The recently concluded Assembly elections in Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh were full of surprises as far as the BJP is considered. The party announced its lists of candidates even before the Election Commission announced the polling dates, fielded MPs, including Union Ministers in state elections.
After the election results, it humbled many winners who considered themselves to be ‘CM material’ by making them ministers under the Chief Ministership of their much younger colleagues. While some have been lucky enough to get a cabinet berth, many now stand as just MLAs.
As 28 MLAs took oath of ministership on Christmas Day in the new Madhya Pradesh cabinet led by Chief Minister Mohan Yadav, a couple of names stood out.
The first name is that of Kailash Vijayvargiya. The BJP’s General Secretary (the most important role in the Sangathan or the organisation) was reappointed to the post for the second term in 2020. He was at the helm of BJP’s power structure when the party attempted to win the 2021 West Bengal elections. He served as a minister under Babulal Gaur and Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
When he was asked to fight the state elections, he did not hide his reluctance. “I did not wish even 1% to contest the elections. I had only planned to attend public meetings,” he said at an election rally.
A leader who prefers to wear his ‘been there, done that’ attitude on his sleeve has now been made to serve as a regular minister under Mohan Yadav, who entered electoral politics just 10 years ago in 2013.
Ironically, this comes less than a week after Kailash Vijayvargiya declared himself a “bada aadmi” (big person) while warning people not to take him “lightly”.
Another big name once in the Madhya Pradesh CM race was former Union minister Prahlad Singh Patel. Patel, who has served in Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s Union Council of Ministers, recently served in the Narendra Modi government as MoS of Jal Shakti and Food Processing. Patel is an OBC (Lodhi) leader and was considered to be in the CM race given that the last three chief ministers of the BJP in Madhya Pradesh have been OBCs — Uma Bharti, Babu Lal Gaur, and Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
But as luck would have it, the Vajpayee-era Union Minister will now serve as a minister in MP under Mohan Yadav. At the time of publishing this article, Patel chose to write only ‘MLA – Narsinghpur’ on his X (formerly Twitter) bio.
Narendra Singh Tomar, another big leader who was serving as a key cabinet minister of the Narendra Modi government and was steering its Agriculture Ministry, is now the Speaker of the Madhya Pradesh Assembly, a major stepback considering that Tomar first became MLA way back in 1998 and served in both tenures of the Modi government.
While Mohan Yadav’s cabinet has taken oath in Madhya Pradesh, the formation of Bhajan Lal Sharma’s cabinet in Rajasthan is likely to take another couple of days. BJP sources suggest that around 15 MLAs are likely to be inducted in the Council of Ministers, but the names are beyond the realm of guesses given the BJP’s chief ministerial pick in all three states.
While Vijayvargiya, Patel and Tomar can draw some solace from their current posts, the speculation of names for the Rajasthan Council of Ministers may leave Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore worried.
The former MP from Jaipur Rural was once the powerful Information and Broadcasting Minister in PM Modi’s cabinet. After losing his ministerial berth, he was made to let go of his membership of Parliament following his Assembly election win from Jothwara. His name doesn’t find mention among the ministerial probables in Rajasthan. Among former MPs, the names doing the rounds include Kirodi Lal Meena and Balaknath.
The fate of the three former chief ministers — Vasundhara Raje, Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Raman Singh – have already been sealed. While Raje and Singh are both National Vice-Presidents of the BJP (considered to be ornamental posts), the latter has been elected as the Speaker of the Chhattisgarh Assembly where Vishnu Deo Sai, a 59-year-old tribal leader, has been made CM.
A viral video showing Raje being told about the Rajasthan CM pick in a chit handed over by Rajnath Singh caught the former royal’s discomfort. Adding insult to injury, the ‘new royal on the block’ Diya Kumari was named Deputy CM. Meanwhile, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, popularly called ‘mamaji’ in MP, is now just an MLA from Budhni constituency. All eyes are now on whether he is brought to the Centre in case Narendra Modi returns as PM for the third consecutive time next year.
In the cult movie Donnie Darko, the titular character Donnie, who often struggled with his identity, delivered this iconic dialogue: “And finally, I looked in the mirror. Not just in the mirror I looked through the mirror. In that image, I saw my ego reflection.”
After the Assembly elections, many BJP ‘biggies’ have been similarly made to confront their egos and swallow it, silently.
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