DECEMBER 13: While the electorate in the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections clearly rejected the policies pursued by the Congress headed by Sonia Gandhi, why did the Congress continue to grope in the dark, asked BJP general secretary M Venkaiah Naidu, MP, on Monday.Naidu, who is in Chennai to inspect the arrangements for the three-day sessions of the BJP's executive and national council, beginning from December 27, was addressing a media conference at the BJP party office.Ridiculing the Congress party's attempts at ``introspection'' to find out why it ended up with an all-time low tally in the elections, he said two factors stood out in the verdict. Approval of the BJP Government's performance since March 1998 (a mandate for Atal Behari Vajpayee) and disapproval of Congress programmes and its ``leadership that was not mature and acceptable.'' The Congress debacle was despite invoking the Nehru-Gandhi family name, he pointed out.Instead of taking corrective steps to rebuild the party organisation that would facilitate functioning as a responsible and constructive Opposition, the Congress attempted to negate the mandate, Venkaiah Naidu charged. The BJP did not want the Congress to go into the oblivion. A parliamentary democracy needed a strong Opposition.Accusing the Congress of indulging in double standards, he recalled that it was the Congress which was instrumental in destabilising the Deve Gowda, I K Gujral and Vajpayee Governments in 1997 and 1999.Rejecting the Congress demand for resignation of BJP ministers chargesheeted in the Babri Masjid demolition case, Naidu retorted that Indira Gandhi was sworn in as Prime Minister in 1980 though she was chargesheeted earlier in the jeep scandal case.The `sudden' demand for the resignation of L K Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi, who were Ministers since March 1998, stemmed from the fact that the Congress could no longer destabilise the Vajpayee Government which had a comfortable majority in the Lok Sabha, Venkaiah Naidu said.The Congress, which challenged the BJP to bring the Bofors pay-off case to an end, now raised a hue and cry when several accused were charge-sheeted, he said.
