At half-time, it’s Yogi 1, Modi-Shah 0

The Uttar Pradesh government’s order mandating all eatery owners on the Meerut–Haridwar highway to emblazon their names on shop signage might have been stayed by the Supreme Court, but its ripple effect is likely to impact the BJP’s internal politics for a good long time.

The order, issued by the Yogi Adityanath-led state government, came close on the heels of the buzz that the BJP’s central leadership was contemplating a change of guard in UP. The two deputy chief ministers, Brijesh Pathak and Keshav Prasad Maurya, have been skipping most meetings convened or chaired by the chief minister.

Along with state BJP president Bhupendra Chaudhary, they have not only been confabulating with prime minister Narendra Modi, home minister Amit Shah and BJP president J.P. Nadda, but also publicising these meetings. The media has been to town with the story that Yogi might be on his way out.

The clamour for Yogi’s head began with the chorus that Yogi was responsible for the BJP’s poor performance during the Lok Sabha polls in UP, where the party’s tally came down from 62 to 33 seats. The Yogi camp countered this by saying none of Yogi’s recommendations for candidates were honoured, so how could he be held responsible?

Yogi himself didn’t react at all. He neither issued any statement nor rushed to meet the central leadership. The only perceptible deviation from his routine was a sudden tour to his hometown Gorakhpur where RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat was to address a training camp for volunteers. Bhagwat had, by then, already taken more than a couple of potshots at Modi. Thus, a meeting between Yogi and Bhagwat would have meant RSS support for Yogi.

The chief minister reportedly waited for two days but Bhagwat didn’t grant him an audience. Instead, a statement was issued saying the RSS chief had no political agenda.

The RSS normally doesn’t issue such communiques, especially to account for an incident that didn’t even take place. What it actually meant was that the RSS was not yet ready to come out openly against Modi. That left Yogi in the lurch.

The Muzaffarnagar SSP’s order (issued on 15 July) instructing all eateries to prominently display the names of owners and employees (to ensure pilgrims on the Kanwar Yatra eat only ‘pious food’ i.e. food cooked and served by Hindus), seemed heaven-sent for Yogi, who immediately encashed the opportunity to embellish his image as Hindutva’s Hero No. 1.

He promulgated the same order along the entire Kanwar Yatra route, which in essence covered the entire state, as kanwariyas travel right through UP. With police already having forced eatery owners to lay off Muslim workers, and proscribed the sale and cooking of non-vegetarian food during the yatra, Yogi’s order amounted to the economic boycott of Muslims. The Supreme Court, while suspending the state government’s order, observed that depriving an entire community of their right to business is discrimination on the basis of religion, and violates Articles 14, 15 and 17 of the Constitution.

The BJP’s central leadership found itself flailing in the face of the Opposition’s onslaught on the discriminatory order. Sweet revenge for Yogi on party colleagues who were baying for his blood. The Kanwar Yatra order served a dual purpose — of further entrenching him as Hindutva’s prime mascot and letting loose the Opposition’s cannons on the BJP’s central leadership.

Yogi was never Modi and Shah’s choice in the first place. In 2017, Modi wanted Manoj Sinha as chief minister while Shah favoured Maurya, then state party president. However, Dr Krishna Gopal, the BJP’s organising secretary (essentially a top RSS functionary) put his foot down. He succeeded in installing Yogi Adityanath and paid the price for it (being demoted thereafter).

Despite BJP bigwigs conspiring against Adityanath, his emergence as Hindutva’s heavyweight champion created a distinct constituency for him across the country, making Yogi the most sought-after leader for election campaigns, second only to Modi.

The saffron-clad mahant’s first tenure in the chief ministerial seat was marked by a spate of encounter killings, the Hathras gangrape case and the showering of flower petals on kanwariyas from a helicopter by top police officers. His ban on cow slaughter took cow vigilantism to outrageous lengths. He triggered ‘Anti-Romeo Squads’ and vile terms like ‘love jihad’ were essential ingredients of his speeches.

Yogi’s reign of hardline Hindutva was always based on hatred of minorities, with one-liners such as, “Before 2017, most of the subsidised foodgrain used to be cornered by those calling their fathers abba jaan”, and “If those doing love jihad don’t mend their ways, their Ram naam satya hai yatra (funeral procession) will start soon”.

In 2021, the BJP brass suggested he move to the Centre and let somebody else hold the reins in the state. On 21 November 202, apparently to dispel rumours of any friction, Adityanath posted a photo on Twitter (now X) of PM Modi and he deep in conversation, Modi with his arm patronisingly around his shoulders.

Yogi fought for a second term in 2022, and won 255 seats in an Assembly of 403 legislators — a majority only slightly less emphatic than the 2017 win when the BJP won 312 seats under the stewardship of Modi, Shah and Maurya.

The current tussle is the party’s second attempt to rock Yogi’s boat. His popularity transcends state borders — a distinction no other chief minister enjoys. This threatens both peers and seniors. The fact that Yogi’s supporters have been projecting him as the next prime minister doesn’t help either.

History seems to be repeating itself in UP. In 1998-99, the then chief minister Kalyan Singh had almost as frosty relations with then prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. A section of state BJP leaders and MLAs made routine visits to Delhi, demanding Kalyan’s removal. The Vajpayee-Advani duo never took any action against the rebels, choosing to patronise them instead.

As a result, a scorned Kalyan Singh extracted his revenge by acting against the party’s official candidates during the 1999 Lok Sabha elections. Though the party’s tally was halved from 58 in 1998 to 29 in 1999, he couldn’t stop Vajpayee from being re-elected as prime minister (largely thanks to a spirited performance by other NDA allies). This gave Vajypayee a reason to shunt Kalyan Singh out, replacing him with the almost forgotten (and forgettable) octogenarian Ram Prakash Gupta.

The same scenario seems to be playing out in 2024, with the BJP bulldozing their own ‘Bulldozer Baba’ by encouraging rebels like Maurya and Pathak.

For the past four years, Yogi has had to deal with a chief secretary imposed on him by the Centre. Cabinet colleagues like A.K. Sharma and state president Bhupendra Chaudhary are perceived to be Modi loyalists. The organising secretary Sunil Bansal too is said to be hostile to Yogi. One wrong step, it seems, and he will be out on his ear.

Yogi has already made it clear to the Modi-Shah duo that if he is eased out of his office, he would prefer to go back to his mutt in Gorakhpur rather than accept any other position. That would further alienate his fellow Thakurs. The party, which has a solid 20–22 per cent core vote bank consisting mostly of upper castes, cannot afford such a big crack.

The chess game between Yogi and central BJP leadership is likely to go on, till one of them blinks, makes a false move and is checkmated. No one can, as of now, predict the outcome. Only two things are certain in this game—the only loser would be the BJP and the only beneficiary the Opposition.