An unusual confluence of opposition planets leaves Modi facing arguably the most feisty challenge in a long time.

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step – or, as in Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi’s case, with the slow spin of the wheels of his election rath yatra , which hit the road on Tuesday.

The places that book-end the rath yatra, which kicks off Modi’s campaign for Assembly elections due later this year, symbolise the message of Gujarat as an investment destination, which Modi is looking to emphasise. Bechraji, where the rath yatra was flagged off, is home to a Rs 4,000 crore investment that Maruti Suzuki recently formalised with the Gujarat government. Sanand, where the yatra will wind down, is home to the famed Tata Nano plant.

But in a larger sense, the widespread expectation among a cross-section of BJP supporters is that the final destination of the rath yatra isn’t merely Sanand, but faraway Delhi, and in particular the office of the Prime Minister. Modi himself has avoided feeding the frenzied speculation about his aspiration for the higher executive office, but his political detractors – of whom there are a sizeable number - suspect that an elaborate PR blitz, engineered by Modi himself, is under way to project him as Prime Minister material.

In a speech at Bechraji on Tuesday, Modi targeted the UPA government and, in particular, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for the various corruption scandals that have virtually killed governance at the Centre. He then dared the UPA government to establish a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the coal block allocation scandal.

“When it comes to Gujarat, SITs are formed very easily,” Modi said, referring to the SIT that investigated the 2002 riots in Gujarat and found him and his government not guilty of the charge of complicity in the riots. “Now, I challenge the Prime Minister to form a SIT under Supreme Court supervision into the coal scam,” Modi added.

That larger pan-Indian back story gives this year’s Assembly election in Gujarat a keener edge, and raises the stakes, both for Modi and his political opponents. It has also had leaders of parties within the BJP-led NDA positioning themselves vis-à-vis Modi – and in some cases, as an alternative choice for Prime Ministership.

In many ways, the 2012 Gujarat elections, in which Modi will be seeking to win for a third time, could prove to be his toughest battle yet. Sensing that an emphatic BJP victory in Gujarat will only enhance his chances of taking a shot at the top job at the Centre in 2014 (or whenever elections are held), his detractors are going into overdrive and finding unity of purpose in their actions.

Thus, for instance, the Janata Dal (United), a constituent of the BJP-led NDA at the national level, announced on Monday that it would contest 100 seats in Gujarat this year, and that Bihar Chierf Minister Nitish Kumar would campaign in Gujarat for his party candidates (and against Modi).

Media commentaries flagged this as another chapter in the Modi-Nitish slugfest to position themselves for 2014. But in fact, there’s nothing new in this. Even in 2007, the JD(U) had contested 35 seats in Gujarat’s 182-member Assembly (more here). That’s entirely in line with the alliance arrangement under which the NDA comes together at the national level, but its constituent parties contest independently against each other at the State level.

In 2007 too, Nitish Kumar had campaigned for his party candidates in Gujarat; his party had positioned itself as “the third front” in Gujarat, and claimed it expected to play a crucial role in the government formation. But those hopes were crushed; the JD(U) won only one of the 35 seats it contested.

Campaigning against Modi in Gujarat is important for Nitish Kumar to project himself as a “secular” leader in his home State. This time, however, the stakes are higher since Nitish Kumar has publicly served notice on the BJP that the JD(U) would walk out of the NDA if Modi was projected as Prime Minister.

At about the same time, the decade-long trials into the 2002 riots are winding down, and as the recent judgement in the Naroda Patiya case established, at least some elements of the BJP and its Hindutva affiliates were complicit in the killings. For Modi, the timing of these verdicts is inconvenient: it interferes with the message that he would like to emphasis: of development and high growth.

Additionally, the exit of former Chief Minister Keshubhai Patel, who had become the pivot for dissidents within the BJP, and his launching his own party, could feed off the angst among sections of the Patel community who have been convicted in the 2002 riots cases. Unlike in 2007, when they Patel vote went predominantly to Modi, despite Keshubhai Patel’s intra-party sniping, this time, the Patels may vote with their feet.

Lastly, the Congress appears to have learnt its lesson from the loss of the previous two elections and is talking less about the 2002 riots as an election campaign theme this time. In the 2002 elections, the Congress, under Sonia Gandhi, played the ‘soft Hindutva’ card in Gujarat and lost; in 2007, it swung to the other extreme with Sonia Gandhi branding Modi a ‘maut ka saudagar’ (merchant of death). That strategy too failed.

This time, the Congress is playing down the riots as an issue but is instead playing the populist card with freebies, including land for the poor. Some of these appear to have been well received in Gujarat, which could test Modi’s hold on his flock, which he had earlier marshalled under the slogan of Gujarati asmita (pride).

In other words, in 2012 Modi faces challenges that he didn’t face in earlier elections. Add to this the risk that his supporters may also slip into a complacence that is typically in parties that have been in power for over a decade, and the odds begin to mount. Adversity often brings out the best in politics, and Modi has demonstrated it in the past too. Yet, an unusual confluence of opposition planets certainly makes this a more feisty challenge than he has faced in a long time.