Identity is always a dodgy business. The sangh parivar was smug about its own identity till the Bharatiya Janata Party came to power as the leader of the National Democratic Alliance. Power corroded the saffron identity of the BJP. Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and later Mr L.K. Advani, recognized that it was impossible to rule India by championing an ideology that was sectarian and communal. Both of them attempted to place governance before ideology. This made the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and other extremist elements in the parivar distinctly uncomfortable. Mr Advani transformed the discomfort into disapproval when he initiated a debate on the role of Mohammad Ali Jinnah in the politics of the sub-continent. The RSS wanted Mr Advani to quit the leadership of the BJP. This has not only increased the distance between the BJP and the RSS but it has also made the BJP a faction-ridden party. The old image of the BJP as a disciplined and monolithic party has disappeared as groups representing different vested interests have appeared to fracture the party. Leaders are jostling to join the queue to succeed Mr Advani. The latter, too, is apparently undecided about his future as the party?s leader. There is a big question about the identity of the BJP. It has become a party of factions rather than a party of ideology and discipline as it used to present itself not so long ago.

Yet the BJP is unable to free itself from the RSS?s attempt to control it. The RSS is trying to introduce democracy into the organizational structure of the BJP. This is a thinly-veiled attack on Mr Advani?s power. Such a proposal, prima facie, is unobjectionable but what is of consequence is the fact that the idea originates not from within the BJP but from the RSS. The intention of the proposal is to keep the BJP within the control of the RSS and to reduce the power that Mr Advani enjoys as BJP president. This is quite a fall for Mr Advani who, till the other day, was Nagpur?s darling. Mr Advani?s sin is that he is trying to take the BJP away from its religious moorings and to make it a party suited to participate in a modern democratic process. The RSS is an organization that has no presence in the democratic system but it wants to regulate the affairs of the BJP which, despite all its shortcomings, is accountable to its voters. Unwittingly, perhaps, Mr Advani has exposed this anomaly in the position of the RSS.