The BJP is stepping into a new phase in its existence as the strongest national party, with the installation of a new president soon. The process for election of the new party chief will be initiated on Monday, and an announcement is expected soon. It is already clear that working president JP Nadda will succeed Amit Shah, current Home Minister, as the party chief. Shah exits from the party chief post after a five-year period which saw the BJP winning large numbers of assembly polls, as also parliament elections with relative ease. Yet, recent times saw the party’s fortunes waning as it lost out to rivals in quite a few states – the last rounds seeing Maharashtra and Jharkhand giving it a thumbs down.
The assembly polls in Delhi a month hence too will be closely watched and AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal might or might not yield much ground to the BJP or the Congress this time – against the AAP’s near-total sweep of seats in the last assembly polls, leaving only three seats to its rivals. The last five years saw Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party chief Amit Shah acting in unison, to push the party’s prospects. Modi’s old chum in Gujarat, Shah acquitted himself well as a taskmaster in organizationally equipping the party to fight and win polls.
In recent times there is a reverse in the party’s fortunes. The BJP lost Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand, and narrowly managing to retain power in Haryana. A failure in Delhi, if it happens, will mean the BJP is largely on the downslide. The failure of the principal Opposition, the Congress party, to get its act together has been of help to the BJP for long. PM Modi made best use of this situation in the last LS polls, effecting a near-sweep of seats in many states – while the south as also Odisha and West Bengal were retained by regional parties.
It is virtually impossible for Shah to continue as head of the party any longer, burdened as he is with heavy responsibilities as home minister – more so as Kashmir, the CAA, the NRC-NPR etc require him to focus attention on governance. At the same time, even as the party gets a new chief, there is little doubt that he will function in full coordination with the Prime Minister and Home Minister, besides retaining active ties with the RSS which has considerable say in the running of the party as also the Government.