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Journalism of Courage
Ever since the NDA government crossed the three-year mark, stock-taking is in the air. At the same time, some early chatter can be heard in the ruling alliance about the upcoming assembly elections in nine states and General Election 2004. In this moment, as the NDA looks back and plans ahead, both exercises are overhung by a spate of recent controversies. Whether it is the VHP-Bajrang Dal stridently taking on the BJP/PMO/PM or the spectacle of NDA constituents openly sniping at each other in public, mounting in-house rumblings have successfully marred the third anniversary celebrations in the Vajpayee government. Plainly, more and more in the NDA, the centre refuses to hold.
It has always been the case that the BJP is under seige more from its friends 8212; sister organisations of the sangh parivar and allies in the NDA 8212;than from its enemies. But this predicament has never been more sharply etched than it is today. The VHP and Bajrang Dal are unhappy, their leading lights proclaim to anybody who cares to listen, with the Vajpayee government8217;s performance on terrorism and disinvestment. As far as these organisations are concerned, the country8217;s security policy should have been far more muscular, and the economic policy infinitely more 8216;swadeshi8217;. But even as they speak, it is evident that these are not the civilised 8216;perceptional differences8217; that party president Venkaiah Naidu has painted them to be, to be sorted out across the table when the family elders meet. The tone and tenor of the criticism 8212; the crass insults hurled at the prime minister or his PMO by senior VHP worthies Ashok Singhal and Giriraj Kishore 8212; point to a more intractable problem. The VHP and the Bajrang Dal are simply unwilling to accept that even a BJP-led government cannot be bullied on crucial matters by interest groups that posture and preen outside of the electoral process. This is, equally, the BJP8217;s failure: as the party in power, it has been unable to impress upon these organisations the full measure of their unimportance.
