New Delhi, Aug. 18: A rash of newspaper articles that BJP politicians and sympathisers have penned this week in praise of Amit Shah appears to suggest a determined attempt to build a personality cult similar to Narendra Modi's around the party president.
Shah, who recently completed three years as party chief and got elected to the Rajya Sabha, has already outgrown his role as a backroom strategist and organisation man and become the BJP's second-most visible face after the Prime Minister.
Now there seems to be an effort to lift him to the next level - almost on a par with Modi - as a visionary working tirelessly on his "mission of reconstructing a great India".
Two articles by BJP politicians in leading newspapers yesterday hailed Shah as someone who had achieved "unparalleled and historic" feats in just three years.
"When Shah took over in August 2014, (the) BJP was in power in just a handful of states. Today, it has its own chief ministers in 13 states and is a partner in another five states," BJP general secretary Vinay Sahasrabuddhe wrote in The Times of India.
"Its membership has increased from three crore to 11 crore. It has the largest number of MLAs and MPs as well.... To have achieved this in a span of barely three years is unparalleled and historic."
In contrast to BJP supporters' insistence over the last three years that Modi's personal popularity alone was powering the party's victory march, the articles seemed to suggest that the electoral success would not have been possible without Shah.
"Felicitating Shah on his Rajya Sabha election, Modi pointed out that to galvanise the party organisation when the party is in power is extremely difficult. But difficulties have never deterred Shah," Sahasrabuddhe wrote.
He quoted Shah as saying: "Electoral success is important, but remember we are not an election-winning machine. We are a party with a mission, a mission of reconstructing a great India."
In an article titled "The Chief's Strategy" in The Indian Express, psephologist turned BJP politician G.V.L. Narasimha Rao compared Shah to Modi as a tireless and relentless pursuer of implausible goals.
"Fighting to win has been the mantra of Shah. He is known to take every election very seriously. He relishes taking on tough challenges. Like Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he does not rest and also refuses to let others rest," Rao wrote yesterday.
On Monday, Devendra Kumar, a psephologist known to be close to the BJP leadership, had written an article seeking to present Shah as someone steeped in humility despite his family wealth.
If Modi was projected as a " chaiwala" (tea vendor) in the run-up to the 2014 general election, Devendra portrayed Shah as someone who had grown up without the comforts that wealth provides.
"Shah was born to a prosperous family. His great-grandfather was the nagarseth of the small princely state of Mansa. Even as he grew up in the family haveli, his parents made sure that he did not get accustomed to the comforts of a lavish upbringing," Devendra wrote in The Economic Times.
"For instance, his sisters used to go to school by bagghi (a horse carriage) but he walked to school. Likewise, while his sisters were served food in silver utensils, he was given food only in brass utensils."
Devendra seemed to hint at a bigger future role for Shah.
"The story of the 53-year-old modern-day Chanakya is still unfolding. The country will see many more of his unseen aspects than just an election machine in the coming months and years," he wrote.
