In the beginning, there was Atal Behari Vajpayee: silver tongued, affable and resilient to the point of eluding ideological labels, despite his roots in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). He could bat for Hindutva when pressured by the RSS paterfamilias and cock a snook at the “swadeshi socialists” when he wanted to.

Now there is Narendra Modi: a sharp-shooter, a loner to the point of being anti-social, unambiguous on ideology and unyielding on policy. Unlike Vajpayee, he gave a wide berth to the RSS when it suited him and held his own despite its opposition. Modi is not a poet but, if needed, can effectively emote. And, after his victory in Gujarat in December, he is fast emerging as the man who would be Prime Minister. The Bharatiya Janata Party’s campaign for the 2009 Parliamentary poll will be led by the leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Lal Krishna Advani. But 2014 may well be the age of Modi.

Last week, the BJP named a 19-member election committee that would oversee election strategy. Eyebrows were raised because Modi did not figure in the list. But then, as BJP president Rajnath Singh argued, neither did the other BJP chief ministers, for they were all anyway involved in elections.

As of now, Modi is one among the five counted in the second tier of the BJP hierarchy, with Sushma Swaraj, Rajnath Singh, Arun Jaitley, and M. Venkaiah Naidu for company. But he stands out on one count — he is the only regional leader in a phalanx of Rajya Sabha MPs who delivered a state thrice to the BJP. Which is why, now that the party has announced that Advani is its prime ministerial candidate for the next Parliamentary elections, the question being asked is, after Advani, who.

“Atalji and Advaniji are natural grown leaders,” says former minister and Rajya Sabha MP Sushma Swaraj. “It’s preposterous to ask who after Advani because according to our Hindu tehzeeb (tradition), as long as our elders are around it is sacrilege to think of their successor.”

Despite her protestations, many in the BJP acknowledge that the question will bob up sooner rather than later. “In politics, public postures are one thing, behind-the-scene movements another,” stresses an office bearer of the BJP.

Old-timers recall that Modi was brought to Delhi as a national secretary because he was allegedly politicking excessively in Gujarat when the BJP first came to power in 1995. Seven years later, he returned to Gandhinagar as the chief minister, never having fought a panchayat election.

But what is clear is that Modi today is not just another chief minister like the BJP’s other five, some of whom are barely known nationally. “He stands out among them and that is what makes him a strong contender on the national scene,” says the office bearer.

For the BJP, the war of succession promises to be a troubled one. There is no clear-cut first among equals — every aspirant thinks he or she is as equal as the other. The issue of succession last came up in 1995, on the eve of the 1996 Lok Sabha elections. The BJP was convinced it was within striking distance of power, albeit with the help of allies. Everyone assumed Advani was the prime ministerial candidate. Everyone but Advani, that is.

So when in November 1995 Advani announced Vajpayee’s name as the BJP’s man for the top job, there were mixed feelings down the line: surprise, resentment and even a sense of betrayal among hard-core Advani supporters. “But Advaniji was always clear that as long as Atalji is there, he is the undisputed neta and nobody else will claim the PM’s post,” says Swaraj.

Vajpayee’s health has deteriorated since his party lost the 2004 election. And Advani, fit at 80, is the undisputed successor. “In the BJP, leaders emerge from a natural process which cannot be delineated in black and white terms,” says Ravi Shankar Prasad, the party’s chief spokesperson and Rajya Sabha MP.

What is clear, however, is that the Modi juggernaut is unstoppable. He is rated as the star campaigner in the election-bound states, ahead of even Advani. When he was in Chennai as Cho Ramaswamy’s guest at a function last week, he was mobbed by the city’s Tam Brahms who applauded his “ability to deliver on his economic policy promises”.

While Modi’s distinct politics, which blend Hindutva with economic reforms and a “no-nonsense” approach to governance, has endeared him to the upwardly mobile urban classes, some in the BJP wonder if these ingredients will make for a winning formula the country over.

“Modi has amended his definition of secularism to mean that the fruits of prosperity should reach the poorest of the poor. Maybe Gujarat has the delivery systems for this sort of thing but we are not sure if it will work all over,” says a BJP vice-president.

The party’s assessment is Modi will have to “repair” his relations with the Muslims — which reached an all-time low after anti-Muslim riots broke out in Gujarat in 2002 — and refurbish his “rural and pro-poor credentials” before arrogating to himself a larger role. “It took Advani nearly 17 years to mitigate the Ayodhya impact. It will take Modi 25 years or more to live down the Gujarat violence,” says a BJP Muslim leader.

Another leader believes that unless the BJP gets a majority on its own, Modi may as well abandon his Delhi ambition. A realistic opinion as of now is that there are four “serious” aspirants: Modi, Sushma (“a crowd puller” in the Vajpayee mould), Rajnath Singh (cow-belt, dhoti-clad, farmer) and Jaitley (urbane and liberal). By a process of elimination, the race narrows down to Sushma and Modi and it is anyone’s guess who of the two will finally make it. Both have age on their side.

The RSS, meanwhile, is rueing the day it decided to give Modi short shrift. A senior functionary says its cadres, from across the country, shot off angry missives to the leaders for “not cooperating” with Modi in the Gujarat elections. “If you ask us for an answer to who after Advani, our cadres have already given it,” says the functionary. General secretary Mohan Rao Bhagwat has directed the state RSS and Vishwa Hindu Parishad functionaries to be “nice” to Modi.

Suddenly, everybody is being “nice” to Modi. You never know when you’ll need him.