VZCZCXRO1909
RR RUEHAST RUEHBI RUEHCI RUEHDBU RUEHLH RUEHNEH RUEHPW
DE RUEHNE #2545/01 3551440
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 211440Z DEC 09
FM AMEMBASSY NEW DELHI
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 8992
INFO RUCNCLS/ALL SOUTH AND CENTRAL ASIA COLLECTIVE
RUEHBJ/AMEMBASSY BEIJING 8162
RUEHRL/AMEMBASSY BERLIN 1504
RUEHLO/AMEMBASSY LONDON 7129
RUEHMO/AMEMBASSY MOSCOW 3851
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RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHDC
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC
RHHMUNA/HQ USPACOM HONOLULU HI
RHMCSUU/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL
RUEIDN/DNI WASHINGTON DC
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHDC

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 NEW DELHI 002545 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR SCA/INS, DRL, DS/IP/SCA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PTER PREL PINR KDEM IN
SUBJECT:  ADVANI MOVES UPSTAIRS, HANDS OVER REINS TO THE NEXT 
GENERATION 
 
REF: A) New Delhi 1813  B) New Delhi 1747  C) New Delhi 1329 
D) New Delhi 1278 
 
¶1.  (SBU) SUMMARY:  India's principal opposition party, the 
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), implemented a generational change at 
the top when its leading stalwart, former Deputy Prime Minister L.K. 
Advani, stepped down from his position of Leader of the Opposition 
in the Lok Sabha, India's lower house of Parliament.  Along with 
this change, the BJP brought in a new president for the party - 
Nitin Gadkari - the youngest BJP president ever.  These changes 
culminate a long and acrimonious struggle within the party after it 
suffered its second consecutive defeat in parliamentary elections in 
May 2009.  The changes in the leadership of the party are aimed at 
giving a younger look to the party - a badly felt need in the face 
of the Congress Party's success at cultivating the gen-next brand in 
an India dominated by younger voters.  The changes within the BJP 
also indicate the increasing hold of the RSS - Rashtriya Swayamsevak 
Sangh, a Hindu nationalist "social" organization that is the 
ideological fount of the BJP.  The party could again revert to a 
core Hindutva (Hindu nationalism) agenda and might take a more 
strident rightist tone in its politics and policies.  While designed 
to address the perceived failures of the last team, the moves at the 
top do not by themselves tackle the deeper problems of ideological 
coherence and personal infighting facing the party.  END SUMMARY. 
 
Advani Hands Over to Swaraj ... 
------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  (U) On December 19, India's Leader of the Opposition in the Lok 
Sabha (lower house) and former Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani of 
the BJP stepped down from his position and handed over the reins to 
Sushma Swaraj.  The 82-year-old Advani was elevated to the position 
of Chairman of the BJP's parliamentary party - a position specially 
created for him.  Fifty-seven-year-old Deputy Leader of the 
Opposition Sushma Swaraj, who was named to succeed Advani as the 
Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, became the first woman to 
occupy a top party leadership position. 
 
... and Rajnath Singh to Gadkari 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶3.  (U) On December 20, the BJP formally announced the name of its 
new party president: Nitin Gadkari, who at 52 becomes the youngest 
ever president of the party.  Following the party's electoral 
debacle in parliamentary election in May 2009, outgoing party 
president Rajnath Singh had announced he would not seek the post 
again after his three-year-term ran out in December. 
 
Quest For a Younger Image 
------------------------- 
 
¶4.  (SBU) These two changes at the top of the BJP were aimed at 
giving the party a much-needed younger look.  Advani, who joined the 
RSS in 1942, was seen as a symbol of a party with an outdated agenda 
that was not relevant to the new India.  Advani's prime ministerial 
aspirations were thwarted twice when the party lost successive Lok 
Sabha elections in 2004 and 2009.  This defeat brought out sharp 
differences within the party culminating in mudslinging and public 
denouncements by its own members and senior leaders (reftels). 
Faced with this internal turbulence, the party's ideological fount, 
the RSS, decided to intervene and laid out a time table for the 
generational change in guard.  Despite BJP and RSS claims to the 
contrary, most political observers believe that the changes in the 
BJP have been forced by the RSS. 
 
Gadkari, an RSS Man 
------------------- 
 
¶5.  (SBU) Nitin Gadkari, who took over as the President of the BJP 
on December 20, is largely seen as the choice of the RSS.  A 
politician from Nagpur (where the RSS headquarters is located), 
Gadkari is a Maharashtra politician with little national experience. 
 
NEW DELHI 00002545  002 OF 003 
 
 
 Before taking over as the BJP president, Gadkari headed the 
Maharashtra unit of the BJP, and led it to yet another disappointing 
finish in the state assembly elections held in October 2009. 
 
¶6.  (SBU) A politician who has never won a direct election, Gadkari 
was a surprise choice as the BJP president.  The RSS clearly wanted 
a young, regional leader who could focus on party building and 
return it to its ideological moorings based on Hindu nationalism. 
In that respect Nitin Gadkari fits the bill.  The RSS also clearly 
did not want the Delhi-based non-RSS leaders whose Hindutva 
credential were suspect and who, in the RSS view, were responsible 
for the BJP's two successive electoral disasters to gain the slot. 
 
 
Gadkari, the Flyover Man 
------------------------ 
 
¶7.  (SBU) Known to be close to RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat, Gadkari 
hails from a family of RSS supporters.  His father was an RSS 
activist and Gadkari started his political career as an activist of 
the student wing of the RSS (ABVP -- Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi 
Parishad.)  Born May 27, 1957, Gadkari has been a member of the 
Maharashtra State Legislative Council (a nominated instead of 
elected body) since 1989.  He is best known for his tenure as the 
Public Works Department Minister from 1995 to 1999.  During this 
period, he oversaw massive road construction projects in the state 
and came to be known as the "fly-over" man since he had initiated 
the construction of around 10 road overpasses (called fly-overs in 
India).  Gadkari is married to Kanchan and the couple has two sons 
and a daughter. 
 
Advani as Buffer 
---------------- 
 
¶8.  (SBU)Advani's elevation to the position of chairman of the BJP's 
parliamentary party is seen as a move to create a buffer between the 
RSS and the Advani loyalists in the party.  His successor, Sushma 
Swaraj, and Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha (upper 
house), Arun Jaitley, are both Advani protgs, who may need 
protection from the RSS from time to time.  With the new party 
president Nitin Gadkari owing his job to the RSS, the new BJP 
configuration leaves outgoing party president Rajnath Singh and his 
followers out in the cold - a move that is likely to perpetuate 
factionalism within the party. 
 
Swaraj: A Fiery Moderate 
------------------------ 
 
¶9.  (U) Known to relish combat in parliamentary debate, Sushma 
Swaraj served as a Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Health 
and Family Welfare and Parliamentary Affairs in successive Vajpayee 
governments in 1996, 1998-99 and 1999-2004.  She also served briefly 
as the Chief Minister of Delhi in 1998.  She was first elected to 
the Lok Sabha in 1996 following a full term in the Rajya Sabha 
(1990-96).  In 1999, she lost against the Congress Party's Sonia 
Gandhi from the Bellary constituency in Karnataka, but secured 44.7 
percent of popular vote. 
 
¶10.  (U) A lawyer by profession, and a political activist since her 
student days, Swaraj joined the BJP in 1984.  Born on February 14, 
1952, to Brahmin parents at Ambala in Haryana, Swaraj is a graduate 
of S.D. College, Ambala, and holds a law degree from Punjab 
University.  As a lawyer, she defended former Defense Minister 
George Fernandes in the Baroda Dynamite case during the Emergency 
(1975-77).  Her husband Swaraj Kaushal was the governor of Mizoram 
from 1990 to 1993, and played a significant role in negotiations for 
the Mizoram peace accord.  Sushma Swaraj is married and has one 
daughter.  She speaks English, Hindi and Punjabi. 
 
Comment: Formidable Challenges for New President 
--------------------------------------------- --- 
 
 
NEW DELHI 00002545  003 OF 003 
 
 
¶11.  (SBU) Gadkari is little known to the BJP cadres outside of 
Maharashtra.  In the hurly-burly of Delhi's power politics his lack 
of experience at the national level could come as a big handicap. 
Gadkari's immediate challenge will be to put together his team of 
office bearers keeping in mind the various power, regional and caste 
equations.  With the results of the Jharkhand assembly elections 
coming out on December 23, Gadkari may also be called upon to try 
and work out a coalition government in that state.  These challenges 
will be a first test of the new BJP leader's mettle. 
 
¶12.  (SBU) These are only the more immediate problems facing 
Gadkari.  Behind these, he faces a party in disarray with six months 
of public and private finger pointing about the May 2009 election 
debacle and squabbling over party positions.  In his first 
interaction with the media after taking over, Gadkari indicated that 
he would like to get back into the party fold those leaders who had 
been expelled from the party for various reasons.  He will also need 
to put in place a process which seriously examines the reasons for 
the BJP's poor 2009 election performance and how to address the 
party's weaknesses.  His greatest strength in these task, however, 
will be the unstinting support of the RSS.  It could also mean more 
direct control by the RSS over the party - something that the BJP 
had tried to reduce during the Advani era.  Indeed, Gadkar stressed 
that "cultural nationalism" (a euphemism used by the RSS to describe 
Hindutva) would be the inspiration for the party. 
 
Comment:  Advani Not Riding Off into the Sunset Yet 
--------------------------------------------- ------ 
 
¶13.  (SBU) While many have viewed his exit from the Leader of the 
Opposition post as the end of an era, Advani himself did not see it 
that way.  He told reporters that he would never get off the 
political "chariot."  Despite his up-and-down relationship over the 
years with the RSS, Advani is still the only BJP leader who can hold 
his own against them.  He is unlikely to play an active role in 
everyday politics, but intends to remain active on the big political 
issues, at least for now.  It is too soon to write a eulogy for the 
BJP's "iron man," who picked up a party that was almost extinct, 
built it from scratch, and led it to power in Delhi.  He then 
watched in bewilderment as the party suffered two humiliating 
parliamentary election losses. 
 
ROEMER