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| Corruption is BJP's No 1 poll plank but what about tainted bureaucrats, police officers | | 'Misrule by twin parivars, good governance, development are other poll planks | | Bharat Bhushan
Early Times Report
Jammu, Nov 21: In run up to the J&K polls, BJP president Amit Shah is demanding votes on four planks - corruption, misrule by two parivars (Abdullahs and the Muftis), good governance and development. These issues dominated his speeches in the yesterday's Ramban and Banihal public rallies where he surprisingly made no mention of any headway made by the NDA to bring back "black money" from the foreign banks.
While he shied away from taking any credit for the BJP's much talked about efforts to bring back black money from the foreign banks, he targeted Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, saying "he seems to have shifted all money to London where he goes and stays for months together to spend summer vacations". Such attacks on him, his father and ex-J&K Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah and the Muftis are likely to get sharper in the BJP election campaigns in the days to come.
The allegation against Omar, which is the first of its kind by any politician, is of very serious nature and a strong reaction is likely from him also. But in J&K, there is also a long list of bureaucrats, engineers and police officers who have amassed huge wealths through unfair means. Their princely lifestyles are talk of the town. Some of them have now retired from service and are part of the saffron brigade. Why is Shah silent on them? It is expected that his party colleagues in J&K would present him the real picture of this lot of tainted officials as well. Being the BJP head, his statements are necessarily to be backed by logics otherwise there will remain no difference between him and a low-calibre political activist.
Also, before making any statement on corruption during poll campaigning in J&K, the BJP president should first tell the countrymen what progress NDA has made to bring back black money from the foreign banks? Not only he, other BJP leaders at the Centre are also not talking on this issue, knowing that their words in this regard had failed to match their actions. Before creating hype about corruption in J&K, the BJP president must tell what his party had done in the similar issues raised by it during the Lok Sabha polls.
A state BJP leader said the party had formulated a political strategy making corruption the main plank of its poll campaign against the NC-led J&K Government. In the Lok Sabha polls too, corruption was their main issue against the UPA Government. The Bofors scam had led to the defeat of Rajiv Gandhi Government and the 2G scandal made dirty the spotless image of ex-Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. BJP is confident that the issue of corruption can also bring down the coalition in J&K and hence has made it the main weapon of their poll campaigning here.
In the BJP meetings held in Jammu in the past few months, it was decided that the party would focus on corruption during election campaigns and this would be its No 1 poll plank, he added.
"The main lever of power in NC-Congress Government is Omar and the party has decided to target him. The party will also be directly targeting the Muftis (Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and his daughter Mehbooba Mufti) over corruption and other issues," he pointed out.
He made it clear that for BJP, the political situation in J&K was akin to what it was at the Centre before the conduct of General Elections when the saffron brigade had targeted Congress on 2G kickbacks issue.
Keeping corruption in J&K in mind, BJP has carefully built up its poll planks. Riding on the Modi wave, the party is lock sure that its planks will give a cutting edge to its campaign in J&K. The party is finding it tempting to make statements of corruption against NC and Congress top brass even when it has no proof against them. Corruption was the BJP's mascot in Lok Sabha polls and it is its mascot in the J&K polls as well.
The issue of abrogation of article 370 seems to have been put in the cold storage by it for ever in its attempt to woo the Valley voters. The party has totally sidelined this issue in the state election campaign.
This speaks of BJP's double standards. By resorting to such poll gimmicks, it can annoy voters in Jammu region. Also, if it is so keen to end corruption and exposing the corrupt J&K politicians, it should not join hands with the tainted politicians and should also make clear its stand on the corrupt civil servants, including police officers. |
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