Eclipsed by the parent
Apropos of the column “Modi: Course correction needed” (December 10), every management operates through both line and staff functions. So it was with the BJP, that came into being as a fledgling line unit after the Parivar decided to set up political shop. It took four decades for the party to be a going concern. But it remains attached by the umbilical cord to the Sangh and, as a result, the staff function continues to often prevail over the line responsibilities. Ministers, while striving at line targets in Delhi, need also to act on staff advisory from Nagpur. Their performance is assessed at both of these directive nodes. The PM is no exception. That is the way the organisation is structured and has remained so, in or out of power. Hardly months into a position of an enviable degree of political ascendancy, the Parivar can not afford to relax its control over the staff function. Not that it doesn’t care for a possible dent in the BJP’s functioning and governance, but zealously guarding the ideological tenets of its founders has been its raison d’etre. It was no different in UPA-II, where the Congress high-command eclipsed its own PM, pandered to the likes of the NAC and took away Manmohan Singh’s power of speech. The Sangh, on the contrary, seems to have sanctioned the PM little else besides speech! Despite this, Singh did manage to animate reforms that are now being followed up on by the BJP. But when under a crunch, the Congress abandoned its second-term PM . The parivar too will not hesitate to find a scapegoat should poll promises wither away in the bud.
R Narayanan
Ghaziabad
Putin’s prowess
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has perfected harnessing his nation’s might to push his brutish agenda in Western Europe. The West’s sanctions on Russia might pinch but Europe has become the collateral damage with China, the challenger to Western powers, willingly engaging with Russia. There is just so much both Russia and Europe can take. But Europe better watch out. Putin will wrestle it to the ground.
Sumona Pal, Kolkata