After the BJP's own and its prime ministerial candidate's dream world of attaining power was shattered by the outcome of the last general election, the party has been lurching from one crisis to another. First, there was an explosion of internal dissent in which Jaswant Singh was joined by Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie. Their charges, as might be expected, were against the leadership's many failures which were said to be responsible for the defeat.

But that wasn't all. What probably riled those at the top was the allegation that their response, too, lacked the kind of seriousness of purpose which the setbacks in two successive general elections merited. In addition, as Jaswant Singh said, there was no linkage between inam (reward) and parinam (outcome) since an election strategist like Arun Jaitley was promoted to be the party's leader in the Rajya Sabha despite the reverses suffered by the BJP.

Arguably, Jaswant Singh had begun to dig his own grave by such criticism, including a call for a rethink on Hindutva, but the BJP still tried to placate him by choosing him to head the prestigious public accounts committee while keeping Yashwant Sinha and Shourie out of the Shimla chintan baithak. These two may now be secretly chuckling over their much lesser punishment compared to what has been meted out to the M.P. from Darjeeling.

But the last straw on the back of the top leadership was undoubtedly the book on Jinnah with its praise of the founder of Pakistan and denigration of Nehru and Patel. Rattled by the earlier criticism from Jaswant Singh, Yashwant Sinha and Shourie and unnerved by the show of dissent from Vasundhara Raje, the party chief, Rajnath Singh, evidently had no option but to take the extreme step.

One reason why he acted in haste was perhaps the fact that his position is under threat. Although Rajnath Singh will clearly prefer a second term as president, he cannot be unaware that his chances are not rated very high because, first, his uncharismatic personality redolent of mofussil towns inspires no one, not even the rank and file, and secondly, because an electoral setback presupposes that someone, especially the chief, must take the responsibility to step down.

Although L.K. Advani made a reluctant offer to relinquish his position as leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rajnath Singh has stuck to his position. As it is, he is an accidental president, having been elevated to his post after the RSS engineered Advani's ouster from it following his praise of Jinnah in Pakistan. Now, in the aftermath of the election defeat and the growing factionalism in the party, which forced it to let Advani continue as opposition leader lest there was an ugly succession battle, Rajnath Singh is clearly under immense pressure.

He could hardly be expected to be in the right frame of mind, therefore, for a calm and dispassionate analysis of the problem posed by Jaswant Singh's book. However, the expulsion has only confirmed that the BJP, as always, remains in the hands of curmudgeons whose only response to dissent is a show of anger and intolerance. This act of fury and resentment is all the more curious since Advani had escaped earlier with a much lighter punishment.

Yet, Advani's admiration for Jinnah was, in a sense, greater than Jaswant Singh's. While the latter has only said that the Quaid-e-Azam was a “great man” who had been unfairly demonised in India although Nehru and Patel were equally to blame for the partition, Advani had eulogised Jinnah for creating history although the process involved untold suffering for millions of refugees on both sides of the border. What was worse, Jinnah's “historical” achievement continues to pose an existential threat to India by incubating terrorism and partnering India's other hostile neighbour, China.

But if Advani could get away by losing only his party post, the reason apparently is his background as a swayamsevak, which has made him take care not to offend the RSS in any way, except for the Jinnah episode, which may have been just a misstep. Jaswant Singh, on the other hand, has never been a favourite of the RSS, which vetoed his appointment as finance minister in Atal Behari Vajpayee's first cabinet in 1998. He had no safety net, therefore, to check his fall.

However, an expelled Jaswant Singh may prove to be more of an embarrassment for the BJP than if he had been allowed to remain in the party. For one, his sacking underlines the kind of “shrillness”, which Arun Jaitley had advised the party to avoid after its defeat. For another, even if Singh does not act in tandem with his political adversary, Vasundhara Raje, to stir up trouble in Rajasthan, he is unlikely to fade away quietly into the Rajasthan desert or the Darjeeling hills. (IPA Service)