It was akin to a ‘quake’ and when it came, it was soon clear that neither the Congress high command nor its leadership in MP had any inkling of it despite several lesser markers registering on the political Richter Scale over last seven months. Anuraag Singh charts the discomfort within the Congress and the lack of inner-party dialogue that Jyotiraditya Scindia’s exit from the party has once again brought to fore
The feints and the shadow boxing had all been there for longas were the cloak and dagger games. Over the last 15 months that the Congress has helmed Madhya Pradesh, warnings of an impending political catastrophe were always there for all to see. Yet, the individual egos in play and ambitions in conflict were so intense that it had seemed insurmountable and irreconcilable and, perhaps, the inevitable was forecast, most interestingly by rivals BJP. Finally, a single peg in the party coming unstuck left the Kamal Nath led Congress tottering on May 10.
As political pundits tried to unravel the mystery behind the suddenness of the ‘political earthquake,’ one thing they appeared to be certain of: That the Maharaja of Gwalior had, by his action and inaction, given ample hints of what was in the offing in the months ahead. Turn back the clock to August 6, 2019. Within hours of Parliament approving the Bill for bifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories and abrogation of special status given to the state under Article 370 of the Constitution, Scindia had pointedly ignored the Congress line and protests to tweet a riposte in support of the Centre’s stand, upsetting his party
BOLT FROM THE BLUE
Few would have then thought that his words then, carried a hint of a rebellion which should not be dismissed. The probing move to the March 10 sequel had come as late as on March 3-4 with a midnight drama at Manesar in Haryana, when state BJP leaders allegedly whisked away ten Congress and allied legislators. Unfortunately for them, the plan to wean the legislators away had come unstuck by March 7 and the majority of the ‘abducted’ MLAs returned home.
That had calmed the Congress nerves, but the actual sledgehammer blow came even quickly — just 36 hours later on March 9 noon — when 19 Congress legislators, all Scindia loyalists, suddenly went missing. That a well-laid plan was being executed was clear when they were found to have shed their personal security and switched off their mobile phones. Hours later, they surfaced at a sprawling resort in Karnataka capital Bengaluru — the place, where four of their colleagues had already been taken to on March 4.
The next move was the big one and deftly executed. As the country revelled in Holi colours, Congress stalwart Jyotiraditya Scindia delivered the painful blow to Sonia Gandhi and Co, resigning from the primary membership of the party and ending an18-year old association with the Grand Old Party, saying he wished for a ‘new beginning’. As the Congress bandwagon in Delhi and Bhopal reeled from its impact, Scindia walked into the BJP headquarters in New Delhi to a warm welcome from party chief J P Nadda and was straightaway nominated as the saffron party’s first preference candidate for the Rajya Sabha from MP.
WAS IT WAITING TO HAPPEN?
In hindsight, leaders now ascribe the fallout to ‘silo-politics,’ which has so marked Madhya Pradesh Congress functioning. With obvious camps of Chief Minister Kamal Nath, former CM Digvijaya Singh and Scindia working often at cross-purposes, the discomfort within the party had unsettled its functioning. Leaders from the Gwalior-Chambal region, avowedly close to Scindia, say the Maharaja had started feeling insecure about his future ever since his unexpected and unprecedented Lok Sabha poll defeat by 1.25 lakh votes at the hands of his former lieutenant and BJP candidate Dr KP Yadav, that too in his pocket borough of Guna-Shivpuri. Scindia had been undefeated till then; ever since he made his political debut in 2002.
“Since the May 2019 results, he was so hurt and downbeat that he needed support but failed to get it from within the party, which left him wondering whether he had any future in the Congress. There remained the formidable challenge of PM Narendra Modi’s popularity wave, which could again nullify his efforts. Was there an alternative? He went by the dictum, ‘if you can’t beat them, join them’,” said a senior Congress leader of Bundelkhand region. Former CM Digvijaya Singh, who has long been seen as Scindia’s foe within the Congress camp wholly agreed. “Since losing the Lok Sabha polls, Scindiaji was upset — not with the party, but with himself. From the information I have, he was in contact with senior national BJP leadership, including PM Narendra Modi and then BJP national president and home minister Amit Shah,” claimed Singh.
IN COMES ZAFAR ISLAM
Digvijaya added: “The BJP high command had asked its leaders in Madhya Pradesh about how helpful Scindiaji could be in toppling the Kamal Nath government, but state BJP leaders assured they could do it on their own. However, when the first attempt failed on March 3-4, channels were again reopened with Scindia.” Informed sources with access to both BJP and Congress political circles say, the process of Scindia’s shift from the Congress to the BJP started around seven months ago with the Baroda royal family and former Deutsche Bank investment banker-turned-BJP national spokesperson Zafar Islam, considered close to PM Modi, playing a significant part. Scindia’s wife Priyadarshini Raje hails from the Baroda royal family and her close relative and Rajmata of the erstwhile royal family, Shubhangini Raje Gaikwad, was one of the proposers for Modi when he filed his nomination papers as the BJP candidate from Vadodara in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
“Both Zafar Islam and Shubhangini Raje Gaikwad became the bridge between the top BJP leadership and Jyotiraditya Scindia in the run-up to his exit from the Congress,” said MP-based political analyst Chandrabhan Singh Bhaduaria, who has good contacts in Vadodara also. The week preceding Scindia’s surprise exit on March 10 from the Congress is believed to have seen hectic parleys between Zafar and also his in-laws’ family in Baroda. On Holi, it was Islam who accompanied Scindia to his meeting with Amit Shah and later PM Modi, which is believed to have sealed the deal.
MARRIAGE VENUES MASK INTENTIONS
Two marriage ceremonies in the first week of March-the wedding reception of BJP national president JP Nadda’s son in Delhi and the wedding of the son of Scindia’s personal staff in Chhatarpur and Gwalior proved to be ideal venues for necessary spadework for the big Holi surprise without drawing too much attention, key sources in BJP confided. While senior state BJP leaders are believed to have discussed the possibility of Scindia joining the BJP at the Nadda reception in Delhi, Scindia loyalists had advance warnings of ‘something big’ in the offing, post the Scindia aide’s function. Most Scindia loyalist legislators, including the 19 who resigned, were present at the Gwalior reception, possibly on March 7.
As ‘planned’ all of them ditched their personal security men on March 9 and switched off their cellphones before rushing to Delhi by road where Scindia awaited them. A senior Congress leader who is engaged in trying to win back the rebels claimed that once the MLAs were in Delhi, Scindia met them singly and made an emotional appeal saying he wanted them to back him in something big he was about to undertake to preserve their collective self-respect. “We have insider information on how the BJP backed these meetings, arranged two-three chartered aircrafts to fly the MLAs from Delhi to Bengaluru on March 9. We also know of the role of MLA Arvind Bhadoria, a key figure in the March3-4 episode, ex-MLA Sudharshan Gupta and ex-minister Umashankar Gupta who contacted the MLA’s “held captive” in Bengaluru,” claimed Digvijaya Singh.
CONGRESS CAUGHT UNAWARES
According to senior Congress leader and former MP minister Mukesh Nayak, “The present situation could have been clearly avoided by the Congress leadership in MP and Delhi, which knew of Scindia’s frustration in not being clearly told whether he would or not be fielded for the Rajya Sabha after some leaders pitched for nomination of Digvijaya Singh and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra from the state.” Ramniwas Rawat, senior Congress leader from Gwalior-Chambal region, agrees. “Had they acted in time, Scindia would have never have crossed over,” he said. According to Congress insiders, who did not want to be quoted, the top leadership was informed of about 15-25 highly disgruntled MLA’s who felt neglected by the party, but it did not anticipate them joining Scindia in such a step.
In the final analysis, the forewarning by intel on such a possibility turned out to be wholly correct. Even without it, that the angst in the Scindia group was rising would have been obvious with legislators like Arif Masood, Sanjay Shukla and Ranvir Jatav, besides allied MLAs, like Rajesh Shukla, complaining of their respective constituency concerns several times which went unaddressed. “It’s the BJP which has used Scindia’s shoulders to take a shot at the Congress government after failing to topple it in the past. We’ve foiled Operation 1, will foil Operation 2 and any other attempt they could mount,” said a confident Digvijaya Singh. He, however, said, “We could have only sent Scindiaji to Rajya Sabha; not made him a central minister as Modi-Shah can.”
WERE THERE OTHER TRIGGERS?
Public relations minister PC Sharma claimed that the Scindia loyalists had little to complain as they had their way in transfer-postings in the departments held by the six Scindia loyalists. “Scindia had himself distributed farm loan waiver certificates to farmers in Shivpuri district of Gwalior-Chambal region recently,” he said. Perhaps the earliest trigger was denial of chief minister’s post to Scindia after Congress emerged as the single largest party in 2018 assembly polls. However, with Kamal Nath at the helm, he was offered the deputy CM’s post but Scindia chose instead to nominate his close aide and present health minister Tulsi Silawat for the post to which Kamal Nath said no.
Guna-based political analyst Vikas Dixit, believes the Congress won an impressive 26 out of the 34 assembly seats in the Gwalior-Chambal region largely because Scindia’s supporters figured he could be the CM. The denial of the post of MP Congress Committee chief — which Scindia had coveted next — ruffled his feathers. His supporters claim even a minor irritant — some delay in allocation of an official bungalow of his choice in Bhopal — did matter, but the ultimate straw that broke the camel’s back was Chief Minister Kamal Nath’s off-the-cuff remark when told of Scindia’s programme to hit the streets over the teachers agitation. “Let him, if he insists,” was Nath’s reply, which spoke of a nonchalance and plain ‘dismissive’ attitude, and steeled Scindia to make his big move.