With 14 seats in Lok Sabha, Assam, which votes for its 126-member assembly in April next year, may not be critical to political parties from a larger perspective, but this time something much more than numbers is involved in the elections: it’s prestige. Incumbent Congress and challenger BJP look set for a battle of prestige in the state. And after consecutive losses in Delhi and Bihar, the BJP in particular is taking no chances.
In a swift move on Saturday, the BJP appointed Union Minister of State with independent charge for Youth Affairs and Sports Sarbananda Sonowal as the state president while accommodating incumbent Siddharth Bhattacharya as the national spokesperson on N-E issues.
The Union minister was at the helm of affairs of the BJP in the state during the Lok Sabha polls last year and he engineered a massive victory for the party by wresting the entire Upper Assam bastion of the Congress for the first time. In the 2014 general election, BJP managed to win seven seats while the Congress secured a humiliating three. Whether it was the magic of the Modi wave or display of exemplary organisational and leadership skills by Sonowal will be clear months later when the results are out.
“Bhattacharya’s term has ended. He was the president of an ad-hoc committee which took charge when Sonowal had to resign as state chief to deliver his ministerial responsibilities in the Union cabinet. With Sonowal’s appointment the youths are happy, so are different castes and communities. With him on the driver’s seat our Mission 84+ will be achieved and it is not a distant dream,” said Assam state BJP spokesperson Shiladitya Dev.
What Dev narrated is perhaps the official line.
The truth probably is Bhattacharya, who got to be the state BJP chief unexpectedly on 16 August last year because of the party’s ‘one person one post’ policy, was hardly popular among the foot-soldiers and didn’t quite enjoy a mass appeal. Moreover, he was largely considered to be autocratic and was not on very sweet terms with all party MPs from the state. During his tenure, frequent protests against the state leadership kept the party on tenterhooks although the BJP tried hard to brush it under the carpet.
Among the major decisions that Bhattacharya took was to bring in former Congress heavyweight and Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi’s Man Friday Himanta Biswa Sarma in August this year. On its own, roping in Sarma was a political masterstroke as it added salt to injury to the Congress already struggling to douse the flames of dissidence and in-house mutinies. As a matter of fact, nine more sitting Congress MLAs loyal to Sarma also defected to the BJP. But that achievement hardly added higher grades to Bhattacharya’s marksheet is apparent now.
Yet to come clean on the multi-crore Saradha chit fund scam, Sarma’s inclusion was actually a bitter pill that many BJP state veterans were forced to swallow.
However, dissidence against Bhattacharya ultimately reached such a level that six of seven BJP MPs from the state formally approached the central leadership to replace him. Following the huge influx from other political and non-political organisations during Bhattacharya’s term, the veterans feared that they would be eventually sidelined.
“Our party leadership both at the central and state levels are aware of it (resentment) and I am confident that our leadership will ensure a smooth assimilation of the newcomers into the party’s fold without making the long-time party members feel sidelined,” Mangaldoi Lok Sabha constituency MP Ramen Deka was quoted as saying by The Telegraph in September.
In humble political wisdom, the Bihar disaster was the most likely trigger for the BJP top brass to quickly realise that there was an urgent need to heed to the concerns of the party workers. Bypassing the state cadres and ignoring ground realities have cost the BJP dearly in Delhi and Bihar and the party seemed determined not to have a hat-trick of the same trend. However, the former Assam BJP chief does not consider himself as a general removed from command just ahead of the combat unceremoniously.
“That I have replaced as state party president suddenly is all media creation. Actually, my term had ended in October itself. Since I am going to fight the polls from the Guwahati East constituency next year it would be hard for me to focus on the entire state. I had requested the central leadership to relieve me but the decision was pending as the party was busy with Bihar polls,” Bhattacharya told Firstpost from Guwahati. The former Assam BJP chief had lost the same seat to Congress’ Captain Robin Bordoloi by a margin of 3,997 votes in the 2011 Assam assembly Election.
He also justified his new assignment as the national spokesperson of the BJP on N-E issues and did not treat it as a less important role. “The party felt that outsiders are usually not familiar with the intricacies of the issues concerning the North East. So this is an important post,” said Bhattacharya. He has also been appointed as one of the vice chairmen of the Election Management Committee to be chaired by Sonowal.
With Bhattacharya’s exit from the top post, there might be some awkward moments for those who were known to be close him, particularly Sarma. Although the latter has been appointed as the convener of the recently formed Election Management Committee, his uncomfortable equation with Sonowal is well known. In a cryptic text response, the former Assam health and education minister had termed Sonowal’s appointment as a ‘positive development’. This of course is a matter of political courtesy; how things unfold will be known as winter becomes harsher in Assam.