Will BJP be the bigger loser?

Several factors make poll forecasts difficult in Maharashtra. Many rebel candidates are fighting the major parties' official nominees; the contest is regionally uneven, in which Vidarbha could play a "swing" role; and Ms Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party has emerged important while Republican Party factions traditionally supported by Dalits face disarray.

The biggest uncertainty arises from inner-party revolts. The greatest churning is inside the Congress, which split five years ago, leading to the NCP's creation.

Dozens of Congress/NCP candidates who stood second in the 1999 Assembly elections now aspire to tickets. When denied tickets, they contest against the official candidates. Bandkhors (rebels) are spoiling the party for the NCP and to an extent, the BJP too.

However, the greatest -- and newest -- loser from the "rebellion" will be the Shiv Sena. In the Sena's succession battle, Mr Bal Thackeray has sided with his son Uddhav against his nephew Raj, the more capable and better-known organiser.

The Raj Thackeray faction, probably working with former Chief Ministers Narayan Rane and Manohar Joshi, will damage the official candidates' chances.

In the past, the Sena supremo would resolve internal differences through his network of patronage. But the network's now in trouble.

Big Money too will shape the contest: About 200 candidates have declared assets worth Rs one to 100 crores! But 54 aren't even registered income-tax payers -- a terrible comment on probity. Half the candidates are no longer bound to any party through campaign-finance arrangements. They act as individual political entrepreneurs.

Another issue that'll influence the elections is statehood for Vidarbha (formerly part of the Central Provinces). The Congress is divided over the demand. The BJP is inclined to support it, but the Sena vehemently opposes it.

The BSP alone strongly advocates statehood. This could win it votes in the region where 20 percent of the population is Dalit.

In the Lok Sabha elections, the fast-expanding BSP caused a loss of nine seats to the Congress-NCP in Maharashtra. Now, it could affect 50 Assembly seats. Dalit youth are disillusioned with the warring RPI factions organised around individuals, which ally with other parties as subordinate forces. Many are attracted to Ms Mayawati's independent Dalit party strategy, which tilts the balance of power.

The Congress-NCP is working up a high-energy campaign. Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee and Mr Bal Thackeray have been too ill to campaign properly for the BJP-Sena. Mr Advani is no substitute. Nor are BJP state leaders Pramod Mahajan and Gopinath Munde.

By contrast, Ms Sonia Gandhi is attracting large crowds. Along with Mr Sharad Pawar, her campaign will make a difference. But will that overcome the DF's anti-incumbency burden? The Front has failed to provide decent governance and has changed Chief Ministers midstream.

The Congress-NCP could, in a worst-case scenario, lose Maharashtra -- although the Sena-BJP won't get a thumping majority. (It might have to ally with the unreliable BSP.) A Maharashtra defeat will represent a setback for the Congress and the UPA in general. But it's unlikely to be grave.

Soon after Maharashtra, Assembly elections are due in Bihar, Jharkhand and Haryana, which the BJP and its allies are likely to lose. This will more decisively influence the national trend.

The NDA faces a likely rout in Bihar. BJP ally Janata Dal (United), which had 30-odd MPs, is badly depleted. The JD(U)-BJP are no match for the RJD-Congress.

But a defeat in Maharashtra will mean a heavy loss for the BJP-NDA. A power struggle has broken out in the BJP, driven by succession to the first-rung leadership. As Mr Advani recently told the BBC, neither he nor Mr Vajpayee will head any future BJP government at the Centre -- assuming it forms one.

This has spurred the "second-generation" aspirants -- ambitious men and women -- to position themselves to battle one another. They include Messrs M. Venkaiah Naidu, Pramod Mahajan, Arun Jaitly, Rajnath Singh, and Ms Uma Bharati and Sushma Swaraj.

Their factional alignments became apparent during Ms Bharati's Tiranga Yatra. Mr Naidu seized the opportunity provided by a court warrant to get rid of Ms Bharati from Madhya Pradesh and did his utmost to marginalise her yatra, in which no major BJP leader participated right till the end.

Mr Mahajan too despises Ms Bharati. He has assigned only 15 meetings to her in Maharashtra, while Ms Swaraj got 28. Mr Advani will address 12 rallies. Mr Mahajan's rival, Mr Jaitley, will only get to address five meetings. But Mr Mahajan will speak in 71 places, and his brother-in-law Munde in 60!

This means the power struggle will sharpen no matter how the BJP performs at the hustings. Today, no top BJP leader can resolve internal power rivalries. Mr Vajpayee seems to have lost the necessary acumen and political prestige. Mr Advani seems to be in a state of disbelief about the Lok Sabha results.

The RSS has stepped into this vacuum with its pet theory -- which many BJP leaders can't convincingly refute -- namely, that the April/May rout was caused by the party's deviation from Hindutva.

The BJP is moving towards a harder line -- a reborn Jana Sangh based on raucous, sectarian Hindu-communal politics, narrowly based on the upper castes, which doesn't try to reach out to OBCs and Dalits.

The BJP's Jana Sanghisation is a recipe for its contraction into a parochial pressure-group. This will probably get accelerated before the next Lok Sabha elections.

The BJP has lost much of its ground support in UP and Bihar. A defeat in Maharashtra, India's second largest state, will erode the chances of the BJP's revival. The dice are loaded against it.

Praful Bidwai is an eminent Indian columnist.