Togadia Back In Sangh Parivar 'Business'

After prolonged hibernation, Pravin Togadia, the international working president of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, is back in the news. He has not made any inflammatory speeches yet, but the fact that he was part of the RSS-BJP select group meeting is indication enough that he is regaining his prominence in the Sangh Parivar’s scheme of things.

Though there is no official word yet on what transpired at the meeting, small `leaks’ suggest that the BJP was told to focus more on ideological issues, with Hindutava and Ram Mandir forming part of discussion agenda. More than anybody else, this is the VHP’s agenda. The BJP may have moved on from `Mandir Wahin Banayenge’ slogan but the VHP continues to hold various programmes, some overt and some covert on the issue. It is one of their core existential matters. It was thus natural that this issue would be taken up at a meeting attended by Ashok Singhal and Pravin Togadia.

But there was no decision on taking the Ram Mandir issue forward at this stage. Also, Singhal has for long been advocating that the BJP will have to keep away from any fresh build-up on Ayodhya and it has to be his outfit’s endeavour. It is wary of the BJP as during 1989-92, the party led by LK Advani hijacked the Ayodhya movement.

Togadia presence in the meeting, who has been kept on the margins by Narendra Modi in Gujarat for long, has been a cause of concern among some BJP leaders. They are wary of his statements and actions, which have often caused great deal of embarrassment to the party. For now, the BJP leaders are downplaying his presence at the Sangh Parivar brass meeting. The plea is simple: since he is an important functionary of the VHP, it should not be a surprise that he was there.

“It was not a meeting directed at the BJP. The possibility of Togadia playing a strategic role is zero now. The purpose of the meeting was general in nature. This takes place once a year and not much should be read into it,” a source said.

Given the current political scenario within and outside the BJP, the chances of Togadia’s revival are slim, he added. The party’s de-facto leader and possible prime ministerial candidate for 2014 parliamentary elections, Narendra Modi is completely opposed to him. He had practically thrown Togadia out of Gujarat during 2008 assembly elections and subsequently worked to ensure that VHP was reduced to a fringe player in the state.

In the December 2012 elections again, Togadia was kept at arm’s length. There were, in fact, reports of Togadia extending covert support to the breakaway Keshubhai Patel Gujarat Parivartan Party. Most active VHP workers supported GPP than BJP in the state. But that in turn expanded Modi’s support base in other social groups. By distancing Togadia, Modi has manged to neutralise the Muslim community’s anger against him to some extent.

Rajnath Singh’s return to the BJP president’s post after a gap of three years will see new intra-party and intra-Parivar equations emerging. He is one of those leaders who prefer to listen more than offering his opinions. In the RSS-BJP-VHP meet he mostly heard other speak than chipping in with comments. Since the meeting took place in Delhi at a supposedly neutral place, BJP MP from North Goa, Shripad Naik’s residence, it attracted great deal of media curiosity. Also, this was first meeting of the Sangh Parivar since Rajnath took over charge.