JODHPUR, Mar 22: Hurt over denial of ticket, senior BJP leader Jaswant Singh today ruled out any compromise on his demand for Barmer constituency and appeared to keep his options open on contesting from the seat as an independent.
He also made veiled attacks on the party leadership but took no names, comments that came as party President Rajnath Singh and senior leader Arun Jaitley spoke of utilising Singh’s services in an appropriate manner.
“The party has done this to me twice now and now there is no chance of accepting any alternative proposal,” he told the media a day after the party gave Barmer ticket to a recent entrant and Congress defector Col Sonaram Chowdhry.
Singh, who would be reaching Barmer tomorrow, refused to disclose his plans on whether he would be filing his nomination as an independent.
“Everything will be decided only after I reach Barmer and have a discussion with my supporters,” he said.
Referring to the denial of ticket to him and the “disregarding” of other senior leaders in the party, Singh said that “this party of ideology is tragically being encroached upon by those, who have been arch detractors of BJP’s ideology.”
“It is so unfortunate that the BJP has been completely taken over by the elements (outsiders), who never have any respect of party’s ideology”, he said without naming anyone.
The former union minister said that the BJP was now divided into two factions “one which is real and the other is unreal or better put original and duplicate. Unfortunately the duplicate part has the reins of party now.”
Opposing giving tickets to those who have recently joined the party either as defectors or as new entrants in politics, Singh remarked sarcastically that “for them it is easy to have a BJP ticket than to have a rail or a flight.”
His earlier three terms in Lok Sabha have been from Jodhpur, Chittorgarh (Rajasthan) and Darjeeling (West Bengal).
Singh turned emotional as he spoke of his “pain” but made it clear that he does not want to do the “politics” of emotions.
He recalled the contributions of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and L K Advani in building the party and wondered where the party is going now.
A close associate of Vajpayee as well as Advani, whose influence has also waned in the party, he said it is important for the subscribers of the philosophy of BJP to know who has “encroached” on it.
“They should ask where is the party going.” (PTI)
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