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BJP : Uma Bharti out, but not down |
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The BJP Parliamentary Board has expelled former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister and fire-brand woman leader, Uma Bharti from the primary membership of the party on charges of indiscipline and anti-party activities. Both Advani and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee were present at the board meeting on Monday, Dec. 5, which took the decision.
Party general secretary Arun Jaitley said the Board decided to expel Uma Bharti after considering her response to the show cause notice served on her and her utterances during the last few days. He refused to comment on Uma Bharti allegation that the party had strayed from its ideology, become corrupt, and had no principles. He said: “Her allegations have nothing to do with the subject of indiscipline but were used to deflect the charges she faced.” She had been using language that was “not dignified politics.”
Jaitley said that of the 13 MLAs who walked out of the legislature party meeting along with Bharti in Bhopal on November 28 when Shivraj Singh Chauhan was elected leader, nine responded to the notice, asking them to explain why they should not be expelled.
They expressed regret over their behaviour and assured the leadership that they would not be found wanting in matters of discipline.
Reacting to her expulsion, Uma Bharti said that she did not accept or recognise the parliamentary board’s decision. She claimed that she is the real BJP. Uma Bharti struck back by demanding that Advani should immediately resign as BJP president as he allegedly disgraced the party by going to Pakistan and praising its founder Mohd. Ali Jinnah. She said that she would send an appeal to the disciplinary committee against her expulsion. Earlier, on Sunday, Dec. 4, Uma Bharti asked Advani and Atal Bihari Vajpayee to float a new political party with no room for what she called a “pack of leaders who are not loyal and lacked ideological moorings.”
Vajpayee on Tuesday rebutted Uma Bharti’s charges that the party was anti-OBC (other backward classes) and that its leadership has been hijacked by four generation next leaders. Vajpayee said “there was no truth” in Bharti’s allegation that four “hijackers” have got control of the plane which had the former Prime Minister and party president L.K. Advani as pilots and party workers as passengers.
“The party is moving forward at its own pace. It is going ahead with the goal in front of it. Nobody has hijacked anybody,” he told reporters on the sidelines of a function at the party headquarters to observe the 50th anniversary of B,R. Ambedkar.
Interim president likely
Uncertainty about who will succeed L.K. Advani as BJP president after he steps down at the end of the month, continues. Party general secretary Pramod Mahajan said in Mumbai on December 7 that Advani will resign from his post after the party’s three-day national convention in Mumbai later this month. He said the party was likely to have a new chief by the end of January next year. But he said discussions on Advani’s resignation and a new appointment would not form part of the Mumbai convention to be held from December 28 to 30.
Mahajan said that since Advani has another year’s tenure left, a stop-gap president would be installed early next year, and a full-fledged one would be elected subsequently. There are reports that former BJP president Venkaiah Naidu may be made the interim president of the party.
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