On OBC reservations, when students took to the streets to fight against a patently retrograde measure, they hoped for support from our major opposition party. It did not come and last week a 27 per cent quota for OBCs in central government colleges was quietly passed in the Lok Sabha with no opposition from a party that believes casteism divides the Hindu vote.

The saddest consequence of the power struggle between the party’s aged leaders is that nobody seems to be paying attention to strengthening the organisation.

Those formerly “selfless” RSS cadres who boasted of being able to march miles into the wilderness of rural India living on water and channa are now more frequently seen in government offices in BJP states, demanding their share of power and pelf.

Otherwise, they stir up dissension, so that BJP chief ministers often find themselves besieged by their own people.

In the old days there would be powerful leaders in Delhi who could intervene to stop this kind of greedy behaviour. Now there is nobody. Rajnath Singh’s word counts for nothing and the two very, very senior leaders are too caught up in dreams of future power to notice that to become prime minister you have to first have a party that can win a general election. As things stand, it would be a miracle if the BJP managed to hang on to the seats it has, leave alone win enough to decide who the next prime minister will be.