“Gujarat Ke Damad”, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi described Jyotiraditya Scindia in a function to mark the 125th foundation day of the prestigious Scindia School at Gwalior on October 21, has reason to feel relieved in the run up to the coming assembly election.
Modi devoted 18 minutes out of his 31- minute speech on the occasion to fondly recall the Scindia family’s association with his home state Gujarat and his parliamentary seat Varanasi.
High Command Backing
Contrary to speculations, the BJP high command has, by and large, protected Jyotiraditya Scindia’s reputation in ticket distribution for the November 17 assembly polling. All but two of his 22 loyalist MLAs, including 10 ministers, who had switched over to the BJP with him to topple the Kamal Nath-led Congress government in March 2020, have been repeated.
Unlike his three cabinet colleagues from Madhya Pradesh, the scion of the erstwhile Gwalior state has been spared the acute predicament of contesting the assembly election.
While Union ministers Narendra Singh Tomar, Prahlad Patel and Faggan Singh Kulaste are struggling hard to foil Congress in Dimni ( Morena district), Narsinghpur ( Narsinghpur) and Niwas ( Mandla) seats, the Union civil aviation minister is free from such worries.
His Rajya Sabha term is to last till 2026. Unless he is asked to contest the coming Lok Sabha election in 2024, Scindia has next two and half years left to sit pretty in the Parliament.
Can Scindia Deliver BJP Gwalior-Chambal?
That said, the apparent blessing of the BJP high command could turn out to be fragile for the Maharaj, if the party performs below expectation in the 34 assembly seats in the Gwalior-Chambal region. A majority of opinion polls are predicting a dismal scenario for the BJP in the region, considered Scindia's pocket borough.
In the 2018 assembly election when Jyotiraditya Scindia spearheaded the Congress campaign, the party had routed the BJP, winning 28 seats in the region.
Since a majority of the winners in the election were his loyalists, the credit for the spectacular feat was majorly apportioned to Scindia. Many of those Congress MLAs joined him in the revolt against Kamal Nath in March 2022.
They are now contesting on the BJP ticket. It is a huge challenge for the Gwalior scion to prove that he still reigns supreme on the Gwalior-Chambal political landscape, regardless of the party affiliation.
That is a Herculean task before him, not the least because the trust deficit between Scindia supporters and the core BJP workers is far from bridged in the three years since the Congress government was toppled.
If anything, the gap has only widened because the pent-up anger of the “original’ party workers is more pronounced against the turncoats in the wake of the BJP’s decision to repeat the Scindia loyalists at the expense of old timers.
For Scindia Loyalists An Uneasy Ride
In fact, the Union civil aviation minister is facing a double whammy. On one hand, disgruntled BJP workers and leaders are threatening to queer the pitch for the sitting MLAs owing allegiance to him. On the other hand, nearly two dozen of his loyalists, who had defected to the BJP following his revolt, have returned to the Congress.
The returnees said they saw no future in the BJP, implying the Congress has better winning prospects in the election. The Congress welcomed the BJP deserters with open arms. A couple of them are now party candidates.
The desertion of his loyalists is being seen as a major setback to Scindia’s political clouts in the BJP. Moreover, he has to contend with half a dozen aspirants in the chief ministerial race, should the BJP retain power, after the party decided to field three union ministers besides party general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya in the assembly election.
Earlier, Scindia was viewed as a direct contender against Shivraj Singh Chouhan , and his supporters nurtured the hope of a repeat of the Assam experiment where a Congress turncoat Himanta Biswa Sarma was made the chief minister.
But in the dramatically changed election scenario in Madhya Pradesh, the BJP high command has decided to solicit “direct support” for Prime Minister Narendra Modi, bypassing the chief minister. In the party’s election advertisements in the state, Scindia’s small photo is allotted equal space in a cluster with those of other CM aspirants including Shivraj Singh Chouhan beneath a big photograph of the Prime Minister.
Congress’s Tactical Campaign
Curiously, the circumstance under which the Kamal Nath government was toppled is not a big poll issue in the campaign. The fall of the Congress government was anticipated to dominate the electioneering scene.
But, neither the BJP appears to be feeling compelled to play the old record about how it was imperative to rid the state of a corrupt government in the middle of its term, nor the Congress seems interested in harping on the “betrayal by Scindia” any more.
Scindia’s role in the BJP government formation seems to have reduced to be a minor issue. In her election rally in Gwalior on July 21, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra only briefly mentioned Scindia.
“I can make a long speech on the corruption of the BJP government or how Scindia changed his ideology instantly, but I only want to raise the public issues that concern their day-to-day lives.”
As though on cue, state Congress leaders are also avoiding Scindia in their speeches and, instead, focusing sharply on Chief Minister Shivraj Singh’s alleged omissions and commissions.
Rakesh Dixit is a senior journalist based in Bhopal. Views are personal, and do not represent the stand of this publication.
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