Every day one or more senior leaders of the saffron party are coming out with critical and sarcastic remarks against the party leadership blaming them for the crushing defeat.
After Shatrughan Sinha, Hukumdeo Narayan Yadav, Ashwini Chaube, Jitan Ram Manjhi, Chandra Mohan Rai, now the senior leader and Begusarai MP Bhola Singh on Tuesday attacked the leadership and said the party committed hara-kiri in Bihar.
“This is not the defeat of the BJP but the party committed hara-kiri. The irresponsible statements of some leaders largely benefited lalu Prasad and Mahagathbandhan. This was a blunder on the part of the BJP leadership not projecting a CM face. This way the party sent a message to the people that there was no leader worth projection as CM face,” the septuagenarian leader commented bitterly.
Buxar MP Ashwini Chaube, whose son Sashwat was defeated in Bhagalpur, was also very bitter. Chaube, who represented Bhagalpur Assembly seat many times, had in fact used all the resources at his command to get his son a ticket despite fierce opposition within the party, said he was going to resign from all the posts in the party and would serve as a simple worker of the BJP. “This is wrong to say that it is the defeat of PM Narendra Modi or party chief Amit Shah. This is the defeat of Bihari people and party workers and supporters and each one should introspect,” he said.
Former Minister and senior BJP leader Chandra Mohan Rai, who was denied ticket this time, attacked State leadership and demanded resignation of State president Mangal Pandey and two other key leaders Sushil Kumar Modi and Nand Kishore Yadav. “If they don’t, the central leadership should remove them,” he said and added that Union Ministers Ananth Kumar and Dharmendra Pradhan, who had been made in-charge of Bihar polls should also be sacked. Rai said the PM was misguided by these leaders and organised his meetings in gali-mohalla. “In the four districts PM held meetings, the BJP failed to open account,” he said.
Another senior leader Gopal Narayan Singh, who is a former State president of BJP, accused State leadership for the crushing defeat saying they provided utterly wrong feedback to the central leadership and ignored local workers. Singh who lost from Aurangabad, said the State leaders used borrowed players and gave them tickets keeping the central leadership in dark.
Former CM Jitan Ram Manjhi, who will be the only face of his party Hindustani Awam Morcha in the Assembly as its all 20 candidates lost badly, said RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat’s statement for review on reservation was ill-timed and it affected the poll scenario. “The RJD and JD(U) succeeded in telling the people that RSS and BJP would end the reservation,” said Manjhi and added that non-projection of a CM face of the NDA also adversely affected the alliance and beef controversy polarised minorities in favour of Mahagathbandhan. Madhubani MP of BJP Hukumdeo Narayan Yadav also held Bhagwat’s statement just before the election responsible for party’s defeat.