EDITORIAL: Advani's Visit and BJP

THE LIGHT OF ANDAMANS - Vol 35 | Issue 17-18 | 28 Oct 2011

EDITORIAL

Advani's Visit and BJP

Lal Kishen Advani had cut short his visit to Ranchi disappointing the workers over there when he said that he had to rush to Andamans as he desperately wanted to meet the old Jan Sanghis in Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

At the ripe age of 84, he could manage to touch this farthest outpost of India, sending a clear cut message that in his scheme of things, Andamans too counts. Whether the state unit of BJP could take mileage of Advani's visit is a different matter.

The group as soon as it landed rushed to Cellular Jail to pay tributes to the freedom fighters. Someone pointed out that he could not control his tears when he visited the memorial. Savarkar has been a plank for BJP and is used to the hilt at different levels. The controversy apart, nobody remembers those who were deported here between 1857 and 1900. They are missed big time by everyone. Those great souls do not qualify in today's milieu. To remember them, one needs to look for a memorial!

Advani's visit had strewn enough feathers in the party. There was a tacit competition in outdoing one another in putting up banners and billboards. One could not see any symmetry in those displays whereas it clearly manifested the differences, and who belonged where and why.

Did the state unit miss the opportunity to bring forth or highlight matters of local concern when the national leaders were here? Most of the speakers at the Conference at ITF grounds had finished their discourses, well before the leader arrived. Advani or the other national leaders should have been at least briefed by the State Unit about the level of corruption in the Administration, which did not happen. Advani spoke about black money and corruption at national level. There was nothing Island-specific in the addresses of the leaders. Even the address by the State head was run of the mill stuff, who could not compose his words properly.

It is also learnt that there was no interaction between the leaders and the party workers, and many of them returned disappointed. The money and energy spent by the party to coordinate the local leg of the Yatra could not create a visible ripple anywhere. The Z-category security too played spoilsport with the local leadership and workers. Till the last moment, they were not allowed to even share the dias with their national leader.

Of late, BJP too have made breakthrough by welcoming a few PRI members from Congress and TMC. A Diwali gift credited to the visit of Advani.

Bishnu too stole the show, when he reached the airport with his entourage to receive his leader to the dismay of the local leaders. They forgot that he is still the MP of BJP and deserved some space in the scheme of things. For that to materialize, his opponents need to mature as politicians. A seat on the dias could have confused many about the events going to transpire.