But for Modi, the BJP would not have been able to win in quick succession the recent municipal and panchayat elections in Gujarat with spectacular success. Outside of politics, Modi is a favourite of the corporate sector because of his emphasis on the state's industrial development and his administrative efficiency.

Given this enviable track record, Modi should have been regarded as a star campaigner at the election rallies of his party and its allies. Yet, he has been pointedly kept out of the Bihar poll scene by his counterpart there, the JD (U)'s Nitish Kumar. Not only that, the patent snub to the hero of Gujarat has been quietly swallowed by the BJP with Sushma Swaraj vainly trying to make light of it by saying that his “magic” is not needed in Bihar.

Nitish Kumar's insistence on excluding Varun Gandhi from Bihar is understandable. The scion from the “wrong” side of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty had shot himself in the foot by his intemperate comments on Muslims earlier in U.P. which earned him a jail term under the orders of the Mayawati government. Besides, Varun is still a virtual nonentity in politics with hardly any supporter besides his mother. But Modi obviously is in a different category. By equating the two, Nitish Kumar has again highlighted how the spectre of the Gujarat riots of 2002 continues to haunt Modi.

Ever since his fateful acts of omission and commission during that dark period, nearly all of Modi's efforts have been to erase that episode from public memory. He belatedly realized that by ignoring the then prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's advice to observe raj dharma, he had harmed his own political prospects. He tried to atone for his sins by, first, focussing on the state's development, which has earned praise even from Mahashweta Devi, the pro-Maoist Bengali writer. And then by giving tickets to Muslim and Christian candidates in the recent polls, in which about 100 of them have won.

There is little doubt that these initiatives have paid him high electoral dividends. He is evidently no longer regarded as an ogre by the minorities. They may not have totally forgiven him, but are willing to let bygones be bygones. However, Modi's career shows that electoral success alone may not add to one's political stature. As his humiliation in Bihar shows, Modi will remain a persona non grata in the foreseeable future even within the NDA.

The rebuff he has suffered in Bihar will seem all the greater if the ruling JD (U)-BJP alliance wins another term in the state. It will show that so far as the NDA's “secular” allies are concerned, Modi's place will remain in the outhouse. Having lost two secular partners before the last general election - Naveen Patnaik and Mamata Banerjee - the BJP is clearly in no position to take the risk of alienating yet another ally, which does not subscribe to its Hindutva philosophy. No matter how much progress Gujarat makes in the bijli-sadak-pani sector, therefore, Modi will have to remain within the Lakshman rekha of his own state.

There are two implications of this predicament. One is that he will not be able to play any role at the national level, where his contemporaries who cannot boast of his administrative skills like Arun Jaitley and Sushma Swaraj will remain in the driver's seat. The other is that Modi will be a constant reminder of the BJP's communal orientation. This image can become darker if the investigations into the riots conducted by the SIT under the Supreme Court's direction unearth some gory details. The Sheikh Sohrabuddin episode is another blot of which Modi will remain wary.

Other parties have overcome their mistakes of the past by apologizing, as the Congress did for the anti-Sikh riots of 1984. Similarly, the communists have said sorry for calling Rabindranath Tagore a “bourgeois poet” and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose “a quisling”. The BJP's difficulty is that communalism is so integral to its outlook that distancing the party from it will lead to a fatal political disorientation. The party is also discomfited by the antics of the VHP and the Bajrang Dal for these are a reminder of the Sangh parivar's anti-minority bias. The continuing focus on the temple following the Allahabad high court judgment is a disadvantage in this respect. No matter how hard he tries, therefore, Modi will not find it easy to get rid of these shackles. (IPA Service)