A few days ago, to share his complains about the BJP high command, Central Minister for State Upendra Kushwaha met with Central Minister and chief of Lok Janshakti Party Ram Vilas Paswan. Both leaders discussed Bihar elections for a long time. According to Paswan, Yadavs in Bihar were not 14 per cent, but 16 per cent, who seem to be completely supporting Lalu at present. Paswan’s real worry was about the 30 per cent voters from non-backward castes. He believed that the turnout of voters from these communities was extremely low, because most of them have left Bihar to settle down in metro cities such as Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and even abroad; hardly any of them come back to Bihar to cast their vote. Where votes from Manjhi community are concerned, 50 per cent people from the community works in brick kilns in different parts of the state, and can’t take off for a day to come home and vote. That is why their polling average was low. For now, Paswan and Kushwaha’s worry was to take NDA’s core voters to polling centres.

Trapped in the quandary of seat sharing, Ram Vilas Paswan went to meet Narendra Modi a few days ago. He mentioned in detail the problems of religion in the coalition, and asked the prime minister to intervene in this matter. Modi listened to Paswan patiently, and then said in clear words, “Paswan ji, please talk to Amit Shah about all matters concerning the elections; the buck stops with him when it comes to matters relating to the party and elections.” After coming out, Paswan expressed his emotions to a close aide thus: “This is not Vajpeyee ji’s BJP, where decisions would be taken collectively; now there is only one owner and one server.”

The BJP is taking it seriously that 22-year-old Hardik Patel has said the lotus will not bloom in Gujarat in the 2017 elections. Considered to be Ram’s descendants, the Patidar-Patels have a direct impact on 75-80 Assembly seats in Gujarat and play the decisive role in any candidate’s loss or win. In Gujarat, the Patel voters alone make for 20 per cent of the votes. In the 1980s, when then Gujarat Chief Minister Madhav Singh Solanki went to town asking for reservations for KHAM (Khastriya, Harijan, Adivasis and Muslims), these same Patidar-Patels had taken to the streets against the proposal. Then they were led by Keshubhai Patel, who used the Hindutva angle to oppose the reservation, and ensured the Congress was wiped out clean. Since then, the saffron flag is reining in the state. Modi’s “ekla chalo” (walk alone) politics has seized the Patel community’s representative from them. Where Anandiben Patel is concerned, she has never been involved with the grassroots. What the BJP urgently needs in Gujarat is a Patel leader, who will help it swim across the choppy 2017 election waters.

It is also relevant to ask why the Patidar-Patel community, which was once against reservation, felt a need to fight for reservation now. In a way, this entire Patel uprising can be considered a byproduct of Modi’s “Ekla chalo” (walk alone) form of politics. After one-and-a-half years of Modi relinquishing Gujarat’s top post, the real picture of Gujarat’s development model is in danger of being revealed. Economists feel this entire development model has no employment opportunities; what’s more, there is no discussion on what happened to the state’s agriculture growth either. These Patidar Patels were hugely reliant on agriculture, but there is a drastic shortage of cultivable land in the state – what with more and more land being given to industrial houses for manufacturing facilities and factories. The rate of unemployment has consequently increased in the community, and they have started migrating to towns and cities in search of work. But since the community does not have a very good education rate, they aren’t getting jobs either. Under Hardik Patel’s leadership then, the community members are asking for reservations.

No matter what the reason is, but whenever there is a BJP-led government in the Centre, the winds of divestment start to blow. The Central government needs to rake up more than Rs 69,000 crore for the government coffers. For this, it is going to come up with divestment proposals of several of its navratna public sector units such as ONGC, Coal India, and SAIL.

The BJP may be spending money like water for the Bihar elections, but party supremo Amit Shah has halved the bills of several public opinion survey companies. Such a company, on whom Amit Shah and Modi had the most faith, had raised a bill of Rs five lakh for Bihar Assembly elections, but the payment made was a mere two-and-a-half lakh. At the same time, Arun Jaitley, who is considered to be an expert on Bihar matters, got an agency conduct a survey for the party, but the agency is being paid even less than that.

For the past few years, the babus in Akhilesh’s government have started to make countless foreign trips on state’s money. Even now, they are constantly planning trips to London and the US. And because these officers are favoured by Akhilesh and Mulayam, the UP government has special feelings for them, too. Sources say investigative agencies are scouring through their travel files to see if their trips are somehow associated with the Hawala network. Seems like it isn’t just about Yadav Singh in the UP government, such issues are as common as day within the party.

After hogging the headlines with his comments on rape, Netaji, that is Mulayam, appears to be miffed with his son Akhilesh. It’s a case of the pot calling the kettle black. Netaji has a lot of complains with his son’s advisory committee. Netaji has been constantly asking why anyone who tries to get close to his son is corrupt to the gills. The newest matter is about Javed Abdi, who became known through get-togethers, where he would tell Akhilesh the latest jokes, and later laughed himself to a minister’s post. He resigned after matters of corruption came to light against him, however. At present, Akhilesh’s primary advisor has come in the form of IIM’s Dikshit, and Abhishek Mishra, who has become an Assembly member for the first time; the latter’s impeccable English has also found a fan in the young chief minister.

Having made several governments in the past cry, onion has become a touchy topic for the Modi government, too. Tweets by Modi and Smriti Irani are going viral – the same ones that they had sent during the UPA’s rule at the Centre. In December 2014, Smriti has tweeted, “Income tax department is keeping a watch on all high value transactions, don’t buy onion.” As a chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi had tweeted in October 2013, “Onions are produced mostly in Congress ruled states, then why is the price rising? Don’t they answer?” Just to let it be known, the BJP is ruling in 13 states, and the price of onions is set to touch Rs 100.

Talking of CBI investigation, the next in line could be Gayatri Prajapati, who is a Cabinet minister in Akhilesh Yadav’s government. Remember, this is the same Gayatri Prajapati who calls himself Mulayam Singh Yadav’s third son. The high court is going to give its decision about this soon; it is also being said that the governor and the chief judge of the high court are of the same opinion about the Lokayukta. It is also worth mentioning that be it the matter of appointing the Lokayukta or MLC elections, the governor and CJ’s dissonance with Akhilesh government is no secret. Sources say that the papers the CBI has in regards Prajapati, the scam immensity may pass Rs 1,000 crore.