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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | BJP weighs Anna effect by Radhika Ramaseshan

BJP weighs Anna effect by Radhika Ramaseshan

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published Published on Apr 15, 2011   modified Modified on Apr 15, 2011

The BJP is still sizing up the fallout of Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption activism, undecided whether it would be able to reap political dividends, if any, from the urban, middle-class “upsurge” across the country.

The leadership is expected to exchange notes and work out its strategy once the Assembly polls verdict is out. “The outcome will show whether the movement (that came in the midst of the state polls) had an impact and if corruption was a big electoral issue,” a leader said.

The BJP’s dilemma, a source said, was evident from the start. When Hazare, RTI activist Arvind Kejriwal, former top cop Kiran Bedi and others sat on a dharna on Delhi’s Jantar Mantar on April 5, the leadership took note of it with “trepidation” and not “expectation”.

The source admitted that despite the BJP’s history of foregrounding corruption in its political and election discourse — especially after it gained enormously from its support to and participation in the Jai Prakash Narayan and Bofors movements — the brass wasn’t overly excited with the scene at Jantar Mantar. “We recognised that Hazare’s movement had the potential of destroying the political class,” a BJP senior official said.

For one, the members from Maharashtra said the BJP-Shiv Sena government in the state from 1995 to 1999 was at his “receiving” end.

A Hazare fast-unto-death claimed the heads of two BJP ministers, Mahadev Shivankar and Shashikant Sutar.

“Both were strong wickets but this man has the knack for claiming one or two wickets in every fasting season. When we were in the Opposition in Maharashtra earlier, we had supported him without realising the implications. He is an unguided missile. The BJP might imagine that it can manipulate Hazare but our efforts can recoil on us,” a Maharashtra MP said.

A source said there was another reason why the BJP was circumspect.

“To Hazare’s civil society associates, the BJP is anathema, they would have spurned its help in any form. It was only when Baba Ramdev and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar went on the dais that the BJP’s type of people poured in,” the source said.

Even so, the BJP’s physical presence at the protest epicentre was minimal. Barring individual leaders, there was no collective appearance.

While sources maintained that a four-day campaign, “however intense”, could not be compared with the other anti-graft milestones in Indian history such as the Bofors (case), the Hazare episode could not be ignored too.

“The public outrage reflects the national mood for which all of us in the political dispensation are responsible,” an office-bearer said.

The jury was out on whether the BJP could extract political mileage out of it. “We are fortunate enough to be in the Opposition but our campaign has got undermined by the charges against our Karnataka and Uttarakhand CMs,” a source admitted.

The “best case scenario” for the BJP, the source said, was for the “movement” to disintegrate under the burden of the internal contradictions between the stake holders. The worst was if the government-civil society panel reached a consensus on the Lok Pal Bill.

The Telegraph, 15 April, 2011, http://telegraphindia.com/1110415/jsp/frontpage/story_13856945.jsp


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