As they become less dependent, children outgrow their parents. Eventually the relationship reverses and it’s the parents who start depending on their children.

The second part of this hasn’t happened yet between the RSS and the BJP but the first is well underway. As with kids in their teens where parental guidance starts reducing, the BJP too now appears to be breaking free.

Certainly there has been a sea change in the relationship since the days of the Vajpayee government where the RSS, was like a permanently aggrieved mother chiding her offspring. That has stopped now. Demands have turned into requests.

What is the evidence for this? Nothing concrete really because it remains a highly private relationship. But the change is quite palpable. However, if you really want to check, you should listen to the Vijayadashami speeches by the head of the RSS. You will sense it.

There are those who say this is because, like an obedient child, the BJP has, and is, been living up the expectations in the parental achievement agenda. That’s absolutely true.

But that doesn’t mitigate the change in the relationship. It’s now more amicable doubtless, but it’s also no longer based on one way dependence.

The reason, most probably, is that the BJP has far more workers than the RSS and is therefore no longer dependent on it during elections. For example, it is widely believed that the BJP lost in 2004 partly because of very reluctant cooperation by the RSS. The new BJP doesn’t have to fear that anymore.

This kind of thing has happened in most countries. France in the last half of the 1790s. The USSR in the early 1920s. Germany in the late 1920s. Britain several times. The US under Franklin Roosevelt and then under Donald Trump.

The emergence of a strong leader usually diminishes the power and hold of the parent organisation.

The exception that proves this rule is Pakistan which can’t break free of the Army.

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