New Delhi: In the last one year, at least four Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-ruled states have seen open rebellion within the state party units against their chief ministers. In some cases, delegations of dissident MLAs have made multiple trips to the party headquarters in New Delhi to press for a change of their respective chief ministers. Here is a quick recap of the BJP-ruled states that have so far registered open inter-party dissidence leading to a call for change of the top guards. ManipurThe first such open revolt against a BJP chief minister raised its head in Manipur. The BJP MLA leading the rebel pack against chief minister N. Biren Singh is Th. Biswajit. Though the power tussle between Biswajit and N. Biren has been brewing for some time, it is only since last year that this has come out in media reports. The genesis of the tussle is the central leadership’s decision to pick N. Biren as the chief minister instead of Biswajit who was looked at as a strong contender for the post by several within the state unit. This was also because the then state president Bhabananda Singh had stated, including in an interview to The Wire then, that he was not in the race for the top post even if the party could manage to wrest power from the Congress. On the eve of the assembly elections in 2017, Biswajit had told The Wire that he was hopeful of catching the central leaders’ attention as he was a young leader and the central leadership had till then picked only young leaders for the chief minister’s post in Assam (Sarbananda Sonowal) and Arunachal Pradesh (Pema Khandu). His hopes developed wings also because another chief ministerial face in Manipur then, K. Joykishan, had suddenly abandoned ship to shift to Congress. After the elections that threw up a fractured result, Biren, an import from the Congress and who knew the workings of the Okram Ibobi Singh government by dint of closeness to him, became the dark horse.Manipur chief minister N. Biren Singh. Photo: TwitterOver time, Biswajit has been joined by a couple of party MLAs, their dissent brewing over N. Biren’s “dictatorial” style of working. Multiple times, these rebels have hopped on flights from Imphal to New Delhi to complain about the chief minister to the central leadership and demand a change, only to be heard and sent back. That Biswajit was included in the N. Biren cabinet did not help. Biren, some months ago, took away his portfolio. The recent serious attempt by the Congress and the National People’s Party (NPP) to topple the Biren government is said to have had the backing of the BJP rebel groups, prompting the party leadership to fly them to New Delhi in a measure to pacify them. N. Biren too landed in Delhi. This June, while three BJP MLAs went over to the BJP, six others spoke against N. Biren to mediapersons. Biswajit is said to have the support of the RSS.For now, as per a truce engineered by the central leadership, Biswajit continues to be in the Biren government. However, sources in the state unit have told The Wire, “They barely talk. It is an open fight.” One senior state party functionary stated, “So far, Biren was being protected by BJP national general secretary in charge of Northeast, Ram Madhav, who also placed in the CM’s office his person from his NGO India Foundation to oversee things. But with Ram Madhav is no more in that position, things will mot remain the same for the CM. However, it is highly unlikely that the new leadership will change the chief minister; it would rather underplay the rebellion for the time being. It would reflect badly on our party.”The leader added, “Also, shifting to Congress in Manipur is not an option for the rebels at the moment, specially after how our party’s central leadership succeeded in controlling the recent serious attempt by Congress and some others to break the Biren government. What I understand is, the BJP Delhi leadership is aware of this difficulty on the part of the rebels and is willing to take the risk of dissidence for some more time.”Also read: Why Is the Manipur Chief Minister Angry With a State Super Cop?Meanwhile, Biren has tried to consolidate his position by bringing in former Congress MLAs to the BJP side and including some of them in his cabinet too. UttarakhandYet another state that has seen rebellion brewing against a BJP chief minister for some time is Uttarakhand. As per news reports, Bishan Singh Chuphal, the BJP legislator from Didihat constituency in Pithoragarh district, visited Delhi for an audience with central party president J.P. Nadda in early September to share his “concerns” regarding corruption in the state under the leadership of Trivendra Singh Rawat. He claimed that no development work has taken place in his area in the last three years since Rawat has taken over the reins. Bishan Singh Chuphal. Photo: Twitter/@bishan_chuphalChuphal is a prominent BJP leader from the state, a five-time MLA besides being the state unit president from 2009 to 2013. In the run-up to the 2017 polls, there was speculation within the state unit about several leaders including Chuphal for the top post. However, the central leadership picked Rawat, an RSS choice. Though Chuphal wanted to be a minister, he was kept out of the Rawat ministry formed in 2017. Till date, two of the 12 cabinet berths in Rawat ministry are yet to be filled. With the death of a minister, yet another cabinet berth lies vacant. In early September, after an audience with Nadda in Delhi, Chuphal told PTI, “Being a minister is nothing for me anymore. I have been the Pradesh BJP president, a five-time MLA, a minister in the past and have been working for the party for years. Becoming a minister would have meant something in 2017 when the party came to power, not anymore.” The speculation within the party is that he sought a change of chief minister in the state. However, the state unit played down Chuphal’s meeting with Nadda as “normal for any party worker to go to the leadership with their problems”. Rawat, who was handpicked by the then BJP president Amit Shah at the behest of the RSS, reportedly called him up to know what was brewing post Chuphal’s meeting with Nadda. He spoke to as many as 18 MLAs to ensure things do not go out of hand. On October 21, the chief minister landed up in Delhi to meet central leaders. According to a BJP leader in Delhi, “He is here to finalise names for ministers for the forthcoming cabinet expansion. Chuphal is in the list.” Rawat, during his meeting with Nadda and others, would also zero in on a name for the Rajya Sabha seat from the state. “Among others, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval’s son Shaurya is also a contender,” the party leader said.Uttarakhand CM Trivendra Singh Rawat, Speaker Prem Chand Agarwal and BJP state president Banshidhar Bhagat at Gairsain in Chamoli district, March 5, 2020. Photo: PTIAside from a disgruntled Chuphal, yet another party MLA, Umesh Sharma, has also complaint about “delays in development work” under Rawat in an email to Nadda last month. BJP MLA Puran Singh Fartyal has also reportedly written to Nadda alleging corruption “in road construction between Tanakpur and Jauljibi”.The party is hoping to silence a few with cabinet berths.TripuraThe case of Tripura is similar to Manipur. The BJP went about fighting the 2018 assembly elections against the long rule of the Left Front without a chief ministerial face to take on Manik Sarkar. It was a clever move. It helped the party attract a set of senior leaders from the Congress, and also keeping the hope brewing within the BJP top ranks in the north-eastern state. With 36 of the 60 seats in pocket, the party won those elections with a comfortable majority – the only state till then in the region to have recorded such success for BJP. The then central leader in charge of the region, Ram Madhav, picked a political greenhorn, Biplab Kumar Deb, instead of a frontrunner, Sudip Roy Barman, who shifted to the party from the Congress, a former minister and a seasoned hand. Several within the party ranks in the state that this correspondent spoke to then looked at Deb’s selection with surprise and deduced that “the central leadership wants someone at the top post who can do Delhi’s bidding”. BJP national general secretary Ram Madhav and Tripura BJP chief Biplab Kumar Deb, who served as an RSS volunteer in Delhi for 15 years before returning to the state in 2015. Credit: PTIWhile Ram Madhav had his back, Deb even took on the man who did all the hard work to help BJP wrest that state from the Left – Sunil Deodhar. Deb and Barman, who became his health minister, began to lock horns often. Last year, the chief minister sacked Barman from his post, accusing him of indulging in anti-party activities. In August this year, an FIR was filed against Barman for allegedly violating COVID-19 related guidelines of the state.In the last two and a half years, thanks to Deb’s glib pronouncements, aside from the fact that he has not able to take senior party leaders into confidence, he has also made an enemy of the local media lately. As many as 25 of the 36 party MLAs now want “a proper reshuffling in the council of ministers so that good governance can be delivered to people” of the state. Led by Barman, they flew down to Delhi in the second week of October to meet Nadda and party’s organisation general secretary B.L. Santosh and also Amit Shah. According to some within the state unit, the BJP rebels are “close to Deodhar, the party’s national secretary”. Most of these rebels were brought to BJP either from the Congress or Trinamool Congress keeping their ‘winnability’ in mind in the 2018 polls.On October 14, four of the 11 BJP MLAs camping in Delhi met Nadda. Though initially, they spoke to media about raising the demand with central leaders about removing Deb from the chief minister’s position as he “is acting like a dictator” and not delivering on the promises made in the vision document for the 2018 elections, they played it down after that meeting. There is now a studied silence there. Karnataka Karnataka is another BJP-ruled state where an inter-party rebellion is out in the open. So much so that state party MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal early this week claimed that B.S. Yediyurappa will not be the chief minister for long. The senior party leader, speaking at an event, said, “Even those in the high command are fed up [of] him. He is neglecting North Karnataka completely. Senior leaders in the BJP are tired of Yediyurappa.” Basanagouda Patil Yatnal. Photo: Twitter/@BRPATIlYATNALYatnal, who is from North Karnataka, said the next CM would be from the North as it had elected 100 BJP MLAs while only 15 came to the state assembly from the South. Yediyurappa is from Shivamogga, in South Karnataka. Yatnal told media that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had also assured him of the change.Though the party’s national general secretary C.T. Ravi later called those statements “outlandish”, it nevertheless pointed at the dissidence brewing within the state unit for some time. In September, due to the growing dissidence within the party, there was a speculation in the media about a change of chief minister in that state. Yediyurappa met not only Nadda and Union ministers in Delhi, but had an audience with Modi too last month. However, a party state unit statement then denied any change of guard in the state. A contender for the chief minister’s post from North Karnataka is the eight-time MLA Umesh Katti. He recently told mediapersons he does not want to be a minister in the Yediyurappa government but the chief minister, as the representative of North Karnataka. One other contender for the top post is the deputy chief minister Laxman Savadi. In July this year, his supporters ran a social media campaign projecting him as the chief ministerial face for the 2023 polls. According to party insiders, he had to rush to Delhi soon after that as it angered the central leadership. “Yediyurappa wanted to remove him from the cabinet,” said a party source in Delhi.Like in Uttarakhand, a cabinet expansion is due in Karnataka too. Of the 28 cabinet berths, six are so far vacant. Expansion is likely after the two assembly seat bypolls are completed. Common factorsThe commonalities that run through all the four cases are chiefly the following: 1) Heavy handedness of the BJP’s central leadership in selection of a chief minister. Pushing aside the standard practice of picking the state party president as a chief minister, or taking the majority of the MLAs into confidence in choosing their leader, the BJP leadership, since 2014, has been going at springing surprises on state units when it comes to selection of a chief minister. This seems to have backfired in some states.2) Inability of chief ministers picked by the central leadership to placate rebel groups, thus firming the divide. 3) Tussle between existing members of the BJP and those brought in from other parties keeping their ‘winnability’ in mind – mainly from the Congress – has led to the formation of factions within the state units, the ‘old’ versus ‘new’ entries. 4) Some state unit leaders facing dissidence – either led by the second in command, or egged on by those faces seen to have been contenders for the chief minister’s post – also claim that “unlike before, the central leadership only deliberately leaves open two fronts at the state level for better control from New Delhi”. Though instances of inter-party dissidence is not new, or party specific in a state government, that they are coming out in the open increasingly from the BJP-ruled states highlights that the formal change of leadership – from Amit Shah to Nadda and the latter forming his own team recently – has generated a certain ounce of confidence and expectation within the party’s rank and file including in the rebel groups, of a possible change of status quo.