For a brighter future

It is by overcoming these problems by a nationwide network of alliances (which would have been unthinkable in the Jana Sangh’s days of Hindi-Hindu-Hindustan) that the BJP has successfully negotiated its way since then to power-sharing at the Centre again, this time as the declared leader of the National Democratic Alliance. Vajpayee has chosen the occasion not only to speak of the party’s victory but also to voice the resolve of its leadership, at least the section he symbolises, to make the change at the Centre work. His call to the Congress for cooperation in evolving a national consensus on national issues and to the allies in the NDA in implementing unpopulist decisions bespeaks a new confidence on the BJP’s part. More widely notable has been his sharp rebuke to the hardliners in the Sangh Parivar, who have been trying to combine the saffron and the swadeshi in their criticism of the coalition’s policies and performance.

What makes this criticism particularly dangerous to the BJP is the underlying but obvious presumption that the coalition is only a matter or passing convenience, only a stepping stone to unshared power. The criticism can only serve to create the public impression that the party and the parivar are only waiting for better conditions and times in which to take issues off the famous “back burner” and implement a non-NDA agenda. There is another category of his government’s critics, whom the Prime Minister has not mentioned: those who regard the moderation of the BJP in power only as a mask. These can be answered effectively only by the party making up its mind to put its altered priorities and policies beyond all reasonable doubt.