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SAFFRON FALL
Little for Congress to gloat overMalladi Rama Rao Rahul Gandhi and Narendra Modi Taking on the role of a Devil’s Advocate, even if one is not a Modi Bhakt or a Parivar acolyte in the wildest dreams, one can ask what is there for the Congress to gloat over its victory in the recent assembly elections in Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, which were no more than a semi-final bout before the April-May ballot for the Lok Sabha. In Madhya Pradesh, it won by default and there was no clear mandate from the people. The BJP made the GOP run for its money and the people watched it like a T20 cricket match. Ashok Gehlot and Vasundhara Raje In Rajasthan, the time tested two-party state, the Congress did not get a landslide victory it expected but just managed to scrape through. Does this show the might of the Congress? Gehlot answered the question when he said that Vasundhara Raje wasted
Ajit Jogi and Mayawati
her opportunity. Well, the result
however shows the state of default
politics in the country. Lal Thanhawala Telangana and Mizoram fall in a different category. Whether the 24 Akbar Road likes to admit or not the party satraps in Hyderabad had egg on their face for their audacity of marching to Rajbhavan a day before counting and staking the right of their pre-poll alliance to be called first for formation of the government. Christian majority Mizoram turned against the Congress as Lal Thanhawala, the party’s mascot for the past three decades ignored the call of the Church and youth organisations for prohibition. The recent verdict is hailed as Rahul Baba’s triumph. And dubbed as a setback for Modi. Brand Modi has lost its sheen, say many commentators, while the Left- Secular camp avers that Moditva has reached its limits.
Manohar Lal Khattar
The short point is there was no
Congress wave. And Raffle was no
Bofors. Nor did Rahul’s discovery
of Hindu gods matteredto the
dismay of saffron camp, which had
gone to the town questioning his
claim to be a Kashmiri Kaul
Brahmin from the Dattatreya gotra.
Yogi Adityanath
Modi is offering more
ammunition to their guns these
days by his lectures to the BJP
cadres from Kerala to Tamil Nadu
and Uttar Pradesh on the harm the
Congress did to the Indian polity.
What is the need for a fresh round
of Congress bashing? If it is a signal
to launching Lok Sabha campaign,
this Modi comes off as a big
disappointment. This Modi is not
the Modi India had seen sweep the polls in 2014 by asking people to
rally round him for ‘acche din’. The question that demands an answer is, particularly going by Khattar-Speak, shouldn’t Modi bear the responsibility for defeat of the BJP, more so when he stands accused of “leading a campaign of calumny and half-truths”? Is the party taking shelter under the intangible antiincumbency sentiment to protect Modi? Are the eggheads unwilling to notice how the rural and urban India is no longer willing to be stuck in the demonitisation groove when they are faced with apotent mix of distress in agriculture fields and job market?Does the party hope to get away by speaking about cows to people asking for jobs? There is a deafening silence from 6 - A, Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Marg (BJP Central Office). Amit Shah True to the traditions of the Sangh (of course, of the Congress as well), Khattar attributed the Haryana result to the charisma of Modi. In neighbouring Rajasthan, however, Vasundhara Raje made no mention of Modi factor. While accepting the poll reverses, she simply thanked the electorate and congratulated the victor. Congress party; Shivraj Singh Chauhan and Raman Singh blamed themselves for the misfortune that has visited BJP in their states after three terms in office. There was no mention of Modi, the star campaigner, and his Sancho Panza, Amit Shah, whom the BJP has been projecting as the modern day Chankya. Also absent was any introspection for their display of what a commentator terms as conceit and braggadocio. Markandey Katju The question that demands an answer is, particularly going by Khattar-Speak, shouldn’t Modi bear the responsibility for defeat of the BJP, more so when he stands accused of “leading a campaign of calumny and half-truths” ? Is the party taking shelter under the intangible anti-incumbency sentiment to protect Modi? Are the egg-heads unwilling to notice how the rural and urban India is no longer willing to be stuck in the demonitisation groove when they are faced with apotent mix of distress in agriculture fields and job market?Does the party hope to get away by speaking about cows to people asking for jobs? There is a deafening silence from 6 - A, Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Marg (BJP Central Office). Manmohan Singh Modi, too, has not answered these questions as yet. But he surprised everyone by landing on the Sonia turf after the results, and by crediting himself as the job creator at the local rail coach factory. From Rai Bareilly to Praygraj and Varanasi and to Pune and Mumbai,he has made Nehru- Gandhi family the focus of his alliterations, acronyms and jibes - a clear signal that he does not want to allow the First Family of Indian Politics the breathing time to assess and rejig its strengths and to force him on the back-foot. He has left Hindutva agenda to his brain’s trust, Amit Shah. And Shah is going around the town after the semi-final bout expounding on the Ram Temple with a caveat. It is that the Supreme Court should settle the Ayodhya title suit in ten days by holding daily hearings.This is akin to the demand of the Parivar affiliates. The dispute which has been lingering from Nehru days may be listed before an appropriate bench of the Supreme Court in the first month of the New Year – 2019. So will the coming Lok Sabha
elections be like the historical wars
for the Delhi sultanate in which no
holds are barred and rivers of
blood have flown, as Justice
Markandey Katju opines. Rahul’s
Congress has not yet taken the
temple bait. It wants to get its
manna from farm loan waivers.
This is surprising. It shows how
short is the memory of the Grand
Old Party (GOP) which has
economists steeped in Nehruvian
socialism and market liberalism in
equal measure. |