Oppose, don146;t distract

The BJP, which discovered its oxygen supply shut down by the country8217;s voters, is today in a desperate search for relevance. Its attempt to make Sonia Gandhi8217;s foreign origins an issue all over again should be perceived in this light. The idea is to ignite an incendiary sense of disgust in the public 8212; that why-can8217;t-one-billion-Indians-find-one-Indian-to-lead-them feeling 8212; which could feed upon itself and yield possible dividends in the uncertain times ahead. For a party whose pet themes have been bombing at the box-office with alarming frequency, this may appear a pretty desperate gamble. But then the BJP is pretty desperate at the moment.

In the mood of wide-scale dejection that has seized it, even a Sushma Swaraj could appear a veritable guru 8212; more so if she carries out her threat to have herself tonsured. There is, in any case, a great deal of churning going on within the party, with the NextGen leaders positioning themselves for future leadership positions. In such a situation, if Uma Bharati makes an statement, you may be sure Sushma Swaraj will make an even more strident one the next day; if a Govindacharya 8212; who has never faced an election 8212; ends his self-imposed exile to set up a Rashtriya Swabhiman Andolan, you may be sure that Sahib Singh Verma 8212; who has just lost one 8212; will launch an Azad Hind Fauj. So persuasive have all these antics been that the BJP and its allies now plan to boycott the swearing in ceremony of Sonia Gandhi as prime minister.

If they do that it will be a bit like a cricket team picking up the bails and refusing to play once the match slips out of its grip. Besides being mean-spirited, it goes against the grain of democracy. Why did they not boycott Sonia Gandhi when she was the Leader of the Opposition if they felt so strongly about the issue? After all, that was a constitutional post as well. Besides, the timing of this particular campaign is spectacularly wrong. Not only has the Congress Party, under Sonia Gandhi8217;s leadership, registered a turnaround in its electoral fortunes, a 13-party coalition has just expressed its confidence in her prime ministerial candidature. In any case, the issue of these famed foreign origins had got another thorough airing during the latest election campaign, with a battery of BJP leaders referring to it constantly. If, despite their best efforts, the Congress came back with an additional 31 seats, and with Sonia Gandhi herself winning by a margin of nearly 2.5 lakh votes, we can only conclude that the electorate has spoken 8212; and it has nothing to say against the lady8217;s foreign origins. So the BJP must be graceful in defeat. They can oppose Sonia Gandhi, by all means, but they must do so politically 8212; and according to the rules of Indian democracy.