Even as the BJP’s Central leadership has reached out to the party’s veterans over the Bihar poll debacle and initiated “discussions” over the issues raised by them, the dissenting group members met here on Friday to pick up the threads again.
Yashwant Sinha met lK Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi separately while Shanta Kumar welcomed the party’s efforts to reach out to them, saying “dialogue must continue”.
Sinha, a former Union Minister, declined to divulge details of their talks. “I have nothing else to say except that I met Joshiji and Advaniji,” he said. Kumar said he welcomed the party’s efforts to reach out to veterans. “The party’s response is good, positive. Our leaders have met. Arun Jaitley met Advani and Joshiji. A dialogue has begun and it should continue. I am satisfied,” Kumar said.
The dissenting voices, however, continued to emanate with MP Manoj Tewari finding fault with the party’s strategy and sulking MP RK Singh supporting their demand that accountability be fixed.
“Accountability has to be fixed. Review should be made of the election debacle. We need to find out what went wrong, who were responsible. That’s what ‘margdarshak mandal’ said,” Singh, the Ara MP, said in a reference to the statement of the veterans.
The former Union Home Secretary claimed BJP gave tickets to people with criminal background, stressing that some of them were not “ordinary criminals” but those on whom Government had declared reward.
“We thought we were a party with a difference. We will give a clean Government.... Then you give tickets to criminals. That is very bad, very sad,” Singh said.
Tewari, MP from North-East Delhi, criticised the party’s campaign in Bihar and lauded the strategy of JD(U)-RJD-Congress alliance as “undoubtedly better”.
In the light of a stinging criticism of the conduct of Bihar elections by the BJP leaders and charge of “emasculating party in last one year”, senior party strategist and Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley this week met Joshi as also Advani.
In another reconciliatory gesture Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari on Friday dismissed that he ever spoke about seeking “explanation” from the senior BJP leaders for making their grievance public.
“Party elders including lK Advani and MM Joshi are our highly respected leaders and neither I nor any other party functionary has ever shown any disrespect to them and there was absolutely no question of any one suggesting explanation from them and not the least demanding disciplinary action against them”, Gadkari, a former BJP head, said in a statement from Nagpur.
He said the BJP central leadership is discussing with the Party’s veterans the issues raised by them in the wake of party’s unsatisfactory performance in the Bihar Assembly elections.
For his part, Union Parliamentary Minister and another ex-party chief M Venkaiah Naidu, who was in Bangalore, said the BJP “will take note of these views and concerns” but not before maintaining that the elders should have raised their views at a party forum rather than going public. He also asserted that the country and party needed Modi’s leadership. The minister also strongly defended the leadership of Modi and Shah.
“Some of our senior leaders have raised certain issues. It would have been better if these issues were raised in a party forum rather than public, but still we will take note of these views and concerns.”
“It has never been the culture of the party to blame any individual for the future of the party. Elections are won and lost as a result of collective effort.....” Naidu added.
This argument has been outrightly dismissed by the veterans contending this is like saying “no one is responsible” for the poll defeat.