If the BJP’s defeat in the recent Assembly elections at the hands of the Congress in three Hindi heartland states — which shocked many and left the saffron party feeling humiliated — has created anxiety among some leading potential allies of the Congress, rumblings are also being heard on the NDA side, especially within the BJP itself.

The chief of difficult BJP ally Shiv Sena, Uddhav Thackeray, on Monday mocked the ruling dispensation with the same cutting expression that the Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has so far used — “Chowkidar chor hai!” Mr Thackeray once again expressed his resolve not to ally with the BJP in the Lok Sabha election.

The Akali Dal, BJP’s other important NDA partner, has also ticked off the BJP after the latter’s recent electoral reverses. It has explicitly asked the BJP not to alienate the minorities.

But the most significant moves by far have come from within the RSS-BJP fold. Union minister for road transport, highways and shipping, Nitin Gadkari, who is a former president of the BJP, is the evident protagonist of this scheme, and he appears far from reluctant in playing the part. The RSS appears central to this venture.

While Mr Gadkari has tried to make half-hearted amendments to his published remarks, these efforts have only served to confirm and highlight his recent utterances.

Last week Mr Gadkari said that while success had many fathers, failure was an orphan, implying that the current leadership of the BJP and the government should own up responsibility for the recent election defeats.

He also tellingly said that in order to show its “loyalty” to the party’s organisation, the leadership should acknowledge its responsibility in defeat. Earlier this week, the Union minister said that the party president must accept responsibility if BJP MLAs and MPs were not doing well.

Taken together, Mr Gadkari’s observations suggest a churning within the RSS-BJP on the question of the Modi-Shah leadership which the well-known actor Shatrughan Sinha, a rebel BJP MP, has disparagingly described as “the one-man show and two-man army” in remarks made in Thiruvananthapuram on Monday.

Perhaps the RSS has not given up on the Modi-Shah diarchy, but is preparing the ground for any eventuality before the next Lok Sabha election. Last week, a farmer-leader of Maharashtra, Kishore Tiwari, who has the rank of Cabinet minister, wrote a letter to RSS supremo Mohan Bhagwat that was leaked to the media.

In it, he took the Modi-Shah duo apart, accusing them of “arrogance”, and cited against them the policy of demonetisation as well as farm sector woes — just as the Congress does. He also went on to say that Mr Gadkari had “adequate leadership qualities”.

Any counter-moves from the resent establishment will be worth watching, but it is clear that all is not quiet on the ruling party front.