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COVER STORY: A. B. VAJPAYEE
TWILIGHT ZONE: Who's Next?
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HEIR LINE: Advani (above) is the obvious successor; Jaswant Singh
(below) has too aloof a persona
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It's a question
no one, least of all in the BJP, wants to either pose or confront. Not
because there are no obvious answers but because it offends the Sangh
Parivar's self-defined respect for hierarchy. For 44 years-less the six
years when he took a backseat-Atal Bihari Vajpayee has been the public
face of the Jan Sangh-BJP. And for the past five years he has been the
head of an amorphous coalition that blends Hindu extremism, Dravidian
nationalism and Lohiaism. "We can't imagine the NDA without you,"
an emotional Farooq Abdullah said at last Wednesday's NDA meeting. "There
is no alternative to Vajpayee," added L.K. Advani, the man Pakistan
believes is the "invisible hand" of the Government.
Yet, if Vajpayee does decide to call it a day,
both the BJP and its coalition partners will have to find an alternative
leader or risk another mid-term election. As the single largest party,
with 180 MPs in the Lok Sabha, it is almost pre-determined that the new
leader will be from the BJP. And within the BJP, there is no doubt about
the heir apparent.
Unlike Vajpayee who was from the party but also
above it, the 74-year-old Home Minister Advani has always been a BJP and
RSS favourite. The man who recreated the BJP from the debris of the 1984
election, Advani is respected for his personal integrity, clarity and
strategic acumen. His reputation as a Hindutva hardliner-a product of
his controversial rath yatra in 1990-ruled him out as the leader of a
coalition in 1996. Since then, however, he has sought to reinvent himself
in a more acceptable garb. As the foremost pointman of the Vajpayee Government,
he enjoys a personal rapport with the leaders of coalition partners. Consequently,
his elevation to the top job may be less complicated than his reputation
suggests. Yet, it will not be hassle free since Advani has made many enemies-both
political and corporate-over the years. They will guarantee a troubled
succession.
If Delhi's diplomatic community had a vote,
their choice would undoubtedly be the 63-year-old External Affairs Minister
Jaswant Singh. A confidant of Vajpayee, Jaswant's problems are that he
is unacceptable to the RSS-they would even prefer George Fernandes to
him-and out of tune with the impulses of the BJP. An efficient minister,
his social aloofness poses a handicap. That's not a problem with the other
possible candidate-the 67-year-old HRD Minister Murli Manohar Joshi. Joshi
is more in tune with the RSS but he could have a problem making himself
acceptable to the NDA partners.
Which leaves the one imponderable: will Vajpayee
want to choose his own successor? And will this choice sway the NDA, if
not the BJP?
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