BJP to ministers: Plug selves

Some were granted leave but on purely genuine grounds, like not being in the city or the country. Absentees included Human Resource Development Minister Murli Manohar Joshi, Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha, Disinvestment Minister Arun Shourie, Commerce Minister Arun Jaitley, Shipping Minister Shatrughan Sinha and Minister of State Vinod Khanna.

The approaching Assembly polls in Delhi, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh topped the agenda. And Naidu issued instructions galore: tour all poll-going states intensively by October 15, go to town with projects executed by your ministries, steal the thunder from Congress governments in states when it comes to Centre-backed schemes, be discreet in handing performance certificates to states, go to party offices while on tours and co-ordinate visits with BJP leaders and cadres and nationalist organisations (Sangh Parivar outfits).

Advani began his address, saying it was Advantage BJP. ‘‘Convert it in to a victory for the BJP,’’ he told his colleagues. General secretary Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, also present at the meeting, said: ‘‘Ministers’ tours would build bridges between the people and party workers in the run-up to the Assembly polls.’’

Naqvi said the ministers had been asked to be in touch with ‘‘nationalist organisations’’ involved in ‘‘positive’’ social work so that people are made aware of the Centre’s welfare schemes.

When he was asked to name the ‘‘nationalist organisations’’ with whom the ministers had been told to co-ordinate their visits, Naqvi said: ‘‘I am not here to draw a list of such organisations.’’ But he replied in the affirmative when he was asked whether the RSS was a ‘‘nationalist’’ organisation.