BJP's Rajya Sabha Picks & Snubs Hint at Bid to Repair Frayed Social Engineering

While the BJP’s RS nominees reveal its concerns for caste equations, regional political balance is also the subtext.

Some of the BJP leaders have begun weighing prospects of Modi replicating his Gujarat experiments at the national level.

(Photo: Erum Gour/The Quint)

Ten Rajya Sabha nominees of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), decided by Prime Minister Narendra Modi after weeks of stock-taking drills, reveal a possibility that a major recast of the Union Cabinet is on the cards. In dropping Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri, Prime Minister Narendra Modi seems to have dropped signs he would prefer to shed cabinet members who come under relentless Opposition attacks at a time of his convenience.

Profiles of Rajya Sabha nominees without exceptions also reveal that the Prime Minister is growing worried with prospects of rupture in the BJP’s social engineering, in the works since 2014, and wants to repair the gaps by stoking the aspirations of party workers.

Signals of a Union Cabinet Rejig

Puri joins the likes of Ravneet Singh Bittu, BL Verma, and George Kurian who failed to impress the BJP for their respective renominations for the Rajya Sabha. Indeed, Bittu’s case is different as the BJP is bracing up to field him in the Punjab Assembly elections. Importantly, Modi cabinet exits are not now just pegged to Ministers approaching the unofficial 75-years age ceiling for holding offices, which is not cast in stone as exceptions are allowed for purposes of political expediency.

While Puri is staring at the 75 ceiling, Verma is 1961-born and a decade behind sighting the age red flag. Further, with the BJP seemingly sending Dinesh Sharma into political retirement as the government appointed him a Lieutenant Governor, the Prime Minister appears to be busy in micro-management of the states’ political affairs. Sharma, who was former Deputy Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, is in his early 60s.

Essentially, insiders tell The Quint that some BJP leaders have begun weighing prospects of Modi replicating his Gujarat experiments at the national level.

The core of the Gujarat model in crude terms is: Modi is the only BJP brand. He will press accelerator buttons to raise profiles of party workers who work with full devotion to him and shed those who seem assured of positions in the government with ease.

By gradually shedding older members in the government and also the party, Modi is also aligned with the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) in fast-pacing generational shift. This explains why the BJP leaders are awaiting the much-delayed cabinet rejig with intense anticipation.

Puri for months faced the Opposition sloganeering in Parliament—"Dekho dekho Kaun aya, Epstein ka dost aya" (Look who has come, it's Epstein's friend). Such slogans are not recorded in minutes of the proceedings of the two houses of Parliament but visuals of broadcasts from Sansad TV have loudly told the world that Puri faced the Opposition heat for months due to his relations with American sex-crime convict Jeffrey Epstein, which were revealed through the public disclosure of e-mails with the latter.

To see Puri likely exiting the Union Cabinet after not getting the Rajya Sabha renominations will arguably be politically naïve. It is evident that Modi is not comfortable with ministers who are mired in controversies. Thus, Puri’s likely cabinet exit will be seen along with Dharmendra Pradhan, who had resigned after a few weeks of protests by the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi.

Rupture in BJP’s Social Engineering

The Rajya Sabha choices of the BJP clearly show that the party is growing worried with the assessment that there’s a rupture in its social engineering. Consolidation of the upper castes and a major gain in Dalit and the Extremely Backward Classes) (EBCs) defined the BJP’s post-2014 social engineering, with Modi at the helm. The BJP, per internal assessment, reached the peak of its social engineering in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. There the social engineering of the BJP arrived at a plateau.

The 2024 Lok Sabha elections showed the first signs of rupture in the social engineering when a section of the upper caste supporters openly begun giving boycott calls for incumbent MPs of the BJP. As the BJP approaches the 2027 Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections, the party strategists seem deeply worried about the Brahmin vote base in the state. With over 10 percent population in UP, Brahmins for decades have been known to command oversized influence in the state politics, beyond their numerical strength. With Modi and Yogi Adityanath at helms at Centre and Lucknow, Brahmins, per a section of BJP leaders, feel politically marginalised with prominent faces from the caste sent into oblivion in the last one decade.

By fielding two Brahmin candidates from UP for the Rajya Sabha biennial elections, the BJP is sending signals to the influential caste to allow time to the party to address its grievances. In 2007, Brahmins had grabbed the political pivot by throwing weight behind Mayawati in UP. In 2012, Brahmins in a big way had backed Akhilesh Yadav. Brahmins, per a section of the BJP leaders, are also incensed with the University Grants Commission (UGC) resolution, stalled by the Supreme Court.

Radha Kant Ojha and Gopi Krishna Pandey seem beneficiaries of BJP’s bid to repair bonds with Brahmins as they now are set for Rajya Sabha stints. By propping up Harish Dwivedi from UP as BJP’s national general secretary, the party is sending signals that a new leadership from the caste will be groomed.

Dinesh Arya from Uttarakhand, and Priyanka Singh Rawat and Vidyasagar Sonkar from UP are BJP’s Dalit outreach in the Rajya Sabha biennial elections. Rawat at 41 years of age also is seen as a beneficiary of Modi and BJP’s search for political profiles for propping them up who are in their 40s.

Shruti Gangwar, daughter of Santosh Kumar Gangwar, who is Jharkhand Governor, and Prakash Pal and Dharampal Singh, an incumbent UP minister, represent the BJP’s EBC outreach for Kurmi, Lodh and Pal castes respectively. Ram Pratap Singh is a Thakur nominee for the Rajya Sabha from UP.

While the BJP’s Rajya Sabha nominees for UP and Uttarakhand show party’s concerns for caste equations, the regional political balance is also the subtext.

Arya in Uttarakhand as BJP’s Rajya Sabha nominee is seen as party’s attempt to address Kumaon region grievance that the party has a Garhwal region bias.

In West Bengal, the BJP seems just copying former state Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s politics playbook of enlisting women star power. Thus, the BJP has fielded Rukmini Mullick alias Koel Mallick, who is a fresh import from the Trinamool Congress.

(Author is a Delhi-based journalist, who has been covering the BJP for several years. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed are the author's own. The Quint does not endorse or is responsible for the same.)