Chennai: “BJPs victory is not complete without Kerala & Tamil Nadu…We will start our work there from today for 2024…”
That FB post posted on May 23 evening by the hugely influential B L Santhosh, BJP’s national joint secretary vested with the responsibility to oversee the saffron spread in the hostile south, speaks loud and clear where his party’s future focus lies.
In fact, the BJP strategists had started drawing up plans for Tamil Nadu soon after Jayalalithaa’s demise in December 2016, but somehow the blueprints were left to gather dust on president Amit Shah’s desk while the party leadership-and that included Prime Minister Narendra Modi-seemed satisfied riding on the subservient AIADMK’s back while focusing time and energies on conquering hostile spaces elsewhere in the country. They did not mind the criticism they were running Tamil Nadu from behind the curtains, that the Edappadi government has been a BJP proxy.
It’s against such backdrop of indifference towards Tamil Nadu despite the Dravidian state presenting a fertile turf post-Jaya to lay the saffron seed and try reaping a rich harvest in the elections to come, that Santhosh’s declaration of May 23 assumes significance. It cannot be just a boastful roar of a toothless tiger as the battle against Didi’s army in West Bengal and the ultimate poll score in such hostile states showed.
“I remember when the party leadership summoned some important functionaries to Delhi for discussion soon after the 2014 polls. I was mighty impressed and pleased when the leaders asked us to prepare ideas on how to prepare for the 2019 elections. That’s the kind of exhaustive planning that our party does very much in advance”, said a senior BJP functionary requesting anonymity.
Said another, “Our leaders must start the preparations right from the top in the state BJP unit. It needs thorough overhaul, starting from the state BJP chief. There is no denying that the state unit under her has failed miserably to counter the vicious anti-BJP/anti-Modi campaign by certain extreme forces in Tamil Nadu. Also, the state unit failed miserably to educate the people about the many path-breaking, pro-poor initiatives brought out by the Modi government”. He said he was ‘pained’ to find the public kept in the dark about the BJP regime’s important welfare measures such as the cooking gas supply.
“But all these shortcomings may soon become things of the past. Santhoshji’s assertion will not be allowed to go in vain. You can expect a major overhaul in
the state BJP soon after Modi completes his cabinet forming”, said the state BJP functionary.
And when that happens, the BJP would not have to opt for embarrassing alliances in future polls-like the one the party formed with the PMK that only the other day left a long petition of serious complaints against the regime of ally AIADMK with Governor Banwarilal Purohit. The DMDK was another burden that the saffron party had to carry through the poll campaign. Political analysts say it would take huge efforts plus resources and unlimited luck for the BJP to win any space in this Dravidian turf, while some spoke of the possibility of the saffron party ultimately ‘swallowing’ the AIADMK. And there is the Rajinikanth factor-’will he, won’t he?’ Though he has made it clear he would launch his party in time for the state Assembly elections, there are many who insist that the superstar maystill dodge such risky
responsibility. In any case, Santhoshji does not have much time left to launch the saffron strategy in TN.
