Southern States - Kerala   

`Probe into vote sale a futile exercise'

By Ignatius Pereira

KOLLAM Oct. 14. The former BJP State vice-president, Xavier Paul, has said that if the party State unit constitutes an inquiry commission to probe the vote-selling allegation against the party in the Ernakulam by-poll, it would only serve to create another round of bitter enmity among party members.

Talking to The Hindu here on Tuesday, he said there was no better instance than his own past experience over such an issue. (Dr. Paul, along with two other vice-presidents of the party in 1991, K. Ayyappan Pillai and Palliyara Raman, was a member of an inquiry commission constituted to probe the vote-selling allegation against the party in the general elections that year.)

He said that though the commission had submitted a report to the Central leadership, it had never been taken up for discussion at the national executive. And he became the enemy of some of the top State leaders. Dr. Paul has since then kept aloof from party activities.

He said that his inquiry report had been submitted to Central leaders including Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the then national president, Murli Manohar Joshi, Sikander Bakht and Sunder Singh Bhandari.

Dr. Paul said the report was based on testimonies given by 140 members of the party including five district presidents. Dr. Paul had even summoned the then State president, K. Raman Pillai, to testify before the commission. In the 1991 elections, the BJP had an estimated strength of 10.5 lakh votes in the State.

But the votes polled in favour of the party were only 4 lakhs. Therefore, 6.5 lakh votes had been sold. The report mentioned that the vote sale was effected through door-to-door campaigning by extreme Sangh Parivar activists who gave the impression to traditional BJP voters that if they voted for the UDF candidate at a particular constituency, the UDF has promised the entry of four BJP candidates into the Assembly.

Moreover, an impression was created among BJP voters that if the UDF was not helped, the CPI(M) would come to power and that would mean hard times for the party.

It was on this score that many BJP votes had gone in favour of the UDF and the Indian Union Muslim League gained the most by returning 19 members to the Assembly, he said.

When the BJP voters asked for an explanation later, they were told that the UDF had betrayed them, the report had said.

The report had also called for disciplinary action against some senior State-level party functionaries on this issue.

The report had mentioned that the 1991 elections were conspicuous with no senior leader of the party entering the campaign arena for the party candidates.

He said the same situation was repeated in the 2001 elections when the `Parivarthana Yatra' of the BJP had posters with party leaders showing their palms.

It connoted a pro-Congress stand and the subject had come up for heated discussions in party circles since the `Kerala Mochana Yatra' of the Congress also had posters of leaders of that party raising their palms.

Dr. Paul said a `chinthan baitak' or an inquiry commission would serve no purpose. These would end up as exercises to hoodwink ordinary party cadres.

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