Secular observers within the state of Gujarat had largely given up hope of the BJP being unseated by the next election, or anytime in the near future. But in recent weeks, the base of the looming political idol that is Narendra Modi has sunk by several inches - an indication that it may be growing too heavy to be borne by the shfting sands of local politics.

A multi-pronged attack from within the Sangh Parivar suggests - now that Vajpayee, Advani and Shekhawat are over the hill - that the second-tier leaders have fixed scythes in their chariot-wheels before the rath-race to the top.

Now they aim to cut Modi's feet out from underneath him.

I.

The first inch was taken off Modi's political stature in July - by compatriots in the Gujarat BJP. The vote for the new President of India was expected to go pretty cleanly down coalition lines, with the exception of the Shiv Sena, who made it blatantly clear they would support the UPA's Maharashtrian candidate, and a bombastic third-front comprised of muddled regional parties. The electoral college for the PoI is Members of Parliament and Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) - state-level representatives. The vote is by secret ballot, and it is one of the rare occassions when the Whip cannot issue instructions to party members on how to vote.

Five BJP MLAs in Gujarat publicly voted for Pratibha Patel, who, of course, won. It was the perfect occassion to make a vivid dissenting statement. The NDA didnt have the numbers to threaten Patil's candidacy, and it had become clear by voting day that the their own candidate, BS Shekawat, was a wind-beaten paper tiger. In addition, the dissenters were themsevles Patels, with Patel constituencies and ties to former Gujarat CM Keshubhai Patel (who was the first to be pulled under the wheels of the Modi juggernaut in 2001). At the same time, it was a shockingly brazen gesture that almost warranted the newspapers' hyperbolic chatter about "rebellion" in the party.

Their intention - apart from tickling their Patel constituencies - was, as they said, to embarass Modi and highlight the weakness of his leadership in the state. Their personal grievances are pretty banal - most are sensitive about having been sidelined and having had Modi's crew cut ahead in the queue. Predictably, there isnt a squeak of concern about his anti-Constituional governance outside of party politics. But none of Modi's opponents have forgotten the fate of Haren Pandya - Modi's foremost rival, also a Patel loyalist, victim of one of the most transparent political assasinations (1, 2) in the last decade.

Gordhan Zadaphia, the apparent leader of the dissenting group, is a good example. Zadaphia was the Home Minister - arguably the most powerful portfolio in a state cabinet - during the 2002 massacres. He is the man who authorized the police to shoot-on-sight in the city of Godhra, and is considered to be responsible for tying the hands of the police commissioner over the next two months. Not a small fish. Now, despite having been suspended by the party's national leadership, he claims to have the support of 25% of office bearers in the state, and he's talking a big defector game in the run-up to the September State Assembly elections.

II.

Modi was cut down a second inch in a statement that Rajnath Singh, the BJP President, made to Outlook Magazine. When asked about his decision to remove Modi from the Parliamentary Board, the party's highest decision-making body, Singh said, "These were routine changes. Okay, the RSS was consulted... it was 70 per cent RSS and 30 per cent my decision."

It is understood that the RSS is suspicious of Modi's iconoclasm - his confidence in his cult of personality that allows him to discard and insult the larger Sangh Parivar structure and the RSS in particular. An RSS functionary told the magazine the previous week that "Some (pracharaks) won’t work for Modi even if Guru Golwalkar or Dr Hegdewar asked them to." But to have the BJP chief admit their efforts to undermine him was a mortification. Singh later claimed the interview was distorted, but the correspondent had it on tape, after which he claimed it was mis-translated from Hindi to English.

III.

Today's news turned up the latest, and most bizarre, rupture within the Sangh: an attack from Pravin Togadia, General Sec'y of the VHP, who claimed Modi was "trying to woo Muslims" and "not pro-Hindu" enough for the VHP to be able to guarantee their support in the State Assembly elections.

The hollow tone in the threat is instantly audible - who the hell else is Togadia going to support? And his ostensible grievance - basically, that the government prohibited bearing trishuls at a rally - is equally unconvincing. Personal sentiments are somehow the issue here: "No one should consider himself the most powerful person and ruling over the hearts of the people,” Togadia said. Apart from some vague caste considerations, Togadia appears to be fighting to get back his spot as Hindutva posterboy.

Modi's cadre-support and, sadly, his public support in Gujarat should be strong enough to carry him back into power without breaking a sweat - but it would take real hubris to be complacent about the prospect of VHP, RSS and intra-party support centrifuging away from him. The grassroots support of the VHP and the RSS - which, discounting the People's Army, is after all the largest volunteer movement in the world - are usually the BJP's best instruments for canavassing, organizing and using tactical violence in the run-up to elections.

All of this may be a flash in the pan, taken for something brighter by the press and a civil society eager to see some restraints clapped on Modi's power in Gujarat. It is not particularly encouraging when the leading antagonists are equally extremist (Pandya, Zadaphia) or when most damaging criticism of Modi is that he is not pro-Hindu enough. But there is a positive lesson about the limits to authoritarian tendencies when traditional checks and balances - most notably the state judiciary, which has been swallowed up by the executive, and the opposition parties, who have progressively lost their foothold - are emasculated.

The limiting factor, rivalry within the establishment, offers some small reassurance that megalomania gets cut down, and perhaps even hoist by its own petard. For instance, the same deep political penetration of the state apparatus that allowed the 2002 massacres to occur, also made it so easy for the government to suppress questions about Haren Pandya's murder, and even to convict nine terrorists of it (under POTA, naturally). That creates a Niemoller-condition in which even members of the ruling party can't feel entirely at ease. They're not expecting to be shot in their cars, but they are expecting to be steamrolled, so they're putting up all the roadblocks they can before the Modi cavalcade gets any stronger. It has certainly slowed him in his tracks for the last fortnight, and there is a small possibility that it may ground his chariot for good.