"I think that is not a very mature
suggestion you win a lot of elections you lose some elections so if we start
throwing out people after every loss we probably will have nobody to left in
the party. So, therefore, in a political election a political party losses an
election collectively, it wins an election collectively after all when Prime
Minister led the campaign and in 2014 we won are we not all in terms of
positions and stature beneficiaries of that and therefore tomorrow or today if
we lose an election should we not be collectively responsible for that."
What
else Arun Jaitley or any other senior BJP leader can say publicly - after the
rout the party had in Bihar assembly polls.
What
Arun Jaitley yesterday said was basically about shielding Narendra Modi and
Amit Shah and that leadership of the party that went into milking the cow in Bihar
- but it boomeranged.
Till
now, every BJP win, post its grand show in the parliamentary polls last year, was
being attributed to Amit Shah and every loss, in different bypolls, was being
conveniently ignored. The first big loss that came in Delhi early this year,
was dismissed as an aberration with debatable points like 'Congress no show',
'RSS disinterests' and the 'Kiran Bedi factor'.
But,
with Bihar now, that 'aberration' can safely be termed a trend and this time,
it will be difficult for Narendra Modi and Amit Shah to ignore the 'writing on
the wall'.
Amit
Shah runs BJP because he is a trusted Narendra Modi man and BJP leaders trust
Narendra Modi because of his 'vote mobilization' appeal. Narendra Modi realizes
this and also this that he cannot pull a successful draw every time, in every
assembly election.
West
Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Assam are due next year and the mother of all,
Uttar Pradesh, is to see assembly polls in April-May 2017 - and BJP has no
chances in all these states except Assam - Narendra Modi knows that.
True,
BJP cannot accept it publicly as reflected further in Rajnath Singh's words,
"Winning
and losing is part of the game. One cannot pin the blame on the PM. We couldn't
understand the mood (in the state). Social equations were against us in Bihar.
I have addressed at least 50 rallies. "
Defending
Amit Shah he said, "In BJP, a person
can remain President for two consecutive terms. There is no bar. The present
tenure of Amit Shah is an ad-hoc period. I mean he is completing my left—over
period since the last one-and-a-half years. He can be regular President for two
more terms. Unke to 6 saal bache hain (he has six years left)."
It's
all logical and practical what all they are saying. BJP will have to weather
hostile and scathing observations from even its senior leaders - L. K. Advani,
Murali Manohar Joshi, Yashwant Sinha, Shatrughan Sinha, Shanta Kumar and so on
- as we saw this evening - because they all saw dead ends of their political
careers with the dawn of Narendra Modi as the only powerful leader of BJP.
They
cannot and they should not hit back on that. The best that BJP can do is to
remain silent, do an honest introspection and carry out the necessary
rectifications it must carry out now.
Even
if it chooses to shield its top brass for this Bihar debacle!
How
these outcomes reflect on BJP governance and functioning only time will tell.
So
far, the day-2 post the Bihar disaster, has given us conflicting signals.
Continuing
its run of controversial decisions, especially around communal issues, the
party went all out to oppose the 'Tipu Sultan birth anniversary' observation by
Congress run Karnataka government. Most of us, especially in our generation,
know Tipu Sultan as a good, patriotic Indian, thanks to the Doordarshan serial,
and we are happy with that. We don't need unnecessary controversy (or
politics), either by BJP or by Congress (after all Congress is also trying to
play communal card of appeasement of announcing the Tipu Sultan event after all
these years).
On
the other hand, the Narendra Modi led government took a much needed, important
step this evening. The government relaxed the much delayed foreign direct
investment (FDI) limits in 15 significant sectors and we should see this as the
beginning of a long delayed reform process.
©/IPR: Santosh Chaubey - http://severallyalone.blogspot.com/
