Individuals embody certain trends, that is their only importance in history. Mr L.K. Advani, the president of the Bharatiya Janata Party, has come to personify reform within the party to which he has shown lifelong allegiance. His project of reform is of a particular kind. He wants to distance himself and the BJP from the smear of Hindu fundamentalism. He wants the BJP to claim for itself the middle ground of Indian politics where it can woo the moderate Hindu opinion, which abhors the trishul-wielding sadhus and is frightened by the rantings of the likes of Mr Praveen Togadia. Mr Advani believes, with every good reason, that belonging to the mainstream of Indian politics is the only way the BJP can survive and grow. As a party of the Hindus qua Hindus, the BJP can only remain a fringe phenomenon, even perhaps a dangerous one. Mr Advani?s project has not won him friends within the sangh parivar, and if his critics within the party have their way, he may have written his own political obituary by trying to wean the BJP away from its ideology.

The most strident criticism of Mr Advani has come from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, an organization which sees itself as non-political but intervenes continuously in the affairs of the BJP. It has been argued that everything in the sangh parivar is actually controlled by the RSS. The leaders of the RSS are the puppeteers, and the others are no more than puppets. Mr Advani has challenged the ideological dominance of the puppeteers based in Nagpur, the headquarters of the RSS. In retaliation, the RSS is now seeking the removal of Mr Advani from the post of president.

It would be extraordinarily myopic to see this as a battle between the RSS and Mr Advani. It is much more than that. It is about the character of the BJP; it is also about the autonomy of its functioning, about religion prevailing over an attempt to place governance at the top of the BJP?s political agenda. Mr Advani may go or stay, or he may quit only after finishing his term in office. But the more important issue is the way the RSS is going about in its efforts to scuttle any attempt to refashion the BJP as a party that can lay claim to the middle ground. If the RSS does establish its control over the BJP, the latter?s colour will remain an undiluted saffron. Mr Advani, in his reformist incarnation, represents the BJP?s future, the RSS represents its past. The choice before the BJP leaders ? especially those belonging to the next generation ? is clear. Mr Advani has no reason to feel diffident. He has set the party?s agenda. If by surrendering to the RSS the BJP leaders refuse to accept this agenda, they will only delay the reform process. History will see Mr Advani as the man who read the tea-leaves right.