There was no euphoria, just anxiety, in the deliberations, setting a distinctly sombre tone for tomorrow's plenary session of the National Council at which outgoing party president L K Advani will hand over charge to his successor, Kushabhau Thakre.

In fact, Advani's speech, his last to the party's apex body, lacked his usual punch and vigour. Where there should have been the enthusiasm of a ruling party, there was only worry as he warned of the difficulties of steering a coalition as large and as unwieldy as the one headed by the BJP.

``A test,'' he called it. ``The people have put us on probation,'' he said, attributing the BJP's failure to win a majority of its own to the fact that it had not yet won the ``full'' confidence of the people.

He admitted that it was not going to be an easy task to run the present government. ``Thefirst six weeks of being in power have been a sufficient reminder of the extremely challenging situation we are faced with. Usually, a new Government is granted a period of honeymoon. We have had no such luxury,'' he said wryly.

Clearly, the public bickerings and pressure tactics of the allied parties have taken their toll on the BJP leadership's spirits.

Given this backdrop, it was perhaps inevitable that Advani should have fallen back on ideology today. In sharp contrast to his address to the National Executive just a few weeks ago in Delhi, in which he had suggested that the party trade ideology in for pragmatism, his speech this morning repeatedly stressed on the BJP's ideological moorings.

``The primary reason for our extraordinary growth is the unique blend of ideology and idealism that sets the BJP apart from the rest of the political parties,'' he claimed. This seems to be at variance with his earlier assessment that ideology had little to do with the BJP's electoral success this time.

Thereasons for this kind of rethinking are perhaps not difficult to find. For one, the fragile coalition the BJP is running threatens to destroy the party's carefully cultivated image of ``able and stable''.

But more than this, the BJP is facing inner dissension and factionalism in some of its key states. The most acute problem areas are Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Haryana. And it is significant that the Chief Ministers of both UP and Rajasthan, Kalyan Singh and Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, did not turn up for today's National Executive Meet.

Even more telling is the fact that party general secretary Venkaiah Naidu announced this at his briefing this afternoon. Although he added that both were expected later at night, party circles felt the Chief Ministers' absence was a telling comment on the state of the party's much-touted discipline.

While the National Executive did not discuss in-house problems and confined itself to finalising the political resolution which will be adopted by the NationalCouncil on Monday, party sources said that informal discussions on a range of issues can be expected later tonight.

RSS ideologue K.C. Sudershan is believed to be in town and will obviously be consulted by both Prime Minister Vajpayee and Advani on their future course of action in managing their contradiction-ridden government.