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Gadkari now a burden? BJP prez not to campaign in HP
Clean Media Correspondent
Shimla, Oct 29 (CMC) An RSS diktat may have made the BJP officially announce that it stood behind party president Nitin Gadkari but the latent tension in the party over him continues to simmer. It became manifest today when leaders of the Himachal Pradesh unit of the party expressed fresh reservations on his presence for campaigning in the state.
Sources confirmed that he will not be going to the hill state where he was scheduled to address two rallies, one in Bilaspur and other in Solan, on Tuesday.
The beleaguered BJP president, however, is not taking it lying down. He is now focusing on a different strategy to regain confidence and find strength — he plans to go back to the roots.
So while other senior BJP leaders will be heli-hopping extensively to various parts of Himachal Pradesh to campaign for the party, more so highlighting corruption charges against Congress’s chief ministerial probable Virbhadra Singh and other misdeeds of Manmohan Singh government at the Centre, Gadkari may be traveling to remote areas of Maharastra to garner support from where it matters most in politics, people, if at all it comes by his side.
He will hold his first such rally in Vidarbha region on Wednesday. He is making all efforts to see that this rally, in terms of size of the crowd, is a success.
Sources said as per the original schedule, as prepared earlier by the BJP headquarters in consultations with the Himachal Pradesh party unit, Gadkari was to fly from Delhi on Tuesday morning to Himachal. His first rally was at the populous Bilaspur at noon and later in the afternoon at Solan. But an influential section of party leaders in the state were not in favour of it and they communicated their feelings to the central party leaders.
Given his previous experience of a lukewarm response in the state, he too decided not to insist on going there, sources said. In fact, Gadkari’s first set of rallies held on Saturday came on his insistence. The venue of those rallies, Rekong Peo in Kinnur district bordering China and the other at far away Nerwa-Chopal were in sharp contrast to the more thickly populated and centrally located areas where other top BJP leaders like Narendra Modi, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and LK Advani addressed.
If this trend of resistance from party units continue then Gadkari may face a similar situation in Gujarat, where campaigning will pick up after Diwali. It would consequently put a real question mark over his `re-election’ as BJP president for the second term.
Gadkari has different ideas though. One of his close supporters said like a good leader who has risen to the ranks from the grassroots it is time for him to regain strength from there. “if is successful in drawing a good crowd on his home turf in Vidarbha and other regions, he can safely claim that people still believed in him than in adverse media campaign. He will prove that he is not a rootless wonder but is someone rooted to the ground. A leader is made on basis of popular support not by media reports.”
But not many in the BJP are willing to buy that. But alternately, they can’t decide on his fate till RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat decides to remove his supportive hand from his protégé. On Friday it was reported that he along with other top RSS functionaries held a meeting in Nagpur where they decided to fully back him and not to “ditch him in any way”.
Later that evening, senior RSS leader Bhaiyaji Joshi issued a statement that was clearly supportive of him: “Some allegations have been leveled by sections of the media only and an authorised agency is yet to look into these. It is unfortunate that the disclosure on these allegations has turned political.”
Gadkari is sure to make headlines on Tuesday – for his absence from a poll bound Himachal Pradesh.
Gadkari now a burden? BJP prez not to campaign in HP
Clean Media Correspondent
Shimla, Oct 29 (CMC) An RSS diktat may have made the BJP officially announce that it stood behind party president Nitin Gadkari but the latent tension in the party over him continues to simmer. It became manifest today when leaders of the Himachal Pradesh unit of the party expressed fresh reservations on his presence for campaigning in the state.
Sources confirmed that he will not be going to the hill state where he was scheduled to address two rallies, one in Bilaspur and other in Solan, on Tuesday.
The beleaguered BJP president, however, is not taking it lying down. He is now focusing on a different strategy to regain confidence and find strength — he plans to go back to the roots.
So while other senior BJP leaders will be heli-hopping extensively to various parts of Himachal Pradesh to campaign for the party, more so highlighting corruption charges against Congress’s chief ministerial probable Virbhadra Singh and other misdeeds of Manmohan Singh government at the Centre, Gadkari may be traveling to remote areas of Maharastra to garner support from where it matters most in politics, people, if at all it comes by his side.
He will hold his first such rally in Vidarbha region on Wednesday. He is making all efforts to see that this rally, in terms of size of the crowd, is a success.
Sources said as per the original schedule, as prepared earlier by the BJP headquarters in consultations with the Himachal Pradesh party unit, Gadkari was to fly from Delhi on Tuesday morning to Himachal. His first rally was at the populous Bilaspur at noon and later in the afternoon at Solan. But an influential section of party leaders in the state were not in favour of it and they communicated their feelings to the central party leaders.
Given his previous experience of a lukewarm response in the state, he too decided not to insist on going there, sources said. In fact, Gadkari’s first set of rallies held on Saturday came on his insistence. The venue of those rallies, Rekong Peo in Kinnur district bordering China and the other at far away Nerwa-Chopal were in sharp contrast to the more thickly populated and centrally located areas where other top BJP leaders like Narendra Modi, Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and LK Advani addressed.
If this trend of resistance from party units continue then Gadkari may face a similar situation in Gujarat, where campaigning will pick up after Diwali. It would consequently put a real question mark over his `re-election’ as BJP president for the second term.
Gadkari has different ideas though. One of his close supporters said like a good leader who has risen to the ranks from the grassroots it is time for him to regain strength from there. “if is successful in drawing a good crowd on his home turf in Vidarbha and other regions, he can safely claim that people still believed in him than in adverse media campaign. He will prove that he is not a rootless wonder but is someone rooted to the ground. A leader is made on basis of popular support not by media reports.”
But not many in the BJP are willing to buy that. But alternately, they can’t decide on his fate till RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat decides to remove his supportive hand from his protégé. On Friday it was reported that he along with other top RSS functionaries held a meeting in Nagpur where they decided to fully back him and not to “ditch him in any way”.
Later that evening, senior RSS leader Bhaiyaji Joshi issued a statement that was clearly supportive of him: “Some allegations have been leveled by sections of the media only and an authorised agency is yet to look into these. It is unfortunate that the disclosure on these allegations has turned political.”
Gadkari is sure to make headlines on Tuesday – for his absence from a poll bound Himachal Pradesh.
ReplyDeleteGadkari must resign and be away from politics untill he is cleared of the corruption charges..