Things have changed. The Ganga is a mighty river that winds through several states. But whoever knew it’d be in Uttar Pradesh that the Ganga will drown the BJP’s chances, the party’s 2022 prospects. So much so, neither Yogi nor Modi know how to go forward. There’s a widening trust deficit: Who’s breathing down whose neck? Both want to salvage whatever’s left of their shredded reputations.

Journalists, grey in the hair and who speak a grating Lucknow i-accent, are getting the feeling that Prime Minister Narendra Modi does not trust Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and Yogi in turn wouldn’t turn his back to Modi. Who knows what goes around in the minds of single men? The stakes are too high and, as sure as the dog that paws at the loose sand on the banks of the Ganga where the shallow graves are, nobody knows what 2022 holds for the Yogi, or for Modi.

Guess, after the Bengal setback and the near total decimation in the perception battle after the devastating second Covid wave, the Modi camp was looking for somebody to scapegoat, and Yogi Adityanath fit the bill. Modi is not so much bothered about what the Times of India and the Hindustan Times, Indian media, talk and write about him, but what's in the New York Times, and the Washington Post, regarding his government and him, does impact him, his thinking.

Foreign media are charting a course scouring the banks of the Ganga and the stench of the Covid-dead is like that which permeates from the bones stacked in the Paris catacombs. Rajdeep Sardesai might not have succeeded, but Barkha Dutt and Rana Ayyub have with their hit-pieces in the Washington Post and the Time magazine hit bull's eye. Besides, Getty Images has made a lot of shill selling Delhi-NCR funerals.

Now, the BJP is taking stock. And Yogi Adityanath is at the centre of the reviews. But whoever believed it’s wrong to bracket the BJP with the RSS together can climb a Peepul! The BJP sure gets its decisions made for it by the RSS. So, Modi and Amit Shah confabulated with the general secretary of the RSS, fellow called Dattatreya Hosabale, and then it was the turn of another RSS implant in the BJP, a certain BL Santosh.

Both these gentlemen took a good look at Yogi in action in Uttar Pradesh and walked away with the feeling that scapegoating Yogi Adityanath for the sorry state of BJP affairs post-Covid second wave would be rank mistake that will boomerang on the party, and Modi-Shah. When in Lucknow, BL Santosh met Keshav Prasad Maurya and Dinesh Sharma after a meeting with the Yogi.

The upshot of the meetings was to reach the conclusion that it would be foolish to shunt the Yogi out of the reckoning for 2022. Apparently Modi wanted a bureaucrat who he favours given a slot in Yogi’s cabinet, but the Yogi sensed that if he agreed, it’d cook his goose and then there would be a Modi-man right under the Yogi’s nose reporting to Modi about Yogi!

The result: Modi could not stomach the “insult”. But Hosabale and Santosh had reported back that the Yogi cannot be removed despite the growing criticism of the Yogi Government for its mishandling of the 2nd Covid wave. Therefore, the review meetings to refurbish the BJP’s image before the 2022 elections.

BL Santosh has reportedly asked Uttar Pradesh BJP leaders to give further feedback, like what are the state unit’s plans to reach out to the angry UP masses. The bad Press the BJP is getting in the UP media are the stuff of horror stories, and there’s not even lingering doubt that if the elections were to be held today, the BJP would be trounced and bounced .

There’s talk that Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has with his total control freak style left BJP MLAs and MPs smarting in the wings. The Yogi’s style emboldened bureaucrats and these ‘babus’ didn’t respect MLA or MP, and didn’t answer to their calls. So, it wasn’t a surprise when appeals and pleas and requests from MLA and MP for oxygen, meds and beds, went for a toss. Not many MLA will tear-up if the Yogi gets the axe. But Modi knows that there will be a meltdown if the Yogi gets the heat. So, for the time being, it’s Catch-22, and a return to the drawing board. (IPA Service)