Rise of a Formidable Political Force  

Express News Service

Of late, there has been a deluge of books on the BJP, some to help writers to cross over to the ‘right’ side, some to encash the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. However, Nalin Mehta’s latest book The New BJP breaks the mould. It is a well-researched massive tome analysing the rise and expansion of the BJP objectively with hitherto ‘unseen’ data available out in the open. The book is a political scientist’s delight.

The author has used hard data and developed new statistical tools with the help of experienced journalists and Big Data crunchers which gives his study a decisive edge. He presents his study with easy-to-understand arguments buttressed by on-field interactions with mid-level and ground-level workers and leaders. Mehta takes an incisive look at the myths around the BJP—an urban-centric party, a high-caste party, an elitist party, a party with a limited agenda of Hindutva that has grown on communal rhetoric, an anti-women regressive party, anti-minority party etc. He dissects the BJP’s grand strategy and its deeply-rooted-in-soil-style of working with the backing of a visionary leader to help it expand beyond the imagination of its critics. This book can be treated by any political party as a primary resource if it wishes to grow, provided its leaders take off their blinkers. It will help them understand why the sustained mudslinging and blind criticism of the BJP is not working.

Mehta’s study of the BJP’s strategy in the Southern part of India, Northeastern region and its focus on women will surprise many. He has presented Karnataka as a case study and tried to understand the problems in expansion of the BJP in the South. It is a wonderful study, but I dare say that if he had dug deeper like a journalist, he might have had reached different conclusions. Critics decrying BJP’s split and acquisition strategies in the Northeast region miss the fact that there has been years of hard work on the ground by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and its affiliate organisations in trying circumstances that gave the BJP the leeway to create space for itself. The author also talks about why left feminism is stuck in a rut while feminism rooted in Indian ethos is growing. 

Mehta also looks at the ideological issues and dilemma that BJP and its earlier avatar, Bharatiya Jana Sangh, faced. But he should have studied the ideas propounded by Deendayal Upadhyay a little more closely so he wouldn’t have dismissed it lightly as some kind of rhetoric. He has managed to lay his hands on a very interesting document from a gentleman in Mumbai who had raised a question long back, ‘Why most of the BJP members don’t get elected again?’.  Mehta goes on to tell us how Modi and his team have been able to solve this problem. He shares many conflicts and disagreements within the BJP beginning from its foundation. He shows how ‘The New BJP’ is a continuity. Interestingly, while other parties split and re-split on ideological issues, the BJP could overcome the differences successfully. Though some leaders left, the party didn’t split. 

He stresses that the BJP under Modi and Shah has created its own massive membership and cadre and rightly compares its membership with the Communist Party of China. Both are political parties. But he is mistaken in comparing the size of the RSS cadre and BJP membership. RSS is a ‘man-making’ organisation that tries to create responsible, selfless, patriotic and disciplined citizens through their years of nurturing. Its members end up contributing their time, energy and money without any expectations in return. Unlike political parties the RSS offers no power and perks to its cadre. 

For the author, the trickiest part must have been to make sense of the organic relationship between the BJP and the RSS —‘umbilical relationship’ as Mehta calls it. He has not taken the easy way out and assumed anything. He has rightly focused on relatively lesser-known organisations like Vanvasi Kalyan Ashram and Saraswati Shishu Mandirs from among the extended ideological family of the RSS. However, I think, he has not stressed the key role of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) enough. It provides critical leadership cadre to the BJP since the ascent of late Arun Jaitley. 

Mehta, the political journalist, emerges in the last chapter. He sticks his neck out and analyses the future of the BJP beyond Modi and the problems that beset the Opposition. It is not an easy task in the dynamically changing political scenario in India but he has done well in not shying away from having his say. Don’t be scared by the size of the book. It is written in an easy-flowing style. Unconventional data analysis and simple graphics are Mehta’s strength areas. Such is his force of arguments that you can’t leave it half read. By all means, this is a landmark book.

The New BJP
By: Nalin Mehta
Publisher: Westland
Pages: 840
Price: Rs 999