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| BJP again committed an act of political debauchery | | Legislative Council Elections | | ET Plus Report
Jammu, Mar 8: The BJP, which day in and day out asserts that it is for the territorial integrity of India and against pro-Pakistan Syed Ali Shah Geelani and his ilk, once again indulged in an act of political debauchery and voted for Shibhen Krishen Dudha, a staunch supporter and admirer of Geelani, in the elections to the Legislative Council, held yesterday. All the four BJP MLAs voted for Dudha overlooking his pro-Geelani and anti-India interviews.
Significantly, even those who had sponsored his candidature did not vote for Dudha for reasons best known to them. Dudha got only 9 votes, including 4 BJP votes. The BJP voted for Dudha despite the fact that its leadership knew his credentials and despite the fact that the local BJP MLAs were against the PDP and PDF-sponsored candidate. They voted because they were "directed by some "bigwigs in New Delhi", "who also", according to sources, "were fully aware of the credentials of Dudha, to vote for him", thus once again vindicating its critics that its "nationalist slogans are just hollow" and that "it is the other face of the pseudo-secular Congress party and similar other outfits".
The BJP MLAs did not vote for Dudha; they actually voted for Geelani, former Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf and self-rule. The BJP during the Vajpayee regime had virtually accepted a Pakistani suggestion that, inter-alia, favoured "maximum possible autonomy for Kashmir and its adjoining areas" and division of Jammu province on communal lines. Things could not move forward because of the political instability in Pakistan. It is not without reason that Kashmiri leaders, including separatists hail Vajpayee and his "Insaniyat Ke Daire Mein" doctrine. By voting in favour of Dudha the BJP lost its credibility, with its critics saying that the "BJP blackened its face beyond recognition" by doing what it did yesterday. Earlier in 2009, 2010 and 2011 also, the BJP had ditched its own candidates and voted for the coalition candidates seeking election to the Legislative Council. In 2011, it indulged in cross-voting on an unprecedented scale and ensured the victory of the Congress and the NC candidates. As many as 7 out of 11 MLAs voted against their party candidate and in favour of the coalition candidates - an act that led to the expulsion of 7 MLAs on the ground that they had violated the party whip.
Incidentally, those 7 expelled BJP MLAs this time abstained from voting, notwithstanding the fact that their leader had declared that his supporters were free to vote for any candidate. Theirs was a master stroke in the sense that their abstention and the participation of the 4 BJP MLAs in the election in which the party had no stakes whatever simply helped the former vindicate their stand that it was not they but other BJP MLAs who had cross-voted in 2011 and they, unlike the BJP, continue to stick to their nationalist agenda.
Political observers are of the view that the "shrewd Kashmiri leadership wanted to further weaken the already rather weak BJP in Jammu province for political reasons" and "they entrapped the directionless and ambivalent BJP through their canny methodology" and "succeeded in their game plan by fielding Dudha as an Independent candidate".
It is not important who entrapped them, what is important to note is that the BJP, which was already at the receiving end for its various acts of omission and commission, allowed itself to be entrapped by forces hostile to India. It has landed itself in a situation that will further damage it. It would be only proper to say that the State BJP has outlived its utility and that it would be better for the BJP high command to disband its State unit, as it has no role to play in the sensitive Jammu and Kashmir State except to watch the interests of the NC, Congress, PDP and even Kashmiri separatists. It is an irony that the NC and the Congress, which otherwise should feel grateful to the BJP, are ridiculing it and dismissing it as a "communal" party.
All in all, it can be said that it is not the NC, Congress and the PDP which are responsible for the decline of the BJP in the State. It is the BJP itself which has been in a self-destruction mode for more than four years now. It has committed workers and cadres but it has no leader. |
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