gadkari’s own decisions. Those can’t be ignored.”

Incidentally, Kushwaha, who was ousted as health minister at the fag-end of the Mayawati-led BSP government’s tenure, is one of the main accused in the multi-crore NRHM scam and was arrested by the CBI after the last phase of the polls in the state. Gadkari had inducted Kushwaha in the hope of wooing voters in Bundelkhand. And Sancheti, a Nagpur-based businessman considered close to Gadkari and a member of the party’s national executive, found himself responsible for dragging the BJP into the multi-crore Adarsh housing scam, when details about a flat in his driver’s name surfaced. Sancheti has been given an RS ticket by the BJP this time round.

“When a controversy like Mishra blows up in the BJP’s face,” explains another senior functionary of the RSS, “it doesn’t damage the party so much. The party moves on. It damages the Sangh and Gadkari. Gadkari is seen as an RSS man. Anything that he does is reflective of the Sangh parivar and that makes these decisions even worse.” This was the reason why, sources confirm, the Sangh pushed Gadkari to issue a statement against Anshuman Mishra on March 25. “Gadkari’s statement that day,” the functionary goes on to add, “wasn’t an intervention of a responsible party president looking to support its leaders and party. It was quite simply the execution of a Sangh order given to him. He didn’t have a choice.”

The forced rescindment, with Gadkari hitting out at Mishra on March 25, was clearly driven by the Sangh’s own compulsion to come clean on the issue of corruption. A former RSS ideologue confirmed, “The Sangh can’t be seen dabbling with corrupt people. Mishra had already caused enough damage to the party by making wild allegations of corruption against senior BJP leaders. Through all of that, Gadkari had maintained absolute silence. The Sangh was upset that Gadkari, who had clearly been favouring Mishra, even going to the extent of allegedly getting his brother a ticket to contest in the recently held UP polls, had kept quiet. The Sangh leadership told Gadkari to sort things out and issue a statement against Mishra.”

A senior BJP leader was caustic: “Post the Mishra controversy, while the BJP has managed damage control, the RSS and the party president are the ones who have come out looking rather poor from the entire episode. After all, Mishra was seen to be Gadkari’s man and Gadkari is seen to be the sarsanghchalak’s confidant. This kind of a link only establishes that the Sangh has double standards. It likes people to believe that it has zero tolerance for corruption, but at the same time promotes the corrupt.”

While the Sangh may have found itself pushed into a corner this time, within the BJP, the anti-Gadkari sentiment has been building for a while now. Senior leaders in the party have openly criticised Gadkari’s “near-autocratic way of functioning”, especially in matters like ticket distribution in state polls. Senior leaders in the party maintain that Gadkari’s over-dependence on surveys for ticket distribution has hurt the party’s prospects in states. Party leaders are particularly peeved with “Gadkari’s style of functioning”. A senior party leader says, “Gadkariji doesn’t follow the BJP’s style of open meetings to discuss issues. He avoids core committee meetings. Forgets about the national executives and refuses to have discussions. As a result, decisions taken by the party seem to be only his own. He has failed on every count.” As Gadkari’s poor report card, insiders offer the poor performance in the UP polls, Yediyurappa’s tussle for power in Karnataka, Narendra Modi’s perennial rebellion and the recent Rajya Sabha nominations as glaring failures.

In December 2009, when the Sangh had brought Gadkari—a rank outsider, often described in party circles as an RSS encroacher—to Delhi, the RSS directive to him was to set the BJP’s house in order. A far cry from that now, in 2012, as he struggles to assert his position in a faction-ridden party, many would say that the swayamsevak from Nagpur has only ended up bringing his own backroom patrons under a cloud.