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Tuesday, March 31, 2009
If the Prime Minister is not willing, he can ask the Congress president.
t was in early 1957 that Deendayalji asked me to shift base from Rajasthan to Delhi to assist Atalji and the other newly elected Jana Sangh MPs in their parliamentary work. Thereafter, Delhi became the centre of my political activity. My new responsibility gave me an opportunity to learn about the functioning of Parliament and the government, besides enabling me to develop my skills in drafting statements, formulating questions, and preparing points for the party’s political propaganda.
he voice of those who wanted to expel erstwhile Jana Sangh members from the party was getting more and more shrill. In this context, two important developments took place in the first week of April. On 4 April, the National Executive of the Janata Party was scheduled to hold a crucial meeting in Delhi to take a final decision on the ‘dual membership’ issue. In anticipation of the outcome of this meeting, we, the former members of the Jana Sangh, decided to hold a national convention in Delhi the following day. Morarji Desai and some others made a last-ditch effort to retain us within the Janata Party on the basis of a mutually acceptable compromise. But the die had been cast.
The Janata Party’s national executive rejected, by a vote of seventeen to fourteen, the compromise formula and resolved to expel all former Jana Sangh members from the organisation.
Our expulsion from the Janata Party came as a big relief to all of us from the Jana Sangh. But at the same time, we were deeply saddened by it. After all, our merger in the Janata Party in 1977, responding to the call of venerable Jayaprakash Narayan, was total and unconditional. Both psychologically and politically, we had identified ourselves completely with the new party. Therefore, our moment of final parting from the Janata Party evoked mixed emotions in my heart, and in the hearts of all my colleagues: loss, sadness, good-riddance and finally, liberation!
The two-day national convention on 5-6 April 1980 added another invigorating emotion—that of determination. Over 3,500 delegates assembled at Delhi’s Ferozeshah Kotla ground and resolved, on 6 April, to form a new political organisation called the Bharatiya Janata Party. Atal Bihari Vajpayee was elected its first President and I, along with Sikandar Bakht and Suraj Bhan, was given the responsibility of General Secretary.
BIRTH-PANGS OF THE NEW PARTY
The beginning of the 1980s witnessed another important development in Indian politics. On 23 June 1980, Sanjay Gandhi, the younger of the two sons of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, died in an airplane crash in New Delhi. After this, a systematic campaign was orchestrated inside the ruling party to induct Sanjay’s elder brother Rajiv, who was then a pilot with Indian Airlines, into the leadership position. In less than two years, Rajiv was made the General Secretary of the Congress party, a move that sent clear signals that Indira Gandhi had made up her mind to ensure dynastic succession.
The biggest electoral setback to our party came in 1984 from a factor that was as unexpected as it was tragic. On 31 October, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was gunned down inside her official residence by two of her own bodyguards—Satwant Singh and Beant Singh. Even as Indira Gandhi’s body was lying in state, Rajiv was administered the vote of office as Prime Minister by President Giani Zail Singh in the evening of 31 October. At forty, he became India’s youngest Prime Minister, with no prior ministerial experience. In a cynical move to exploit the sympathy wave, the government dissolved the Lok Sabha and called for fresh elections to be held within forty-five days.
In the 1984 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP became the worst victim of the ‘sympathy wave’. Our party could win from only two constituencies in a House of 542 MPs—one in Gujarat and the other in Andhra Pradesh. Unbelievably, even Atalji lost his seat from Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh. The Congress won as many as 401 seats, better than its best performances during the premiership of Nehru or Indira Gandhi.
Naturally, the pall of defeat hung over the party as its national executive met in Calcutta in March 1985. ‘As the President of the party,’ Atalji said, ‘I take full moral responsibility for the failure of the BJP in the Lok Sabha elections, and I shall be gladly willing to undergo any punishment that the party decides.’ The party, however, promptly turned down his offer to resign. For, everyone in the BJP knew that our tally of two seats in the Lok Sabha was by no means a true reflection of our party’s real presence in Indian politics.
he voice of those who wanted to expel erstwhile Jana Sangh members from the party was getting more and more shrill. In this context, two important developments took place in the first week of April. On 4 April, the National Executive of the Janata Party was scheduled to hold a crucial meeting in Delhi to take a final decision on the ‘dual membership’ issue. In anticipation of the outcome of this meeting, we, the former members of the Jana Sangh, decided to hold a national convention in Delhi the following day. Morarji Desai and some others made a last-ditch effort to retain us within the Janata Party on the basis of a mutually acceptable compromise. But the die had been cast.
The Janata Party’s national executive rejected, by a vote of seventeen to fourteen, the compromise formula and resolved to expel all former Jana Sangh members from the organisation.
Our expulsion from the Janata Party came as a big relief to all of us from the Jana Sangh. But at the same time, we were deeply saddened by it. After all, our merger in the Janata Party in 1977, responding to the call of venerable Jayaprakash Narayan, was total and unconditional. Both psychologically and politically, we had identified ourselves completely with the new party. Therefore, our moment of final parting from the Janata Party evoked mixed emotions in my heart, and in the hearts of all my colleagues: loss, sadness, good-riddance and finally, liberation!
The two-day national convention on 5-6 April 1980 added another invigorating emotion—that of determination. Over 3,500 delegates assembled at Delhi’s Ferozeshah Kotla ground and resolved, on 6 April, to form a new political organisation called the Bharatiya Janata Party. Atal Bihari Vajpayee was elected its first President and I, along with Sikandar Bakht and Suraj Bhan, was given the responsibility of General Secretary.
BIRTH-PANGS OF THE NEW PARTY
The beginning of the 1980s witnessed another important development in Indian politics. On 23 June 1980, Sanjay Gandhi, the younger of the two sons of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, died in an airplane crash in New Delhi. After this, a systematic campaign was orchestrated inside the ruling party to induct Sanjay’s elder brother Rajiv, who was then a pilot with Indian Airlines, into the leadership position. In less than two years, Rajiv was made the General Secretary of the Congress party, a move that sent clear signals that Indira Gandhi had made up her mind to ensure dynastic succession.
The biggest electoral setback to our party came in 1984 from a factor that was as unexpected as it was tragic. On 31 October, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was gunned down inside her official residence by two of her own bodyguards—Satwant Singh and Beant Singh. Even as Indira Gandhi’s body was lying in state, Rajiv was administered the vote of office as Prime Minister by President Giani Zail Singh in the evening of 31 October. At forty, he became India’s youngest Prime Minister, with no prior ministerial experience. In a cynical move to exploit the sympathy wave, the government dissolved the Lok Sabha and called for fresh elections to be held within forty-five days.
In the 1984 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP became the worst victim of the ‘sympathy wave’. Our party could win from only two constituencies in a House of 542 MPs—one in Gujarat and the other in Andhra Pradesh. Unbelievably, even Atalji lost his seat from Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh. The Congress won as many as 401 seats, better than its best performances during the premiership of Nehru or Indira Gandhi.
Naturally, the pall of defeat hung over the party as its national executive met in Calcutta in March 1985. ‘As the President of the party,’ Atalji said, ‘I take full moral responsibility for the failure of the BJP in the Lok Sabha elections, and I shall be gladly willing to undergo any punishment that the party decides.’ The party, however, promptly turned down his offer to resign. For, everyone in the BJP knew that our tally of two seats in the Lok Sabha was by no means a true reflection of our party’s real presence in Indian politics.
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