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BJP against RS seat for Natwar Singh

Neena Vyas

Rajnath Singh not to seek another term

Natwar Singh

NEW DELHI: The Bharatiya Janata Party is not expected to accommodate the former External Affairs Minister, Natwar Singh, in the Rajya Sabha. Notwithstanding reports that Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje was keen to do so, senior party leaders here indicated that the BJP could not give him a seat as the party had repeatedly demanded his resignation following a United Nations report on the oil-for-food scandal.

“If Ms. Raje wants to give a seat to a ‘Jat’ – Mr. Singh is a ‘Jat’ and that is the reason being given for Ms. Raje’s support to his candidature — let her give some other ‘Jat’ candidate. How can the BJP give Natwar Singh a seat? It is impossible,” said a very senior party leader speaking authoritatively.

“We demanded Mr. Singh’s head and got it,” was how another senior leader put it.

The likelihood of the former Gujarat Chief Minister, Keshubhai Patel, getting another term in the Rajya Sabha was also remote, party insiders said. There were two factors – Mr. Patel’s health that would not permit him to attend Parliament regularly, and the fact that he had put in his lot almost openly with the dissenters in Gujarat during the recent Assembly election.

Asked who the BJP candidates would be for the Rajya Sabha, party president Rajnath Singh said: “I have yet to talk to party chief ministers to ascertain from them what names their States were likely to recommend. It is only after this process is completed that the party’s candidates for the Rajya Sabha are to be finalised – about a week from now.”

However, he said he had made up his mind about not seeking yet another term in the Rajya Sabha for himself. His term will end in November this year. “It was a set of circumstances that put me in the Rajya Sabha. I never sought this. I will not seek another term,” he said, hinting that as party president he would set an example.

As for contesting the next Lok Sabha poll, Mr. Singh was non-committal. He said that at the time of the next general election the party would decide on who among the leaders should contest. “We will need some senior leaders to manage the election instead of getting bogged down in their own elections.”

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