How two tall men tumbled

Pankaj Vohra chronicles the major setbacks LK Advani and Lalu Prasad Yadav suffered in the year gone by.

Two men, but the same fate. L.K. Advani and Lalu Prasad Yadav — leaders who left their stamp on national politics — suffered major setbacks in 2005.

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While Advani's innings as BJP chief is coming to an end because of his deviation from the Hindutva ideology that he once so passionately professed, Lalu's thesis on caste equations fell by the wayside and the people of Bihar voted his party out of power.

For the time being, Advani may continue as leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha and Lalu as the Union railway minister but the political clout they enjoyed seems to have deserted them.

Who could have imagined that Advani, who transformed the BJP from a party of two MPs in 1984 to that of 182 MPs in 1999, would have to face the wrath of the RSS, which, at one time, considered him its favourite swayamsevak? What a fall it has been.

From a position of supreme authority, Advani has been reduced to a lame duck president and all because of his politically suicidal tendencies. He was rejected essentially because he tried to change his image — from that of a hawkish Hindu leader to a moderate secular messiah whose views on Jinnah could not have come at a more inappropriate time.

Though Advani had defied the RSS several times in the past and got away with it because of the patronage he enjoyed from some of its top leaders like H.V. Seshadri, his utterances in Pakistan were seen as ideological blasphemy.

Advani may find it very difficult to continue as leader of Opposition as his hold over the party is slowly slipping, especially with the BJP seemingly torn apart by a fierce power struggle. He will go out as the BJP president who both built and destroyed his party.

Lalu Yadav was essentially a product of the JP movement and shaped his politics on the socialist philosophy. The ordinary Bihari saw him as one of their own — someone who saw himself as a victim of upper-caste oppression. Though Lalu, Nitish Kumar and Ram Vilas Paswan started out together, they ended up contesting the previous elections on different sides. Lalu, like the other two, once believed in social justice for the backwards, Dalits and the minorities but somewhere along the way, he started showing his preference for the Yadavs, the caste he belonged to. That's when he gradually began losing support.

Lalu projected himself as the saviour of the poor and Bihar's only credible voice against upper-caste exploitation. But he lost sight of the fact that while his charisma was a hit with the people, they wanted something more concrete — development, for one. So from being seen as a messiah, he became the symbol of inertia and corruption in the state.

In 2005, Lalu miscalculated twice — during the two Assembly polls and ended up with his opponent scoring the most impressive victory in recent times, one which overturned his caste thesis and also his political fortunes.

He will be remembered not just for his wit and humour — people won’t forgot the fodder scam in a hurry.