Quiet Fall of Dhankhar Signals a Deep Rift Within Modi Regime; Govt Not Keen for Parliament Debate on Bihar Electoral Rolls; India's Jobless Data Seen As Inaccurate

A newsletter from The Wire | Founded by Tanweer Alam, Sidharth Bhatia, Pratik Kanjilal, Seema Chishti, Sushant Singh, MK Venu, and Siddharth Varadarajan | Contributing writer: Kalrav Joshi, with additional inputs by Anirudh SK

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Over to Siddharth Varadarajan for today’s Cable

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Snapshot of the day

July 22, 2025

Siddharth Varadarajan

Narendra Modi’s churlish message – some 15 hours after Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar’s shocking resignation on ‘health’ grounds last night – had all the warmth of a notice the Enforcement Directorate might send and tells us all we need to know about the story behind the story: the Dear Leader’s grip over his own flock has loosened, and how.

“Shri Jagdeep Dhankhar Ji”, he tweeted, “has got many opportunities to serve our country in various capacities, including as the Vice President of India. Wishing him good health.”

The Prime Minister’s willingness to reduce a purportedly ill colleague’s constitutional career to the opportunities he “got” (from Modi, of course) makes it clear that Dhankhar has been shown the door. Ironically, the man faithfully served the regime for years, first as governor of West Bengal, where he continuously needled Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, and then as Vice President and Chair of the Rajya Sabha. It was in this position that he emerged as a blatantly partisan battering ram – silencing the opposition in the house, targeting the judiciary, civil liberties, the media, the intelligentsia and inveigling against secularism and the concept of the ‘Basic Structure of the Constitution’. Not once during this period did Modi and Amit Shah use their media proteges to even gently hint that the Vice President was overstepping his remit.

Dhankhar’s resignation took his staff and all MPs, especially from the Opposition, by surprise. Now, in the aftermath of Dhankhar’s departure, various theories are doing the rounds, centring on real or imaginary tactical and strategic differences that emerged with Modi and Shah. NDTV suggests the rift was linked to Dhankhar agreeing to the tabling of an impeachment motion against Justice Yashwant Verma by the Opposition. But the government is also apparently keen to impeach the judge and it seems odd that a fight over credit could have had such a drastic consequence. Others see Dhankhar as collateral damage in the rift that appears to have opened up between the RSS and Modi over who will be the next BJP president, with the Vice President seen as closer to Nagpur. Sheela Bhatt excavates some of the other sources of tension but it is indisputably a measure of Modi’s declining hold that everyone believes his exit has to do with a power struggle.