Asense of déjà vu must be gripping BJP patriarch L K Advani.
His hopes of becoming the President of India have been dashed in much the same manner as he was robbed of his dream to be prime minister.
The Jain diaries and the hawala case snatched the PM’s post from under his nose back in 1995.
Now the Supreme Court order reviving the Babri Masjid demolition case against him has ruled him out as a potential presidential candidate to succeed Pranab Mukherjee.
In fact, BJP circles are buzzing with comparisons between Narasimha Rao and Narendra Modi.
Rao used the Jain diaries and the hawala case to hound his opponents inside and outside his party.
Advani as president of a rising BJP then was one opponent he feared. For Modi, the SC order could not have come at a more opportune time.
In one go, the order has snuffed out two aspirants for the post of President, Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi.
The names of both were in circulation in BJP as well as opposition circles.
Advani was BJP president and the face of the Ram mandir campaign which put the saffron party on the national map.
He would surely have been its PM nominee in the 1996 election but for the hawala case filed against him the year before.
As questions rose, even within the RSS, about his integrity, Advani quit as BJP president in a fit of pique and announced Vajpayee’s name as the party’s PM face for the election.
Although Advani was later acquitted in the case, it was too late. Vajpayee had caught the public imagination and went on to be PM.
Like the hawala case, the Babri Masjid blow has come on the eve of the presidential election, due in June this year.
BJP circles are wondering whether a jinx haunts Advani which trips him up just as he nears the pinnacle of his ambition.
Orchestrated drama
The ongoing drama in the AIADMK in Tamil Nadu appears to have been orchestrated with an eye on the upcoming election for the President of India.
The BJP-led NDA is short of an estimated 25,000 votes in the electoral college which will vote. A united AIADMK can make up the shortfall.
But to get the AIADMK on its side, the BJP first has to purge it of Sasikala’s influence. Sasikala wants no truck with the BJP which she feels has been promoting former chief minister O Panneerselvam against her.
The first steps towards her marginalisation in the party have been taken with the investigation into bribery charges against Sasikala’s nephew Dinakaran and the start of unity talks between rival factions of the AIADMK.
It seems deputy Lok Sabha Speaker and veteran AIADMK leader M Thambidurai is playing a significant role behind the scenes as an interlocutor between the BJP and the two factions of his party.
ust this week, he had another meeting with BJP president Amit Shah, say BJP sources. He is believed to be in touch with Shah on a regular basis.
The election for the President is due in June but the process will begin in May. The BJP would like to tie up the AIADMK’s support before that.
There is talk that the AIADMK will be inducted into the NDA and one of its leaders may even be given a ministerial berth.
Looking ahead to 2019
Amit Shah is hyper active these days wooing potential friends and allies. He has set in motion the process of getting the AIADMK on the BJP’s side, possibly into the NDA.
The timeline for this is before the June presidential election. But he seems to also be looking ahead at the 2019 polls simultaneously.
He has started talks with Mulayam Singh’s younger brother Shivpal Yadav, say BJP sources. Shivpal has met Shah at least twice since the formation of the BJP government in UP.
He has also met chief minister Yogi Adityanath twice. BJP circles say Shah is exploring the possibility of getting Shivpal on his side before the 2019 polls.
The aim is to split the Yadav vote and spoil the party for the much talked about mahagathbandhan between Akhilesh Yadav, Mayawati and the Congress. Interestingly, the BJP is working on Akhilesh’s half brother Prateek and wife Aparna as well.
The young couple has met both Shah and Adityanath several times.
Adityanath also visited the gaushala they run in Lucknow and commended them on the steps they have taken to protect the cow. It looks like new alignments are taking shape for the 2019 Lok Sabha election which the Modi-Shah duo is determined to win at any cost.
Electoral tie-up
Meanwhile, on the other side, Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav are in regular touch to discuss the possibility of an electoral tie-up.
The buzz in UP is that they will test out the viability of a mahagathbandhan in the bye-polls for the Gorakhpur and Phulpur Lok Sabha seats.
The seats will be vacated after Yogi Adityanath and Keshav Maurya resign from the Lok Sabha. They are the MPs from these constituencies.
They have been told to resign only after the presidential and vice presidential polls in June and July respectively.
This means the bye-polls will probably take place towards the end of the year, possibly with the assembly elections in Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat.
They will be a litmus test for a possible Mayawati-Akhilesh partnership.
Equally, they will be a litmus test for Amit Shah who is doing his best to thwart a Biharstyle mahagathbandhan in UP.