The politics of resignation and why BJP will stay ahead of the game

Soon after the 2015 Delhi assembly elections, where the Aam Aadmi Party scripted an incredible victory winning 67 out of 70 seats, the party was once again being considered as a serious option to the Bharatiya Janata Party and Narendra Modi who ran a whirlwind campaign to win the 2014 general elections and several state assembly polls held thereafter.

AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal, who many thought had changed after his resignation drama earlier last year, had admitted that he was a little scared of the people reposing their faith in him so strongly. He had also asked his supporters to be humble in their victory. And then, within weeks, AAP seems to have gone into a tailspin with stories of party ideologues Prashant Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav being unhappy with Kejriwal’s brand of politics. The drama attained it’s peak in the national executive meet on Wednesday.

Right before the Delhi assembly elections, a senior journalist had opined that the Aam Aadmi Party is to Delhi what the Shiv Sena was to Mumbai -- the former's anti-VIP rhetoric unique and rooted in Delhi as much as the latter's anti-outsider rhetoric was in Mumbai. 

The comparison has become stronger after Arvind Kejriwal’s latest offer to resign from the post of AAP convener and the aftermath of AAP's meetings on Wednesday. Kejriwal’s calculated resignation just ahead of the National Executive meeting and his absence on grounds of health is reminiscent of late Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray resorting to similar tactics while maintaining an iron grip on the Sena.

Thackeray offered to quit the post of Shiv Sena chief every time he felt challenged by his deputies. It didn’t happen often, but he used the resignation astra very effectively and ensured he remained ensconced in the top seat. Just like AAP, Sena too faced revolt from within in the early years and Thackeray responded with resignation. With Sainiks being violently supportive of Thackeray, Madhav Deshpande and Bandu Shingare had to exit the party and offer abject surrender.

The moment came yet again in Sena history in the 90s’ where Thackeray felt insecure with the growing clout of the likes of Anand Dighe who had openly started to defy him and had established his own empire in Thane. Thackeray’s resignation threat, voiced through party mouthpiece Saamana, brought thousands of Shiv Sainiks to his residence Matoshree and party headquarters in Dadar, where they chanted Thackeray’s name and abused every other party executive. Senior leader Manohar Joshi was even slapped by an emotional Diwakar Raote who is now a minister in the Maharashtra government.

We have seen this happening in the Congress as well, with the Gandhi family members getting into the resignation mode every time the First Family got insecure about their position in the party. Facing revolt and square blame for the party’s debacles since 2014, Rahul Gandhi recently disappeared to an unknown destination and now we hear that he could be anointed as party president, even though the party fared pathetically in all elections where the Reluctant Prince was asked to lead from the front.

Sonia Gandhi, too, used the ploy effectively in 1998 when the trio of PA Sangma, Sharad Pawar and Tariq Anwar gently prodded her about the reports of her having two passports. Instead of offering any explanation, she chose to resign, resulting in the All India Congress Committee rallying around her and forcing Pawar-Sangma- Anwar out. The Congress might talk about internal democracy, but it ends when the First Family comes into question.

And this is where the Bharatiya Janata Party is different and has enjoyed a longer shelf life despite suffering worse debacles than the Congress in the past. In the 1984 general elections after Indira Gandhi’s assassination, BJP had won only two seats and most people had written obituaries for the party. And yet, in just five years, the party became a force in national politics thanks to Lal Krishna Advani’s rath yatra over the Ram Mandir. He was compared to the Iron Man of Indian politics, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, to show Congress' Rajiv Gandhi. When it became clear that hardliner Advani could not rally the opposition around him, AB Vajpayee was brought to the fore. Advani was forced to play the second fiddle and Vajpayee was portrayed as the greatest Prime Minister India ever had. He was declared a statesman par excellence. His oratory skills, where his pauses were offered more meaning than they had, were praised to the hilt. Post the 2004 elections where the party suffered unexpected defeat, the ideologues went into a huddle. It took a while for the Sangh parivaar to accept Narendra Modi as the man to take on the Congress. But once Modi was accepted as the leader, again he was projected as the Best Administrator the world had ever seen. The jury is out after nine months of the Modi sarkar and the debacle in the Delhi polls, but the Modi factor will still continue to rule for the next few years.

What is clear is that even though the BJP may appear to be a party that revolves around an individual, it still is a party where this individual is changed as per the needs of the time. So it is Advani, Vajpayee or Modi who may appear to be the centre of BJP’s universe, whereas the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh still remain the ones plotting the course. The ideologues take a call on a periodic basis on whom to project as the next iconic leader and then through various tools, successfully catapult him as the next best thing.

Shiv Sena never had an icon beyond Bal Thackeray, the Gandhi family did not allow any other icon to come up in the Congress. It’s the same case with almost all other parties in India – be it the Nationalist Congress Party, Trinamool Congress, AIADMK, DMK, Samajwadi Party, or a Bahujan Samaj Party. So whether you like it or not, if AAP continues in the same thread, it is not likely to last too long.