The Hindu : There is dilution in BJP ideology: Advani

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Mar 23, 2004

National

National

There is dilution in BJP ideology: Advani

ON BOARD THE BHARAT UDAY YATRA BUS, MARCH 22. The Deputy Prime Minister, L.K. Advani, today admitted to some dilution of the Bharatiya Janata Party's ideology on its way to becoming a ruling party at the Centre and said acceptance of economic liberalisation by all parties had bridged the ideological divide among them.

"A country as vast and pluralistic as India cannot be ruled only by an ideological party such as the Jan Sangh. It has to be an aggregative party," he told a group of reporters during his ongoing 8,000 km-long `Bharat Uday Yatra.'

"I propounded that either we limit our objectives as an ideological party and fight election in some States or corporations, but if we aspire to become a ruling party in India, we cannot be limited as an ideological party," he said.

On whether it had diluted the BJP's ideology, Mr. Advani said, "it takes place. Otherwise, don't think in terms of ruling the country and exist just as an organisation and propagate ideology. To rule India, we have to be inclusive."

Taking pot shots at the Congress, he said ``it is ironical that the Vidhan Sabha elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh were fought on the issues of development and good governance, it was one of the Congress Chief Ministers who raised the issue of cow slaughter as their track record had been very bad."

Stressing that the Kashi and Mathura temple disputes were not on the BJP's agenda, Mr. Advani said, ``I have time and again said that only construction of the Ram temple is on our party agenda and even the Ayodhya issue will be solved after the elections."

To a question, he said, "If I were to spell it out (the terms of talks to find a negotiated settlement), it would have died long back."

Mr. Advani said ``one reason why ideological gaps between parties have been bridged is that liberalisation has been accepted by all in the country. And we are discussing that the role of the State should be minimal."

Asked if minimising the State's role limited its functions as a welfare state, he asserted, "Therefore, we cannot have America in India."

"When the Janata Party was formed, I had said it can be a two-party system if it stabilised but both the Janata Party and the Congress had to be aggregative parties."

On the reasons for the fall of the Janata Party Government at the Centre, Mr. Advani said one reason was the clash of ambitions of the top leaders but the major reason was the fear after the announcement of organisational elections in the party that it would be dominated by the cadre-based Jan Sangh.

Air-conditioner fails

The air-conditioning system in Mr. Advani's rath tripped again today, forcing him to move to a car to carry on his yatra. This is the second time that the AC in the Swaraj Mazda rath has collapsed.

It had failed last week when Mr. Advani was in Andhra Pradesh and was repaired in Nagpur. It again failed apparently due to over-loading while moving from Jhansi to Gwalior via Datiya, BJP sources said.

PTI

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