The BJP National Executive beginning Friday in Panjim is all set to firm up its strategy for the next year’s lok Sabha elections and discuss the possibility of anointing Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi as chief of the poll campaign committee.
In the midst of the raging debate within the party on the future of Modi, the party cadre are looking forward to the party meet in Goa, perhaps the last one before the lok Sabha election.
“Our action will speak much louder than our words,” BJP vice-president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi told The Pioneer on being asked about assigning Modi a national-level task.
Party sources claimed that BJP chief Rajnath Singh was in favour of Modi heading the campaign committee, while party veteran lK advani has suggested that such a decision should coincide with the formation of a separate campaign committee to oversee the upcoming Assembly elections. The pro-Modi clamour got louder with Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar saying on Thursday that the Gujarat CM could bring the BJP back to power at the Centre. For the record, the party will deliberate on three resolutions — political, economic and internal security — but the focus would be entirely on the backdoor meetings to fine-tune the organisational affairs for the Assembly election in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Delhi.
But the leadership issue remains the most complex knot that the party will have to untie at the Goa meet. Modi’s appointment as campaign committee chief would be a virtual attempt at addressing this question.
Dispelling reports that party stalwart lK Advani had been undermining the Gujarat Chief Minister by propping up name of his Madhya Pradesh counterpart Shivraj Singh Chauhan by extolling virtues of his good governance skills and humility, Naqvi said that the octogenarian politician was one of the party’s tallest leaders and one who commanded respect from the contemporary leadership. “He (Advani) and Atalji have nurtured the BJP by making a lot of sacrifices. Their contribution cannot be forgotten by us. They have hand-held the present leadership. If someone is under the misconception that Advaniji is supporting or opposing someone then they should dispel it,” Naqvi said, trying to put an end to the controversy.
Naqvi also revealed that the contentious issue of building the Ram temple at Ayodhya was not on the party’s priority list. “As far as agenda and priority is concerned, the priority before the party is price-rise, corruption and bad governance of this government,” Naqvi said, when asked why party leaders had been silent on the Ayodhya temple issue in the run up to the national executive meet.
Trying to score a point over the Congress as far as coalition management was concerned, Naqvi said that the BJP always treated coalition governance as a “dharma” and not compulsion like the Congress party has.
“Coalition is not a compulsion for us. We have proved our commitment to credibility and stability of a coalition during our NDA (National Democratic Alliance) rule. We consider alliance as a religion,” Naqvi said.
The BJP spokesperson also said that the Gujarat by-election results, in which BJP wrested all the six lok Sabha and Assembly seats from the Congress, was a ground reality which the Congress had failed to grasp. He advised the Congress to get a feel of the ground and act accordingly, instead of creating imaginary bubbles like the Rs 180-crore Bharat Nirman advertising campaign, calling it a ‘Bhrashtachar Nirman’ campaign after the numerous scams, which have tainted the UPA regime.
“If they do not know ground reality then I think they should take into account yesterday’s results and understand for themselves. This is not Bharat Nirman. This is Bhrashtachar Nirman. And its slogan ‘meelon chalna hai, meelon chalenge’ is actually ‘we have looted millions and we will loot more millions’,” Naqvi said.