BJP, Cong brace for General Election

Advani's 'war room', Rahul's committee to weigh challenges.

The Congress and the BJP seem to have begun preparations for the next General Election in the earnest, at least in terms of their top leadership.

While Rahul Gandhi's committee to look into future challenges for the Congress is raising heat and dust, the BJP's "war room", set up by L K Advani, is ready with a group of strategists.

The tradition of the war room, the BJP's version of a "kitchen cabinet", is not new. Most recently, late BJP leader Pramod Mahajan had set up one during the 2004 General Election.

This time around, the venue of the war room is BJP General Secretary Ananth Kumar's home in Delhi, and the main members of the group are a mix of former bureaucrats like Vijai Kapoor, journalist-turned Advani advisor Sudheendra Kulkarni, and old BJP hands like Vinay Sahasrabuddhe and Balbir Punj.

The idea of the group came about after L K Advani was named the BJP's prime ministerial candidate just before the Gujarat Assembly results in November.

Late in December, Advani convened a meeting of a group of BJP leaders and Kulkarni to look into the challenges of the next elections. A typical meeting of the group discusses previous elections, voter trends and identifies certain local factors that influence outcomes.

This, however, raised a lot of questions among those not included in the group, like party president Rajnath Singh. A separate group to look into elections was set up with 19 members with most of the old group, the only noticeable exception being Sudheendra Kulkarni.

Sources in the party and the RSS also said that this assuaged some of the feelings, but Kulkarni's alleged role in the Jinnah controversy, and his rehabilitation in Advani's group has hurt the RSS.

Regardless, the setting up of this group has signaled that Advani will take his advice and is determined to have his own way as far as who is included in his inner circle.

One top RSS leader said that although the organisation was upset at this exclusion of others and inclusion of some, they feel that "Advaniji knows our feelings and if he continues this way, then he must have good reasons to do so."