WHAT GUJARAT REVEALS ABOUT BJP, OPPOSITION

Congress and regional rivals struggle to mount any effective challenge in the Indian state

- BY SWATI CHATURVEDI | Special to Gulf News

If you want to know how long and hyper-successful the Bharatiya Janata Party’s political project will last, look at Gujarat — where the party, ruling for decades, periodically purges itself and changes the faces running the state because the opposition is comatose.

What this means is that the ruling party in Gujarat, the BJP, is acting both as the government and the opposition to itself. The recent cabinet reshuffle this week illustrates this: all ministers of the Bhupendra Patel-led Cabinet, except him, resigned. Only four were retained, and 17 new ministers were sworn in.

Gujarat is the state that gave Modi multiple terms as chief minister and catapulted him to a three-term prime minister of India. He and Home Minister Amit Shah retain a huge personal stake and a constant hawk-eye on the state. From Anandiben Patel, (late) Vijay Rupani, to Bhupendra Patel currently, all the CMs have been Modi’s personal picks endorsed by Shah — and all have been Patidars, the politically dominant caste of Gujarat.

Gujarat is a cautionary tale for India’s shambolic opposition, which shows no political hunger to come to power. A brief spark was seen in the 2017 elections when Rahul Gandhi got his caste arithmetic right and presented Gujarat with three new young leaders: the Patidar face Hardik Patel, fresh off leading an agitation; Alpesh Thakor, the Congress party’s backward caste face; and Jignesh Mevani, the convener of a Dalit front and Congress MLA in Gujarat. Both Patel and Thakor later joined the BJP.