BJP decides to take Vajpayee Govt to task

NEW DELHI, DEC 24: Tacitly acknowledging that the Vajpayee Government's performance has not been up to the mark, the Bharatiya Janata Par...

NEW DELHI, DEC 24: Tacitly acknowledging that the Vajpayee Government8217;s performance has not been up to the mark, the Bharatiya Janata Party8217;s top leadership has decided it is time to take a hard look at its functioning and come up with suggestions on how to improve it.

The meeting of the party8217;s National Executive, to be held in Bangalore on January 2 and 3, will see the Vajpayee regime come under a microscope since one of its aims is to identify the shortcomings of the 10-month-old Central Government.

Steps for better coordination between the government and the party are also high on the agenda, particularly after the embarrassment over the Insurance and Patents Bills during the Parliament session.

Being held in the backdrop of the BJP8217;s debacle in the November Assembly elections 8212; for which many hold the poor performance of the Centre partially responsible 8212; leaders are hoping that some soul-searching will yield answers on what the party should do to set right the reverses it suffered in Delhi,Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. A detailed analysis of the reasons for the setbacks in these states will form the basis for the party8217;s strategy.

The government8217;s somersault on its 8220;swadeshi8221; economic policy 8212; as evident from the Insurance and Patents Bills 8212; has left the BJP8217;s cadres confused and disenchanted. Party general secretary M Venkaiah Naidu said today that programmes would be chalked out to explain to party workers the 8220;situation and circumstances8221; under which the government was functioning.

Swadeshi, said Naidu, was a 8220;broad philosophy8221; but it was necessary to be realistic since one was living in an era of globalisation. He said that political parties must readjust themselves to new realities and that broad consensus on vital economic issues was called for. Rather than adopt the United States or Soviet models, it was necessary for countries to have their own economic models. The South-East Asian experience had shown this and swadeshi was an appropriate model for India, he said.

Inreply to a question, he said there was no proposal to follow the Congress in giving 33 per cent reservation to women in party posts. But, he said, the BJP was the first party to have reservation for women, scheduled castes and tribes in the organisation.