‘Break-up sad & unfortunate’
Yet another split in the NDA has left the BJP worried about the ‘agenda’ that will dominate the next lok Sabha polls.
The party is apprehensive that the JD(U)’s quitting the NDA for “secularism” might take the steam out of the BJP’s campaign against misrule, corruption and inflation under the UPA and reduce the battle for lok Sabha to a ‘secularism versus communalism’ fight that will have the BJP at a disadvantage.
“Now other regional parties, which heavily bank on minority votes, would now find it difficult to move closer to the BJP,” a top BJP leader said. The BJP considers Trinamool Congress (West Bengal), Biju Janata Dal (Odisha), Telugu Desam Party, Telangana Rashtra Samiti (both Andhra Pradesh), Asom Gana Parishad (Assam) and similar outfits as potential allies in both pre- or post-poll situation.
These parties have sizeable minority voters and would face Assembly elections in their State either simultaneously with the national poll or in less than two years of it.
Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Assam, Bihar and Odisha alone account for 159 out of total 543 lok Sabha seats. The response to the idea of ‘Federal Front’, which elicited support from the Samajwadi Party of Uttar Pradesh having 80 lS seats and Babulal Marandi from Jharkhand, is threatening to upset the BJP’s calculation.
Sources claimed party veteran lK Advani called up BJP chief Rajnath Singh after Nitish announced the split in Patna. The two shared with each other their “impact assessment” of the break-up.
While Singh’s role is seen crucial behind Narendra Modi’s anointment as head of BJP’s campaign committee, Advani had been a strong votary of NDA-plus, the idea of an expanded NDA.
At BJP’s Surajkund conclave last year, Advani had suggested the party to include in its agenda a ‘charter of commitment’ to minorities to achieve the target of having NDA-plus. “The break-up of NDA is sad and unfortunate,” Sushma Swaraj wrote on micro-blogging site Twitter.
At a party function later in the evening, Rajnath Singh went offensive against the JD(U). “It is unfortunate that they have decided to end the alliance just around when the atmosphere was ready to dethrone the Congress. People are ready to oust the Congress and the parties who will not act according to the wishes of the people would not survive long in Indian politics,” Singh said at a youth convention here.
The BJP chief reminded Nitish that even Jai Prakash Narayan, who spearheaded the most powerful anti-Congress campaign in the country, wanted to remove the Congress from power.