The mystic mahant who stumped them all

Bengaluru: Whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi will swear in Yogi Adityanath as the 32nd chief minister of Uttar Pradesh on Sunday evening with as much enthusiasm as he would have his first choice, Mr. Siddharth Nath Singh, is open to question.

Clearly, however neither the prime minister nor party president Mr. Amit Shah, the architect of the BJP’s stupendous success in winning four out of five states, had bargained for the young Mahant throwing his hat in the ring. It would mean that a novice with no experience in governance was taking control of the BJP’s top prize, UP, and that Singh, Modi’s much speculated pick, the so-called ‘Experiment Boy’ and former prime minister Lal Bahadur Shastri’s grandson, the newly minted MLA from Allahabad, was cut unceremoniously from the short-list

The Yogi hadn’t even stood for elections in the hard fought campaign to win UP. His relationship with the BJP has been anything but smooth. The five time Gorakhpur MP has strenuously denied it, but eight members of his aggressive Hindu Yuva Vahini had filed their nominations against BJP candidates, only to withdraw it later.

So, why and when did the firebrand saffron clad graduate decide that the top job was his for the taking? The catalyst, a source close to developments said, may have been none other than Communications Minister Mr. Manoj Sinha, the front-runner for the CM’s post who was told early on Friday night, that he was no longer in the running. The source said that Mr. Sinha, had his hopes up after BJP insiders let it be known that Union Home Minister Mr. Rajnath Singh had turned down the job when he was told that he would have to take two deputy chief ministers on board.

In Varanasi on Saturday, Mr. Sinha had gone temple-hopping in what many saw as him seeking the blessings of the gods before he took on the top job on Sunday. Instead, a disappointed Mr. Sinha, it is learnt, was given the bad news by a senior party functionary that he was no longer being considered for the job. He was reportedly told that the man who was most likely to make the cut as the new UP CM would be Siddharth Nath Singh, a Kurmi, and coincidentally, also from Gorakhpur.

Mr Sinha, insiders said lost little time in alerting Yogi Adityanath of the threat in his own backyard. Yogi, who sees himself as the only leader from Gorakhpur, and has always been unwilling to share that space with any other leader, was clearly alarmed. The Yogi reportedly flew to Delhi, and met with the Prime Minister, and promised to work with the prime minister on his 2019 development agenda rather than the divisive Hindutva, love jihad and forced conversions that have been his hallmark. Empty promises or not, only time will tell…

Mascot of hindutva

• Born on June 5 1972, Adityanath was the youngest member of the 12th Lok Sabha at 26. He has been elected as an MP from Gorakhpur to the Lok Sabha in the 1998, 1999, 2004, 2009 and 2014 elections.
• Yogi Adityanath comes from a Rajput family. He completed his Bachelor’s degree in science from Uttarakhand.
• He is also the founder of the Hindu Yuva Vahini, a social, cultural and nationalist group of youth who seek to provide rightist Hindu platform.
• Adityanath is the Mahant (head priest) of the Gorakhnath Mutt, a Hindu temple in Gorakhpur, following the death of his spiritual ‘father’, Mahant Avaidyanath in September 2014.
• Adityanath has rebelled against his party on several occasions, but because of the sway he holds over the ‘Hindu’ voters, the BJP apparently could not ignore his ‘leadership qualities’.
• A strong votary of construction of the Ram temple at the disputed site in Ayodhya, Adityanath drove BJP’s Hindutva campaign in the eastern UP in the just concluded Assembly polls.
• In 2005, Adityanath allegedly led a purification drive which involved the conversion of Christians to Hinduism. In one such instance, 1,800 Christians were reportedly converted to Hinduism in the town of Etah in UP.
• Born Ajay Singh, the diminutive shaven headed politician is known for his powerful oratory, though most of his speeches hinge on divisive lines and has been in the forefront in keeping the communal politics alive in the country.
• Clad in his trademark saffron-coloured robe, Aditayanth, a Gorakhpur MP, has been seeking greater power and is expected to give a push to BJP’s Hindutva-wrapped agenda of development with the emergence of a separate powerbase for the party in eastern UP.
• He lauded US President Trump’s travel ban that aimed to halt immigrants from a handful of Muslim-majority countries from entering America, saying India needed similar action to check terrorism.

What he had said on crucial issues
On Minorities: There have been 450 riots cases in West UP in two-and-a-half years of Samajwadi Party rule because the population of a particular community is rising manifold. Why are there no riots in eastern UP? You can easily understand. In places where there are 10-20% minority population, stray communal incidents take place. Where there are 20-35% of them, serious communal riots take place and where they are more than 35%, there is no place for non-Muslims.”
On Kairana ‘Exodus’: “Yogi is not talking about today, Yogi is talking about future. Exodus is a very big issue for us…BJP will not let western Uttar Pradesh turn into another Kashmir.”
On Shah Rukh Khan: Shah Rukh Khan should remember that if people would boycott his films, he would also have to wander in the streets like a normal Muslim…