Detractors wait for right forum to pin Rajnath

NEW DELHI: There���s further proof that the BJP might remain trapped in the self-created quagmire of intrigue and factionalism. On Friday, Mr Rajnath Singh���s detractors said that the issue of the party president violating the party constitution while recasting the central parliamentary board will be raised at an ���appropriate party forum���.

These leaders said the party president did not have the power to unilaterally constitute the team. ���It has to be done only with the consent of the national executive. And he did not seek the permission of the national executive to reconstitute the highest policy making body of the party,��� they said.

In his anxiety to fill the body with senior leaders, the party president also did not take care to strike the right social balance. In the reconstituted central parliamentary board, seven of the 11 members are Brahmins. After Narendra Modi���s removal from the panel, OBCs have no representation.

The central parliamentary board used to be a body populated by party heavyweights. The reconstituted CPM has members like Bal Apte and Ananth Kumar, who have no major utility for the organisation and to states that will go to polls in the course of the next two years.

The anti-Rajnath group can be expected to take up this issue at the next meeting of the party���s national executive. Although the new team is seeking the support of the RSS nominee in the organisation, Ram Lall, to talk the anti-Rajnath leaders out of their current mood, leaders like Mr Modi are unlikely to put up with attempts to undermine their importance.

Mr Modi, incidentally, was the only national leader of the BJP who campaigned for the party in the Maharashtra civic elections. BJP bigwigs, who entertain some illusions about their clout with the Hindi-speaking voters of the state, chose to remain in Delhi.

The goings-on in the BJP will just not suit the party as these fissures have been revealed ahead of important electoral bouts in states. While two elections are underway, polls are scheduled to be held in Uttar Pradesh, Goa and Gujarat in the coming months.

Fears are also being expressed within the saffron outfit that the factional feud in the central unit will detract attention from its immediate tasks. The first sign was visible in Gujarat, where the newly-appointed youth wing chief, Mr Amit Thakkar, was greeted with brickbats. Mr Thakkar is a loyalist of known Modi-baiter Keshubhai Patel.