NEW DELHI, 14 May — The Hindu extremist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the lead partner in the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA), yesterday blamed its allies for their stunning defeats in assembly elections but said the verdict posed no danger to Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s coalition government.
BJP leader J.P. Mathur said the opposition’s sweeping victory in the states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Assam and West Bengal and the Union territory of Pondicherry following last week’s ballot would not lead to instability in New Delhi. He said the NDA enjoyed a majority in parliament and would continue to govern at the center. “These polls will have no impact on the Vajpayee government’s stability because it has a parliamentary majority in the Lok Sabha (lower house). People will forget these elections in two months.”
“It was a local election, no national issue was involved,” said BJP President J. Krishnamurthy, whose predecessor was forced to resign in March when he was caught on camera taking a wad of cash from journalists posing as arms dealers.
Unfazed by the resounding defeat of its allies in the state elections, the BJP yesterday claimed results from regional elections would pose no threat to the central government.
“Absolutely not,” Krishnamurthy said when asked whether the poll results could threaten the Vajpayee government.
“Vajpayee is as safe as he was ever,” Krishnamurthy said.
Mathur said the BJP allies were to blame for their defeats in Tamil Nadu and Assam. “Our allies stood disgraced and contested the polls without basic strengths,” he said. “There was a wave against them and this result was expected.” BJP allies Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and the Asom Gon Parishad (AGP) rule Tamil Nadu and Assam respectively, but lost the elections, held on Thursday. The BJP was not a major force in any of the five places, but it fared poorly. Mathur said the defeat for the BJP and its allies did not mean that Vajpayee had lost his mass appeal. The prime minister has in recent months been battered by a defense corruption scandal that forced his party president to quit in disgrace.
Mathur said Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi’s bid to nominate his son, M.K. Stalin, as his successor in the DMK had upset many in Tamil Nadu. Stalin struggled to win the election from a constituency that had been a DMK bastion.
Mathur, however, admitted that the BJP “miscalculated” by tying up with the AGP in Assam just ahead of the polls.
But Mathur appeared to be happy over the Trinamool Congress’ failure to dislodge the Left Front in West Bengal, which the Communists have ruled for 24 years. Trinamool President Mamata Banerjee was a BJP ally until she dramatically quit the Vajpayee government in March and teamed up with Sonia Gandhi’s Congress party. Mamata, has resigned as the Trinamool chief after her party’s defeat in the elections.
Left Front’s victory in West Bengal, spells a major relief for the former chief minister of the state Jyoti BasuFor the first time in 49 years, Basu did not contest, yet the 87-year old leftist campaigned tirelessly addressing two to three rallies a day. Time and again, he asserted, “There is no alternative to the Left Front in West Bengal and that is why the Fronts victory is inevitable.”
Mathur agreed that the election results would make the Congress — which won in two states and could retain power in Pondicherry — more aggressive. “The results will encourage the Congress to attack us more.”
“It is a direct rejection of the economic policy of the central government. It has become untenable for the Vajpayee government to continue,” said Sitaram Yechuri of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM). “There is going to be a realignment of political forces at the national level. There is serious trouble for the BJP and it’s allies.”
