Thursday, July 21, 2022

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group


The Dhankhar Selection mystery

Contrary to popular perception that West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar was told by the Prime Minister on July 16 when he called on him at the PM office is completely misplaced. In fact, it was Dhankar who had sought prior appointment with the Union Home Minister, Amit Shah and also with the PM. He had sought the meeting as he was coming to attend Governors' customary  dinner with the out-going President, Ramnath Kovind. He wanted to meet both the leaders to apprise them of the prevailing situation in West Bengal. When Dhankhar called on Modi, the entire discussion was confined to West Bengal only. Dhankhar was not given any clue either by Shah or Modi that he is going to be picked for the VP's job in the evening. Though Dhankhar's name had started doing the rounds in social media immediately after photographs of his meeting with the PM were posted on twitter by the PMO, he had no clue. Dhankhar was at the dinner table at the Rashtrapati Bhawan in the evening when he received several missed calls and messages on his mobile phone. Since it was a dinner engagement, he could neither  take the calls nor look into messages. But an Orderly of the Rashtrapati Bhawan walked up to his seat and whispered that there is a message in his phone. Dhankhar later confirmed to this writer that he got to know about his candidature at the dinner in Rashtrapati Bhawan only. A highly senior leader of the BJP said that the PM is a stickler to the protocol and known for keeping things to himself till the end. If he had disclosed to Dhankhar his name for Vice President's post earlier, the meeting of the BJP Parliamentary Board consisting of top leaders would have become redundant. It was BJP president JP Nadda who told the board that he had received three names for the VP's post and let the board decide. Rest is history.

 

BJP's Big ambitions for 2024

 

Modi may be BJP’s triumph card for winning elections after elections since 2014. But even then the party machinery is working round the clock to fix nuts & bolts to ensure more and more states are brought under the saffron flag. It may be converting defeat into victory in some states by resorting to unfair practices to achieve the target. But that’s the New BJP. However, those working behind the scenes (read RSS here), tell a different story. The New BJP is promoting Martial Race in states wherever necessary. If it is keeping Thakurs as Chief Ministers in UP, Uttarakhand and Himachal it is retaining Rajnath Singh as number two in the Union Cabinet. If the party brought a Patidar in Gujarat, it installed a Maratha as CM in Maharashtra. Eknath Shinde was brought to cut Sharad Pawar and Uddhav Thackeray to size at the cost of its own most trusted leader Devendra Fadnavis. It is keeping Shivraj Singh Chouhan as CM to keep OBCs in good humour. But Jyotiraditya Scindia and Narendra Singh Tomar are Union Cabinet Ministers to woo the Rajputs. The BJP badly needs a senior Jat leader to help it in Haryana, Rajasthan and parts of UP. It installed Jagdeep Dhankar as VP to woo the Jats who is the first Jat in 75 years of India's history to don the mantle. In Haryana, it already has Dushant Chautala, a Jat leader as Deputy CM. In order to woo the Tribal in 109 Lok Sabha seats in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha and other states, it brought the first Tribal woman as President. Thus, the BJP’s think-tank is working tirelessly for 2024.

 

Gehlot's Nashik nightmare

 

With the change of regime in Maharashtra, fortune of many leaders may also change. It transpires that a police case in Nashik against Vaibhav Gehlot, son of Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, may witness some interesting twists and turns. The case came to light when a businessman in Nashik got a case of Rs 6.89 crores cheating registered against Vaibhav Gehlot and 13 others in March this year. But the Police under the MVA government was reluctant to register the case and the businessman approached the court. The court directed the Police to register an FIR. The case was transferred to the Economic Offenses Wing (EOW). Within days, the complainant approached the court saying he would not like to pursue the case against Vaibhav Gehlot . But the court did not proceed with as much alacrity as the complainant. In the meantime, the Uddhav Thackeray government fell and obviously, Gehlots may witness some turbulence. All eyes are on the Nashik complainant whether he changes his tune after the change of regime in Maharashtra. Ashok Gehlot’s  brother Agrasen Gehlot had been raided by the CBI in June and the Chief Minister is having sleepless nights.