New Delhi: Addressing the 69th national conference of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) in Delhi on 8 December, Union Home Minister Amit Shah termed himself an “organic product” of the ABVP.
He is not alone in this claim. Many leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) started their political journey from the ABVP — the students’ wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
When Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power in the Centre in 2014, of the five BJP chief ministers already in office — Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Madhya Pradesh), Manohar Parrikar (Goa), Vasundhara Raje (Rajasthan), Raman Singh (Chhattisgarh) and B.S. Yediyurappa (Karnataka) — two (Chouhan and Parrikar) had been associated with the ABVP.
After PM Modi took over the reins, the number of ABVP alumni among chief ministers increased significantly. Out of the 28 BJP chief ministers who have served since 2014 (including five who were already in office), 13 have been part of the ABVP during their college days.
Some of the prominent names are former Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis, former Jharkhand CM Raghubar Das, former Gujarat CM Vijay Rupani, former Himachal Pradesh CM Jai Ram Thakur, former Tripura CM Biplab Kumar Deb and incumbent Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath.
During PM Modi’s second stint, 2019 onwards, nine new chief ministers were appointed by the BJP and, of these, five had their grooming in the ABVP. Former and current Uttarakhand chief ministers Tirath Singh Rawat and Pushkar Singh Dhami, respectively, are both from the ABVP.
Apart from them, the three chief ministers appointed by the BJP this month in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh — Mohan Yadav, Bhajan Lal Sharma, and Vishnu Deo Sai, respectively — also have an ABVP background.
The ABVP’s influence is also evident in the Union Cabinet. In the 2014 Modi cabinet, out of the 41 ministers who were sworn in, around 18 had cut their teeth in their youth with ABVP.
In the second Modi cabinet, of 56 ministers, around 24 are from the ABVP. These include Nitin Gadkari, Rajnath Singh, Piyush Goyal, Dharmendra Pradhan, Amit Shah, V. Muraleedharan, Kailash Choudhary, Bhupender Yadav, and Nityanand Rai, among others.
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ABVP’s role in shaping leaders
So what makes ABVP a launching pad for leaders?
Formed in 1949, the students’ wing of the RSS has over 50 lakh members across the country now, according to ABVP.
“The courage with which students get the opportunity to make decisions in their life enhances their personality, and this is a plus point for them, which helps them in future,” explained Sunil Ambekar, who had earlier served as the ABVP’s National Organising Secretary and is currently the RSS’s head of media and publicity.
Speaking about his days at ABVP, Union Minister of State for Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries Sanjeev Balyan told ThePrint, “I was in ABVP from 1989 to 2010, first during my PhD studies in Haryana and later during LLB studies at Meerut University. Many leaders came into BJP from student politics, and over the years, ABVP has ended the dominance of SFI (Students’ Federation of India, youth wing of CPI (M)) and NSUI (National Students’ Union of India, youth wing of Congress)”.
He added that in many universities — from Rajasthan to Uttar Pradesh — elections are not happening.
“Student leaders emerge from election and street fight, this is what I gained from ABVP. If this does not happen, the process of new leaders coming up will be stopped,” he asserted.
Another senior RSS functionary, who did not wish to be named, explained how the Vidyarthi Parishad, unlike other students’ bodies, functions independently, allowing its members to become more responsible.
“ABVP functions as a training ground for the members who come from all walks of life and end up producing leaders in politics and other fields. But yes, unlike in other organisations where the interference of the political party is a lot, at ABVP, they learn to function independently and they take decisions on their own,” said the functionary.
According to the him, the members have to run the organisation themselves, and even as ABVP leaders, they remain in touch with the general public. “So, the responsibility of their decisions also rests completely with them. This definitely helps in making them better leaders.”
Though ABVP has definitely provided guidance as and when required, he explained that the risk factor pertaining to their decisions is completely their own.
“I would say, as far as politics is concerned, the responsibility that they learn while being in ABVP is one of the biggest qualities. They also learn to run the organisation, something which helps them while running the administration,” the functionary added.
ABVP has largely followed the same line as its parent organisation — the RSS — by focusing on issues related to nationalism and character-building by participating in programmes and agitations, like Chalo Kashmir, Ram Janmabhoomi Andolan, and removal of Article 370, among others. However, what differentiates it from RSS is the fact it ventured into electoral politics.
Speaking to ThePrint, the national media convenor of ABVP, Ashutosh Singh called the student organisation a grassroots movement, which is now in its 75th year.
“Our members have a grassroots connect at a very young age, and within ABVP, we have people from all walks of life but all are given the same treatment. So this grassroots connection comes in handy as far as politics is concerned. The fact that we are encouraged to make individual decisions also helps us in becoming independent at a very young age,’ Singh said.
Moreover, according to Singh, the fact that people can become members from as early as class IX helps them become aware of grassroots issues and also makes them “mature”.
“At a very young age, they are also able to form opinions regarding ideology. So campus politics and issues related to the society help them become better leaders in the future as they are able to connect with people much better,” he added.
(Edited by Richa Mishra)
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