By Arun Srivastava
Reports that point out that BJP would lose around 100 seats but eventually emerge as the single largest party in the Lok Sabha after the 2019 elections may sound soothing to the ears of the leaders of the party and its rank and file, but this prospect is understood to have unnerved both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Amit Shah. They fear that this could encourage the dissidents within the party to press for a change in leadership.
While Modi and Shah are getting ready to face the Congress challenge, especially from the united opposition, but the internal threat is a major cause of worry. Anti-Modi leaders and forces inside the BJP have been mustering strength to demonstrate their strike power at the right time.
Realising the intensity of the situation, the RSS leadership is getting ready for action so that Modi and Shah get some breathing space. But they are at loss to work out the mechanism to check the Congress onslaught. Rahul Gandhi has already dropped hint of the nature of attack he would launch against the BJP and the Modi government. According to the Congress sources, since Modi has miserably failed on the economic front, BJP with RSS would like to focus on Hindutva. Of course, it would play up its programme for the rural poor and dalit voters.
The tenor of the Congress campaign was clear when at a meeting in Germany Congress president Rahul Gandhi attacked the prime minister for his exclusivist policies and programmes, which he said would breed insurgencies. Rahul also blasted the religious approach of the RSS and BJP.
In London he compared the RSS to the Muslim Brotherhood, a political Islamist group with strong presence in the Arab world, particularly Egypt, and said that the Sangh fountainhead wants one ideology to run through every single institution and crush all other ideas.
Though Rahul of late has adopted an aggressive posture against Modi, it was probably for the first time he chose to attack BJP and RSS. Shah has fielded at least three senior leaders and spokespersons to defend Modi and his governance. Their action plan is to keep Rahul embroiled on the issue of the formation of opposition alliance. They hope this will not materialise and the failure would smear Rahul’s public face, which would boost the prospect and image of Modi. Already BJP is harping on the point that the united opposition was nothing but a disaster.
Some time back BJP general secretary Ram Madhav had described the unity move of non-BJP parties as an alliance of corrupt parties, which is bereft of ideological commitment. He also credited his party for the peace largely prevailing in Jammu and Kashmir and militancy being neutralised effectively.
It is an irony that people believe in the government claim that the country’s economy is the fastest growing and the NDA government has made grand economic gains, but intriguing Modi or his aides have failed to quantify the gains. It is a paradox that Modi who used jibes against Nehru all these years has finally come to embrace his vision of socialist ideas.
Modi has launched a number of welfare schemes but none of them is successful or has made a significant impact on the lives of common people. Modi has been speaking of empowering dalits but his cadres have been lynching them.
Modi led NDA to power in May 2014 on the promise of restoring India to a path of high economic growth, ending economic mismanagement, creating millions of jobs and rooting out corruption. But the failure of the government to boost the economy and create jobs has hurt the country badly. Undeniably India is in a negative growth mode. Industrial production is down for the first time in two decades. Export fell by 20 per cent and at least 1.5 million officially employed workers are expected to lose their jobs soon.
Rahul’s reference to the Islamic State drawing a parallel between the RSS and the Muslim Brotherhood has angered the BJP, but there is no denying the fact that Modi has failed to provide a direction and meaning to the growth and development of the country. (IPA Service)
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