In the days to come, the BJP’s National Secretary and former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri’s grandson Siddhartha Nath Singh will be seen playing an important role – that of Jan Sangh’s Founder Shyama Prasad Mookerjee — in a Bangla movie titled Danga. What is even more important to note is that Siddharth Nath Singh’s name was recommended by Kolkata-located Shyama Prasad Smarak Samiti. The members of the samiti feel that Nath’s looks and features resemble Shyama Prasad a lot. It would be interesting to see if Nath gets a green signal from his own party to play the role.

Remember that grand Modi show at Wembley, London, this time? Somewhere along the line, Manoj Ladwa emerged as a crucial organizer for this event, who also played a big role in giving a form to Modi’s election campaign in 2014. Sources say the same Gujarati industrialist who is considered to be a close confidante of Modi’s also had a part to play in the success of the “Wembley show”. One of his companies is also located in Dubai, and sources claim that the big cash for the show came from this same office in Dubai. Sources say that Ladwa also went to Dubai to settle the accounts after the grand show got over. It is worth mentioning here that Ladwa has been associated with Modi since 2003, and had a crucial role in organizing the Vibrant Gujarat event. Ladwa’s Sangh connection is also an old one, and he is a member of the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh’s (HSS) Britain chapter. It is also said that he has the ability to extract huge sums of money from the NRI community in the name of charity. Ladwa raised a lot of money through HSS for the Gujarat earthquake of 2001, and the Odisha cyclone of 1999. The entire amount was sent to India through an arm of the Sangh, Seva Bharti. A big portion of Ladwa’s income is from his PR and lobbying company, Saffron Chase; Ladwa founded this company along with his friend Vikas Pota. It is worth noting that Pota is also a member of the HSS in London. Sources also reveal that Ladwa and Pota’s Saffron Chase is also a counterpart of APCO in London. APCO is the same American company that gave an edge to Modi’s election campaign, right from Vibrant Gujarat days. Sources also say that in 2001, the Indian embassy had also taken the services of Ladwa’s company to woo Labour Party and Tony Blair, and the results were positive.

Along with his friend from Chicago Dr Bharat Birai, Manoj Ladwa has been spreading the ideology of the Sangh Parivar in the US and European nations. He has also been collecting claimed and unclaimed amounts of money for the Sangh. But the question is: why is the organization upset with Ladwa despite all this? The issue is, Ladwa has personal relations with those in the Labour Party in the UK and it is said that this time when Modi went to London, David Cameron of the Conservative Party left no stone unturned in rolling out the red carpet for Modi. Sources say that during such warm welcomes, the British prime minister let it slip to Modi that he was unhappy with the fact that Ladwa was campaigning for the mayor’s elections on behalf of the Labour Party. What the Sangh leadership doesn’t like is – why is Ladwa campaigning for a Pakistani British citizen Sadiq Khan, who is the Labour Party’s candidate for the mayor’s post? Ladwa will have to face such unpleasant questions and more in the days to come. And this might somehow affect Modi as well.

The Sangh also has its brows furrowed at one of India’s top industrialists, Gautam Adani. Sources say that the top leaders of the Sangh have made it clear to the prime minister that it is not going to help him and the party to be seen publicly with Adani, since the Opposition is going to unnecessarily turn it into an issue. Sources say that 15 years ago when the then Prime Minister Atal Bihar Vajpeyi went to New York and stayed at the New York Palace Hotel, where Modi now stays, two of Vajpeyi’s old friends Ghatate ji and B K Modi came there to meet him. They too advised him on similar lines, saying he should not give too much importance to Sant Singh Chatwal, because there were serious allegations of embezzlement against him were being made by banks. Vajpeyi seemed to have agreed to this point when his son-in-law Ranjan Bhattacharya (from an adopted daughter), who was sitting outside his bedroom, was roped in by Chatwal and Co, and matters allegedly started turning in their favour during Vajpeyi government’s rule. The moot question here is: has Modi’s friend Gautam Adani taken the same place as Ranjan Bhattacharya? It is said that heeding the Sangh’s advice, Modi has now started to maintain a clear distance from Adani. This fact is substantiated by Modi’s recent London trip, when Gautam Adani cancelled his stay in a London hotel in a hurry. It is said that Adani’s room was booked in the same hotel in James Court where Modi was supposed to stay. Gautam Adani was nowhere to be seen during Modi’s Turkey trip either.

Sangh’s prominent leader Duttatreya Hasbale has become active to save Amit Shah’s presidential post. It is to be noted that Hasbale is considered to be extremely close to Narendra Modi. Aiding him in his assignment in every way possible are Ananth Kumar and Ram Madhav. At the same time, Sangh’s two top leaders Mohan Bhagwat and Bhaijaji Joshi are said to be of the opinion that it is only after Shah’s farewell that a new surge of energy will course through the paralysed limbs of the BJP. Bhagwat and Bhaiyaji are said to be of the same old opinion that the country’s prime minister and the BJP’s top man should not be from the same state of Gujarat. For a long time now, Shah has been trying to get into the good books of the Sangh, and in this he has been aided the most by Sangh-beloved Nitin Gadkari. A few days ago when Bhaiyaji’s brother died in Madhya Pradesh, Shah made it a point to travel there especially to pay his condolences. Apart from this, for his son Jai Shah’s wedding, Shah sent invites to all top leaders of the Sangh. Hasbale was seen especially engaged during the wedding ceremonies as well.

A thought that has recently gathered momentum among Team Modi is: how about giving the command of Gujarat to Amit Shah from coming December, and make the present state chief minister Anandi Ben Patel the governor of a state. This will not only take care of the harm done by Hardik Patel, the state will get the same edge it had during Modi’s rule. In any case, Shah is known for his skills when it comes to damage control. Sources say that the municipal elections in Gujarat, which are due on December 2, will be decisive. It is believed that the BJP is playing on a weak wicket this time, while the Congress is full of confidence. Thus, if Anandi Ben Patel is unable to unfurl the BJP flag in these municipal elections, she might be in danger of losing her post.

Nitish Kumar is caught in the maths of getting Prashant Kishore a Rajya Sabha seat. It is to be noted that in the coming year, five Rajya Sabha seats will become vacant from the JD (U) quota; Sharad Yadav, Ramchandra Prasad Singh, K C Tyagi, Ghulam Rasool Baliyavi and Pavan Verma are due to retire. Nitish has already promised to Arun Shourie and Prashant Kishore that he will bring them both to the Rajya Sabha. At the same time, he is finding it tough to ignore Sharad Yadav and Ramchandra Prasad Singh (R P Singh) either. It is worth mentioning here that it is the same R P Singh who was once a principal secretary under Nitish Kumar, hails from Nalanda, belongs to the same community as Nitish, and left his job in the IAS to join him. But if the math is to be believed, Nitish doesn’t even have it in him to get two people into the Parliament from his party quota. That is because you need 40 Assembly members to vote for a Rajya Sabha candidate; in the current Assembly Nitish has only 71 Assembly members. Which means he will need Congress’ assistance to get the numbers right. On the other hand, the Congress is already asking for a seat from Nitish; the Congress has 27 Assembly members and it is short by 13. If they get the support of at least 11 JD (U) members, it will be easy for them to get another two. The Congress wants to send either C P Joshi or Dr Shakeel Ahmad from the Bihar seat. For Nitish, it is clearly a matter of tough decisions.

In the past 16-17 months, the Modi-mad BJP has given rise to endless questions within the party regarding its future. In the current circumstances when Modi and Shah can’t look beyond themselves, several veteran party leaders are considering forming a new party or platform together as a form of protest. The recent big loss in Bihar has further given the ambitions of these dissidents a shot in the arm. Party leaders such as Lal Krishna Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Yashvant Sinha, Shanta Kumar, Arun Shourie, Shatrughn Sinha and Ram Jethmalani are worried that in the recent years, ever since the Modi sun has risen on the BJP’s horizon, the party has strayed from Atal ji’s ideals. So on the occasion of Atal ji’s birthday on December 25, these leaders may collectively announce the formation of Bhartiya Janata Party (Vajpeyi). If there are hurdles in the formation of a new party, these veteran party leaders might give it the shape of a new platform. A reliable source with Advani claims that this effort by the party veteran leaders also has the inside support of the Sangh Parivar, which is seeing the move as a pressure tactic for Modi. The Modi camp has also started its exercise to pacify these senior party leaders. Sources reveal that Modi has handed over this responsibility to his reliable trio – Jaitley, Gadkari, and Venkaiah Naidu. Ananth Kumar has started making efforts on his own. But pacifying the irate veteran leaders will not be that easy this time.

More than with Modi, the BJP’s senior-member brigade is far more upset with party president’s Amit Shah’s corporate way of functioning. So, their first condition is that Amit Shah will have to go. At the same time, Narendra Modi has made Shah a matter of personal prestige. Modi camp’s argument is that Shah has not completed his tenure until now, and he is still completing former party president Rajnath Singh’s tenure. But the fresh defeat in Bihar has raised questions about Shah’s political future. Now even the Sangh seems to be giving credit to the argument that the wave of dissatisfaction within the party will ebb only if Shah leaves. Otherwise, this tsunami of dissatisfaction will only grow with the argument of staying true to the democratic system. It is worth mentioning here that Shah’s current presidential term ends in December. It might just be possible that the world’s biggest political party might get a new president in January, 2016.

The question is that if the order for Shah to leave is carried out, who will be the BJP’s next president? Until now, the agreed-upon tradition has been that it is the Sangh that chooses the party’s president. Sangh’s close aide Nitin Gadkari has a big role to play in making Amit Shah the party president. If sources are to be believed, only two names are playing in the mind of Sangh at present – Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari. Sources say that right after the Bihar Assembly elections when Rajnath Singh met with Sangh’s chief Mohan Bhagwat, he registered his complain about Shah; Rajnath said that most of the party leaders are not finding it easy to work with Shah. But if Shah does have to leave, it is tough to believe that Modi camp will agree to Rajnath becoming the party president. In such circumstances, Nitin Gadkari has emerged as a name that will be agreed upon by all. But sources close to Gadkari say that he is happy with his ministerial avatar. Neither does he want to leave his department, nor does he want to go back to serving the organization. Thus, if Gadkari does not agree to becoming the party president, J P Naddha’s name might be next on the list. Personally, Modi will like to see Manohar Parrikar as the next party president because he might easily turn out to be Amit Shah No. 2.