New Delhi: Veteran Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Lal Krishna Advani Wednesday called up senior leaders of the Janata Dal (United) urging them not to snap ties with BJP in a haste.
Advani swung into action within 24 hours of agreeing to withdraw his resignation from all posts in the party.
Both Advani and JD (U) have a common political adversary in the Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi. Advani had opted to resign from all party posts on Monday after BJP president Rajnath Singh on Sunday announced Modi’s appointment as chairman of the BJP central election committee.
Sources in the BJP said that Advani during his telephonic conversations with the JD (U) president Sharad Yadav and Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar said that Modi’s appointment to the post was an internal matter of BJP and does not in any way indicate that he would be appointed prime ministerial candidate of the BJP-led National Democratic Front (NDA) for the next year’s general elections.
BJP had succeeded in mollifying Advani giving the same logic with the promise that he would be duly consulted when the time to name the prime ministerial candidate comes.
JD (U)’s antipathy for Modi is well known. Under Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar’s pressure, Modi had become a persona non grata and was kept out of Bihar assembly elections in 2010. The clamour to name Modi as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate had soured relations between the two parties in Bihar where they share power since 2005 and has now come to the breaking point with JD (U) preparing to dump BJP in Bihar and walk out of the NDA.
Sources in the BJP suggest that Advani with his proactive move to get in touch with Sharad Yadav and Nitish Kumar wants to ensure that his own chances of becoming the next prime minister is not marred due to break-up of NDA. Advani was NDA’s choice as the prime ministerial candidate in 2009 general elections. JD (U) had earlier suggested that it would prefer Advani as the NDA’s prime ministerial candidate again while speaking against Modi.
