Advani changes tack

Relegated to the fringes by the BJP high command over the past five years, Lal Krishna Advani has roused himself from obscurity on the eve of the party’s foundation day, only a few days ahead of the first phase of the Lok Sabha elections. In a blog titled ‘Nation First, Party Next, Self Last’, the former Deputy Prime Minister seems unrecognisable from the firebrand leader who had shaped the Hindutva agenda and remained a vociferous votary of the Ram temple. Replaced by party president Amit Shah from the Gandhinagar seat, which he had won six times, the nonagenarian Advani has chosen not to raise a hue and cry over the snub. Instead, he has launched a veiled attack on the party top brass for dubbing political rivals as anti-national over the emotive issue of national security. His new-found respect for diversity and freedom of expression is obviously music to the Opposition’s ears.

Interestingly, neither Shah nor Narendra Modi is mentioned in the blog. It was this duo which had unceremoniously made Advani a member of the BJP’s Margdarshak Mandal (group of mentors) along with another senior leader and fellow party founder, Murli Manohar Joshi, soon after the landslide victory in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Advani has finally made it clear that he is not on the same page as the all-powerful twosome. By underlining the party’s commitment to the freedom of choice of every citizen at the personal and political levels, he has virtually questioned Modi-Shah’s strong-arm tactics.

Unsourced news reports have claimed that Joshi is negotiating with senior Congress leaders after being considered ‘too old’ for the BJP ticket. The disgruntled old guard might not figure in the saffron party’s current scheme of things, but the likes of Advani and Joshi have already given Opposition parties fresh ammo to target the ruling dispensation. In the twilight of their political careers and no longer in the electoral reckoning, the two stalwarts can afford to speak their mind and make the powers that be uncomfortable.