BJP is in a mess and sending dangerous signals to the nation; but I do hope they come out of it strongly. India needs them!

The last elections had invariably cast a heavy spell on BJP. As a result of which, over sometime now, the party had had been busy in meetings. And aptly so, these high profile and highly secured meetings had been named Chintan Baithak (‘thought sittings’). But ironically, the outcomes of these meetings have not been as thoughtful though! On the contrary, the party has been reeling under a perpetual conflict, and unfortunately all of this is coming from the leadership. The lineup of miseries starts with Arun Shourie’s remarks and stretches up to Vasundhara Raje's clichés with the party over her resignation and the suspension orders served to her loyals Rajendra Rathore and Gyan Ahuja. Before Raje’s episode could have been resolved any further, a new episode on BJP leader and party veteran Jaswant singh popped up, wherein he was recently expelled for writing a book on Muhammad Ali Jinnah and his thoughts on partition.

On this, the two veteran leaders, Arun Shourie and Vasundhara Raje (who is having conflicts with the party on other matters too!), challenged the decision of the party high command. Like Raje, even Shourie is having conflicts with the party on his remarks. To reiterate, on August 24, 2009, Shourie asked the RSS to takeover BJP’s control and described Rajnath Singh as “Alice in Blunderland” during a programme on a television channel. He further tagged BJP as “Ek Kati Patang” and said that all top leaders should be removed. All in all, there seems to be no stoppage of the crossfire of remarks from BJP’s top-guns. From Advani to Shourie to Arun Jaitley to Sushma Swaraj – no one is leaving any stone unturned to further complicate the matter. If Mohan Bhagwat is fighting for leadership on one hand, then on the other, Yashwant Sinha and Arun Shourie are being scrutinised over their accountability on the elections’ performance.

The fact is that the hangover and the aftermath of loss in the Lok Sabha elections seem to have shattered the party’s foundation. The party expects Vasundhara Raje to resign when the majority of the MLAs want her to continue; they even summon BS Yeddyuruppa (BJP Chief Minister of Karnataka and the first BJP CM in any southern state) and seek an explanation for his not being able to deliver the promised numbers; and BC Khanduri, former BJP CM of Uttarakhand, even after giving his best shot, is asked to leave!!

There is no doubt in the fact that this churn was visible within BJP since sometime now. Unfortunately, it has taken a turn, wherein it is making the party extremely vulnerable from within. And worse is the fact that the BJP is creating opportunities for the opportunistic and self-centered regional and fringe parties to come to the center-stage and make their positions formidable. That probably is going to be the biggest loss for the nation, for none of these fringe players has a national vision as most of them serve their regional mandates. The sooner BJP evolves from this crisis, the better it is; but the manner in which they are going about it, things don’t look bright as of now. In fact, their current crises are sending extremely dangerous signals to the nation.

Take the case of Jaswant’s expulsion. There are two things that evolve out of it. First, has Jaswant become less important for BJP with time – like Natwar Singh or Arjun Singh had become for the Congress? In essence, was the party simply waiting to get rid of him any which way? And if that was the case, when people become old in Indian politics, why can’t they be allowed and guided to step down in a dignified manner? Why don’t we explain to them to do so, and give them a nice farewell instead of expelling them at the slightest ridiculous reason? Secondly, if indeed the BJP did expel Jaswant for his Jinnah encomium, then what is the signal that the party is trying to send to the nation? Are they trying to say that – hey, we hate freedom of expression, don’t believe in democracy, support M F Hussain’s paintings being vandalized in exhibitions; and will continue doing that even when we come to power, as we already do all this inside our party too? Or are they trying to say that – hey, we are categorically a Hindu party and there is no way we will let Muslims feel we are secular (then why the sham of having a Shahnawaz Hussain and an M A Naqvi in the party in the first place)?

BJP needs to realize that only inclusive agendas will bring a party to national power in days to come. Urban India doesn’t categorically understand this gagging of expression or non-secular saffron clad behaviour. And if the BJP does understand that and changes, only then will they perhaps be able to not only give a democracy like India what it needs the most – a strong second party – but also itself a chance to come back to power.