BJP is discovering that its prized defectors may be more liability than asset

The 2024 Lok Sabha election showed that turncoats winning on BJP ticket had a lower victory percentage than the party’s own candidates.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and BJP leader Jitin Prasada at a meeting ahead of the Lok Sabha election, in Pilibhit, Uttar Pradesh, on April 9. | Photo Credit: PTI

Many things do not sit right with the defectors who joined the BJP in the run-up to the 2024 election imagining that the party of Prime Minister Narendra Modi was invincible. Today, they stand with a force that is not all-powerful. These people, therefore, no longer have assured futures or the strut of a single party rule. The defectors’ success rate in elections is also low, and as a result, they are not the most valued commodity within the BJP but individuals who now have to find their place in the changed dynamics of a coalition regime.

Among the defectors are the so-called young MPs who were referred to as “babalog” when they were considered friends of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi. Many are dynasts from landowning families, some titled, and some are alumni of the privileged Doon School.

R.P.N. Singh, hailing from a small “royal” family in Uttar Pradesh, and a former Minister of State in the Manmohan Singh government, typifies this brigade. He joined the BJP just before the 2022 Assembly election in Uttar Pradesh, and this created a minor social ripple as he and wife, Sonia Singh, editorial director of NDTV in the Prannoy Roy era, epitomised Delhi’s liberal elite. After he joined Modi, Sonia survived the Adani takeover of NDTV and did not quit as many of the other established anchors did. Singh is now a Rajya Sabha member and part of the shouting brigade on the Treasury benches. He has not got a ministry.

But he presumably has friends among the Congress and Doon School old boys who crossed over. They once constituted what the Prime Minister referred to as the “Khan Market gang”, but today they are in the saffron party spotting sinister threats to the nation whenever the opposition demands inquiries into matters like the Adani-Hindenburg report. They also energetically promote programmes such as “Har Ghar Tiranga”; their version of nationalism naturally had to be transformed from the Congress to the BJP whose mothership, the RSS, never participated in the national movement for Independence as many of the defectors’ families did.

Scindia gets a good deal

Jyotiraditya Scindia is possibly the only former Congress leader who has had a good deal in the national BJP as he is the scion of the Gwalior royal family. He is a Union Minister holding the portfolios of communication and one named development of the North Eastern region.

Until the last election, he held the prized portfolio of civil aviation, which has now gone to the Telugu Desam Party. In the Manmohan Singh years too he held power, communications, and information technology, commerce and industry, so it is not that he was short of rewards with the Congress. In Doon, Scindia was Rahul Gandhi’s contemporary. Their younger schoolmate and Congress-to-BJP long jumper is Jitin Prasada, now Minister of State for Commerce and Industry, and Electronics and Information Technology.

There is a colourful story about a more recent defector who crossed over in January this year. Milind Deora, from a significant Congress family in Mumbai, joined the BJP’s Maharashtra ally, the Eknath Shinde faction of the Shiv Sena. According to Rajya Sabha MPs, when he entered the Upper House (his reward for defection presumably), Deora went rushing to greet his former leader Sonia Gandhi, but she reportedly turned away saying she did not talk to traitors. It was described as “an elegant snub”.

All these men of means and political lineage, once part of Rahul’s inner circle, are somewhere in the BJP spectrum but without any great public importance. Rahul Gandhi has meanwhile come into his own. It can be argued that Rahul’s new perspectives on politics and social justice come from influences that are often subaltern and non-elite. So, from an ideological perspective, it is probably in the order of things (and good for the Congress) that the “babalog” are preserving their fortunes on the wealthier side of the political spectrum.

Losing respect of peers

The shift has been harsh on some members of regional parties as well. Praful Patel was once considered the right hand of Nationalist Congress Party boss Sharad Pawar, but he defected to the Ajit Pawar faction that flopped in the recent election. Both Praful Patel and Ajit Pawar faced corruption charges, and the cases against them were dropped after they defected. Praful Patel expected a big portfolio as well, but members of the larger parivar resented the importance given to tainted imports. Having burnt his bridges, Patel has to make do with what the BJP did throw him: a seat in the Rajya Sabha front benches usually reserved for former Prime Ministers and parliamentary leaders of parties. Incidentally, with the Maharashtra Assembly election ahead, Ajit Pawar said on August 13 that it was “a mistake” to have fielded his wife against “his sister Supriya Sule”. So, meltdowns and repositionings are taking place.

Patriarch Sharad Pawar has, however, signalled that the INDIA bloc members need not show Praful Patel any niceties. In Parliament, he is in no man’s land. Sanjay Raut of the Shiv Sena (Uddhav) said on the floor of the House: “ED charged Praful Patel with buying the property of Dawood Ibrahim’s friend Iqbal Mirchi through money laundering worth Rs.180 crore. But the ED has now given the property back to my friend Praful Patel.” No one from the Treasury benches defended Patel.

The defectors may have shrugged off the ED cases, but they have also lost respect. Those who have brought nothing to the table but demand positions will be treated as baggage by the BJP in due course. From 2016 onwards, there has been a trend of politicians shifting to the BJP and bringing down many State governments through defections. Until 2024, they had a good success rate of being re-elected.

That is no longer true. In the 2024 Lok Sabha election, the percentage of turncoats winning on the BJP ticket fell below the victory percentage of the BJP’s own candidates. This means that the value of entrants from other parties is diminishing. Post-election analysis also shows voters turning against some of those who switched allegiance for personal gain. Of course, this does not mean that the BJP will give up on its smash-and-grab policy, dubbed Operation Lotus, of breaking parties should the need arise.

Saba Naqvi is a Delhi-based journalist and author of four books who writes on politics and identity issues.