BJP ignores Sena's pressure, readies for going solo

When the government at Centre on Tuesday daringly moved forward to recommend President's Rule in Maharashtra, the BJP was clearly calculating long-term gains and losses from such a decision in a state where after last three decades it could establish itself as a party of primacy piggy-riding the same Shiv Sena, which tripped it in government formation this time.

The BJP which mostly a junior partner in the more than three-decade-long alliance till 2014 Assembly polls where it contested separately from Sena and emerged as the single largest party, cornering away 122 of 288 Assembly seats and left Sena far behind at 63.

Ultimately Sena had to make peace and they together formed the government.

This time both went into the alliance but there was no gain in numbers and the drop was more sharply visible in case of the BJP, which was down to 106 and Sena to 56.

Though Sena’s slide in numbers was less, the BJP has realized Sena’s limited potential as far as its strength in the Hindutva constituency is concerned.

With Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief and Home Minister Amit Shah at the helm of party affairs and Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray no more, Sena has no Hindutva icon matching the appeal of the two BJP leaders.

There is a view in the BJP that Senas’ Hindutva appeal vis-a-vis that of the BJP has got all the more limited after the Supreme Court verdict in favour of Ram temple within six months of Modi 2.0 government coming to power, the government’s decision on the abrogation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir and its earlier moves of Balakot terror strike post Uri surgical strike against Pakistan.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls when the BJP-Sena alliance swept Maharashtra winning 42 of 48 Lok Sabha polls, the credit went to Modi-Shah duo.

The BJP had won 24 of the 25 seats it contested and Sena 18 of 23 it had fought on.

Even in the Assembly polls, the BJP parted 124 seats for Sena but Sena’s strike rate was much lower. Despite this leaders from Sena repeatedly kept training guns on the BJP.

After the election results, Sena leaders came out with cartoons showing Sena's symbol bow and arrow hanging overhead and pointing directly at BJP's party symbol lotus and another caricature showing the tiger (Sena’s symbol) wearing a lock rocket (NCP’s party symbol) sniffing at lotus (BJP’s symbol).

The two caricatures appeared days after results of the state polls were out on October 24, kicking off a chain of strong reactions from BJP leaders.

So the BJP felt that instead of frequently “surrendering” to the recalcitrant ally, it was time for the party to go solo and test its strength as an alliance did not increase the tally of either party in this election.

As far as the Maratha sub-nationalism issue riding which Sena shot into prominence in the eighties and continued with success in later decades, this has also timed out with change in demography as well as economic scenario in the state, where anti-North Indian, anti-Gujaratis or anti-Tamil politics have no takers now.

So when Sena upped the ante asking for its share in the chief minister's post despite having got nearly half of the numbers of that the BJP had won in this Assembly polls, the BJP, which was already at the receiving end of frequent barbs by its oldest ally decided to call the bluff.

The BJP feels that an alliance of three parties— the Shiv Sena, the Congress and the NCP— will not sustain for long and will fall sooner than later due to internal contradictions in the long run.

The BJP has already seen this in Karnataka, where the Congress-JDS tie-up could not stand the test of time.

Off late, there has also been a thinking growing in the BJP that "excessive" dependence on allies is not good for its own growth and now is the right time for party to try to grow on its own in states, where the BJP has not had its own chief ministers or has not been able to come to power on its own.

Besides, saving the alliance on the terms set by Sena would have had a cascading effect on allies in other states, emboldening them to seek their pound of flesh more aggressively.

Already after Sena saying no to the BJP, NDA allies LJP and Shiv Sena have started asserting in Jharkhand, while BJP’s blow-hot blow-cold relationship with Nitish Kumar in Bihar has often taken a stand contrary to that of the BJP— be it triple talaq, Uniform Civil Code, abrogation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir.

By not yielding to the demand of its oldest ally, the BJP has given a clear message to NDA partners not to take it for granted.

Before this, the BJP had refused to yield to pressures from Nitish Kumar in 2013, who was opposing the elevation of Narendra Modi as BJP’s PM candidate for 2014 Lok Sabha polls and then to TDP’s Chandrababdu Naidu in 2018, who was seeking special status for Andhra Pradesh.