HVK Archives: No intention of quitting public: Advani
No intention of quitting public: Advani - The Observer
Observer Political Bureau
()
17 July 1997
Title: No intention of quitting public: Advani
Author: Observer Political Bureau
Publication: The Observer
Date: July 17, 1997
Bharatiya Janata Party president Lal Krishna Advani said on Wednesday that
he had neither any intention of retiring from public life nor opting out of
future elections.
He said that he was not against contesting elections as and when they were
held. He, however, said that he would not contest any Lok Sabha byelections.
Addressing a press conference at Himachal Bhavan here, he said "Dilli se ab
Nayi Dilli door nahin lagta (New Delhi does not seem far from Delhi now)."
This was his assessment of' his two-month-long journey across the country.
"We are already in power in Delhi. And after the yatra, I am firmly of the
belief that the BJP will come to power in New Delhi also," Mr Advani said.
Interpreting the response of the people as "their yearning for a change in
the Government at the Centre and the manner of governance," Mr Advani felt
that the BJP could provide this.
For Mr Advani, the Swarn Jayanti Rath Yatra (59 days, 15,000 km, 22 states
and Union territories) was an educational, exhilarating, enlightening and
inspiring experience. In his opinion, it would translate into additional
seats in the Lok Sabha from new areas.
"In any general elections held from now, the BJP and its allies - the Shiv
Sena, Haryana Vikas Party, Samata Party and the Akali Dal will win enough
seats to form a Government at the Centre," Mr Advani claimed. "At present,
we are not looking for new allies," he said in response to a question.
The response of the people to the patriotic pilgrimage, as Mr Advani
described the yatra, which at places even surpassed the response of
highly-emotive Ram Rath Yatra, indicates that "Indian politics is moving in
the right direction."
"As the BJP president, I am happy to have been associated with this major
mass contact and mass education campaign focussed on a landmark event in
the history of modern India," Mr Advani said in a written press statement
circulated at the conference.
"If Bofors was the decisive electoral issue that sealed the fate of
Congress president and Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in, the 1988 general
elections, the fodder seam symbolising corruption in high places will be
the decisive electoral issue in any election held from now," he said. He
predicted the "doom of all those leaders and parties which were saving
Bihar Chief Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav."
However, what he found strange was the silence of the champion of probity
in public life, former Prime Minister V P Singh, who came to power on the
Bofors issue, to the murky happenings in Bihar.
Mr Singh's silence was disappointing, Mr Advani felt. It was the silence
and inaction of Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral, whom he described as a
decent man, that incensed the BJP president. "I had expected Mr Gujral to
resign," he said.
"Those who protect the fodder seam accused are doomed to disaster," Mr
Advani predicted and said that the reason for this was the people's
aversion to corruption, which ate away most of the benefits of development
and progress the country made in the past 50 years.
The United Front Government continued to get weaker and weaker with each
passing day, he said, referring to the DMK statement and its threat to pull
out of the Central Government. "This only reinforces the instability of the
coalition arrangement," Mr Advani said.
At the same time, such a Government was making attempts to malign and
destabilise the perfectly functioning Maharashtra Government, Mr Advani
charged. The campaign in Mumbai was a deliberate conspiracy to malign and
use certain incidents to topple the Shiv Sena-BJP Government, he alleged.
Even in Punjab, certain forces were not happy at the harmony between the
Sikhs and the Hindus, achieved due to the tie-up between the Akali Dal and
the BJP, Mr Advani said.
Mr Advani, however, skirted the issue of a leadership tussle in the Delhi
BJP unit, where an open fight for the top position has been raging.
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