Last Updated on 10 years by INDIAN AWAAZ
Opposition Party-the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).Ms Swaraj was humiliated and insulted in full glare of television cameras for upholding decency and democratic norms by her party chief and Nagpur Nominee Nitin Gadkari. By castigating Ms Swaraj publicly, Mr Gadkari has undermined the constitution.
Mr Gadkari must remember that by virtue of being the Leader of the Opposition, she is holding a constitutional position which and enjoys all the privileges of a cabinet rank. Mr Gadkari can only claim that as President of the Party, he appointed Ms Swaraj the Leader of the Opposition. Instead of uniting the Party, every decision of his has only ended up in creating fissures within the Party.
He has succeeded in creating a wide schism between the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha and the counterpart in the Rajya Sabha-Mr Arun Jaitely.
In any case, the two high profile parliamentary leaders have never got along. Mr Gadkari, must also remember that the leadership right from Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Lal krishen Advani had built the party bringing it to the National level and any nominee from Nagpur. This is not the first time that Mr Gadkari is creating problem for the leadership.
Earlier, he pulled up, Ms Swaraj publicly for attacking erstwhile Party’s poster boy Narendra Modi. Even Party Stalwart Advani was not spared for having expressed regret to Sonia Gandhi for a task force Report which had alleged that late Rajiv Gandhi, her mother, had stashed away money in Swiss banks. Citing the report, Mr Advani, at various public meetings demanded Sonia Gandhi to come clean on foreign accounts. Taken aback, Sonia Gandhi, in a strongly, worded letter, denied that neither her late husband nor a family members had any accounts in Swiss Bank. This episode also created problem for the party leadership who felt that Mr Advani should have not gone public since it was party document on black money. BJP had appointed a task force unearth black money in foreign banks and how to bring it back.
The four-member Task Force included S Gurumurthy, former IB Director Ajit Doval, Prof R Vaidyanathan and advocate Mahesh Jethmalani. The crisis of leadership frittered away the political and psychological advantage the Party had enjoyed since it lost power in 2004.
BJP, for the first time, had the Congress Party down on its knees with rapid-fire attacks on CVC mainly due to Swaraj, Corruption in Commonwealth Games and Adarsh Society scam to mention a few. Just at a time when the Party was riding high, its President has pulled it down.
Bosco Celestine is the senior editor of theindianawaaz.com
Photo courtesy: The Indian Express