Consider these facts. Even before the new president could settle down in Delhi gaddi, many of the earlier notions have vanished. To begin with, L.K. Advani is not going to retire, not to speak of taking political sanyas. Nor will his role be confined to what he himself had said 'overseeing the transition'. Instead, he will remain at overall command of the BJP's parliamentary wing as its guardian spirit. We still do not know whether Nagpur had anticipated such an abrupt turn. First he picked up Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitely. Then came more loyalists as deputy leaders and chief whips in both houses.

The induction of Gopinath Munde, a traditional rival of Gadkari, into the group will make the line-up all the more formidable. BJP veterans feel these very first moves had violated the collective spirit prescribed by Mohan Bhagwat. Old guard from the other side has not been consulted. It has been a neat coup d'etat. It was all done by deftly using the authorisation powers to oversee the transition. Now instead of 'transition', the person who was to retire, has been retained under a wider compass. Creation of the post of chairman of the parliamentary party, though looked innocuous from Nagpur, has virtually laid the foundation of a powerful parallel power centre within the BJP.

The proposal had come from Swaraj who expressed her discomfiture at being superior to Advani. Soon the other Advani appointee S.S. Ahluwalia began striving hard to give the post the right legal sanctity. He has suggested to the Congress managers to amend the rules to give cabinet rank to the chairpersons of both BJP and Congress. (Sonia Gandhi, chairperson of the CPP, had refused to avail of any such rank) Apart from seeking to retain government facilities, the move makes a strong political statement that it is not the party chief, but chairman Advani who is on par with Sonia Gandhi.

A long-ignored BJP veteran says only those familiar with the Advani durbar's manipulative skills can foresee the trap. The idea is to neatly bifurcate the BJP into two autonomous wings. While Advani as chairman will run the parliamentary wing, organisational work will be left to party president Nitin Gadkari. This will be an inverted version of the Congress model where Sonia Gandhi has given functional independence to the government wing under PM. As in Congress, the party chief should give full powers and freedom to the parliamentary wing.

Now much will depend on how skillfully the fort holder tackles the problems. Delegated authority from Nagpur alone will not give him powers. Rajnath Singh knows how nasty the Delhi crowd can be. As a 'mofusil' leader and usurper, Gadkari may encounter stiffer resistance but in subtle ways. Rajnath was an easy victim of intrigues because of his self-righteous pronouncements and dependence on the same old crowd at the policy level. He had brought in Muralidhar Rao but it was too late. Hence whenever issues came up, the same old Delhi leaders dominated the decisions, political or organisational. Thus Rajnath's own views got drowned in collective chorus. We do not know how Gadkari is going to tackle this crucial challenge.

One suggestion is to induct large fresh blood from the states, mainly the GenNext kind who are not part of any group. They can also be a countervailing force in Delhi politics. Names of Manohar Parikar, Vinay Sahasrabuddhe and Murlidhar Rao are in circulation. The latter two are known for their sharp ideological bend. Sahasrabuddhe is a key figure in Mumbai-based Prabodhini, an institute that trains BJP cadre. Murlidhar Rao has been active in Swadeshi Jagran Manch until the Vajpayee government muffled it. Govindacharya, once a rising star, will be another asset for the new team.

In terms of long-term policy postures, Gadkari's task is going to be even more difficult. He and Bhagwat have already emphasized policy priorities like nationalism ('cultural' as well as economic), restoration of 'value-based politics', consensus decisions as against coterie rule and primacy to party rather than personalities. His reference to SJM exponent Datopant Thengdi's ideas may be another pointer. Gadkari has sent the right signals by declaring he would not become MP so long as he is the party chief. Yet exigencies of realpolitik may force Gadkari to play down part of those structural and policy reform agenda. For, each one of them will encounter stiff resistance from the parliamentary wing as well as elite lobbies.

In his post-bifurcation interview, Advani himself has made it clear that the old-style collective leadership or total consensus cannot work in a 'modern' political party. 'You will need some one who is the last word in the party,' he asserts. 'Sangh does not believe in importance to individuals but we cannot avoid personalities in politics.' In a dig at Bhagwat, Advani warns that both sides should not give advices 'to one another through media'. With such open declarations, it is not going to be easy for the RSS and the new BJP president to enforce their ideological and structural reforms.

Gadkari's immediate priority may be to attend to the problems in Jharkhand, Rajasthan and Orissa. Even this can reveal his style and what kind of people he will depend for trouble-shooting. For a decade and half, the party has been functioning under a highly personalised leadership structure with power and patronage emanating from bungalows where outside wiz kids take decisions. Rajnath Singh, the first outsider president after Murli Manohar Joshi, fell easy victim to the culture of sycophancy and became part of the rot.

If the new president is really serious about charting out a new path - or a return to the pre-durbar mores - by 're-orienting and re-inventing' the BJP, he will have to begin at the top. He will be keenly watched how he goes ahead with 'decentralizing and distributing power in the party organisation', as he has promised to the media. For this, he should draw more from Rajnath Singh's travails as party chief than his own business management training. (IPA Service)