DNA Edit: The Amit Shah Juggernaut

With a party president like Amit Shah, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has a unique advantage no other PM can claim to enjoy since Indira Gandhi, who had both the government and the party under her thumb. However, Shah, who enjoys Modi’s complete confidence, has been given a free hand to keep the party machinery fighting fit at all times.

Modi appears to have learnt the right lessons from the Congress’ plight where a succession of Congress prime ministers-cum-party presidents (like Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, and PV Narasimha Rao) focussed their energies on governance, but did not realise the rot setting into the party organisation. Even the AB Vajpayee-LK Advani-MM Joshi combine that dominated the BJP between 1980 and 2004 made the mistake of leaving the party organisation to lesser leaders, rendering it unprepared for the 2004 polls, which eventually led to a defeat.

The following election in 2009 was a repeat. In contrast, under Shah and Modi, the BJP has gone from strength to strength as it annexes one state after another. Shah is now setting out on a 95-day Deen Dayal Vistarak Yojana to add more states to the BJP kitty. The parallels between the Vistarak Yojna and the Ashvamedha Yajna of ancient times is hard to miss. Regional chieftains who looked invincible just a year ago — like Mamata Banerjee, Naveen Patnaik, and K Chandrasekhara Rao (KCR) — are suddenly beginning to feel the heat. In West Bengal’s municipal polls, the Trinamool Congress had let loose violence reminiscent of the CPM’s heydays.

In Odisha, Patnaik is combating dissension within the BJD and orchestrating a reshuffle in the party leadership. In Telangana, KCR’s strange sops to the minorities have been aggressively countered by the BJP, putting the Congress, which was aspiring to tap into anti-incumbency against the TRS, on the back foot.

In Tamil Nadu, aspirations for a new face are growing within the Dravidian parties. Kerala continues to be an outlier for the BJP, but that has not stopped Shah from trying.

With the Modi government nearing the half-way mark, Shah is clearly preparing the party for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls where Opposition parties may go to the extent of conceiving an unprecedented pre-poll alliance to halt the Modi juggernaut.

The irony is that while the Opposition strain their nerves on the  inconsequential presidential election, Shah is fanning out from Delhi to meet his workers at the grass roots. Clearly, the Modi-Shah combine is one step ahead of their ragtag opponents.