BJP national president Amit Shah’s recent two-day visit to Jammu and a slew of hectic deliberations related to party matters have significantly removed some mist that had wrapped J&K political and ideological scenario over past few months. He held parleys with party leaders and workers, interacted with party ministers, MLAs, MLCs and asked for briefs on performance. Rarely does a national president of the ruling party go deep into such details in various aspects as he did in a State where the party is in coalition with the ruling apparatus.
Amit Shah chose three areas in relation to J&K on which he reflected candidly and confidently. He seemed very confident of setting things right if these have gone wrong somehow somewhere. The three areas are (a) security and status (b) futuristic vision and goals of the party and (c) delivery. With regard to security and status, he made a pointed statement which has created many ripples in the placid waters. He said that BJP was not a party that is going to compromise on security and national sovereignty in any case. He made the cryptic remark that nation comes first and Government come after that. Asserting that only recently, the Prime Minister had chaired a high powered meeting on J&K in which the security aspect was discussed threadbare and the Prime Minister had made it sufficiently clear that no talks would be held with separatists and anti-national elements, he said it meant that the Centre would talk to only genuine and legitimate stakeholders. He reiterated that BJP would not mind if the Government had to be sacrificed for national sovereignty. This somehow could be a hint to the rumours that the State Government has been clearly told that controlling the unrest in Kashmir was the task which local leadership had to perform and that it should be done as soon as possible.
In regard to futuristic vision and policy of the party, the national president said that the party and its workers had to start working assiduously from today for the Parliamentary elections of 2019 and Assembly Election of 2021. He has issued clear instructions to the party workers and MLAs/MLCs that they have to be in close liaison with their constituencies and expand their activities.
With regard to delivery aspect, the national president is said to have been flooded with complaints from sections of party workers mostly directed against some BJP Ministers and MLAs. They were chastised for non delivery and much reduced interaction with the grassroot level workers of the party. The general complaint was that the people of Jammu had great expectations from the present coalition Government but these have not come true. If more than 19,000 crore rupees have been released by the Union Government out of the Prime Minister’s package, at least half of it meaning 9,000 crore rupees should have been spent on developmental works in Jammu region. BJP Ministers need to show what developmental work was done in Jammu province and what projects were completed during their tenure. We understand that the national president has taken a very serious note of internal dissensions in the party and warning has been given to those who do not conform to the party discipline. Those who brought these complaints to the party chief were very vocal in anticipating a big damage to the party in future elections if the rot was not stemmed forthwith and drastic action was not taken against those who are alleged to have undermined party discipline.
BJP national president has given enough hints that the party would not hesitate from taking big steps in the State aimed at restoring law and order and bringing back peace to Kashmir and at the same time doing some meaningful exercise to overhaul the structure of the party in Jammu.
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