LUCKNOW/NEW DELHI, 21 October — Political squabbling in his own political constituency compelled Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to cancel his press conference at Raj Bhawan in Lucknow yesterday and rush back to New Delhi, complaining of "bad throat."
Vajpayee yesterday cut short his two-day visit to the Uttar Pradesh capital, and returned to New Delhi after canceling a series of programs on his itinerary.
Vajpayee took all by surprise when he walked into the venue of a press conference on the lawns of the governor’s residence, in the morning to declare he would not interact with the media on account of a sore throat.
"Much as I wanted to have a long question-answer session with you all, my bad throat is not allowing me to do so," Vajpayee told a huge crowd of journalists. "If my throat improves by the evening, I will speak to you at the airport before my departure."
However, barely half an hour later messages were doing the rounds on the police wireless system about a change in the prime minister’s program and his rescheduled departure at 1.00 p.m.
"On medical advice he has decided to cut short his stay here and return to New Delhi," a Uttar Pradesh official told reporters. Notwithstanding official claims, speculation is rife here that the sudden change in Vajpayee’s program was due to growing dissidence in the state BJP unit.
Dissatisfied with the Cabinet expansion Chief Minister Mayawati carried out this month, a band of some 26 BJP legislators had demanded a pullout by their party from the coalition government led by the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).
As Vajpayee refused an audience to the dissident legislators, they were planning to give vent to their anger at the RSS show in the evening.
"That would have afforded us an opportunity to be face-to-face with the prime minister, who is otherwise surrounded by a coterie that sabotaged our plans to have a word with him," said a BJP legislator and former minister who was angry at being robbed of a chance to meet Vajpayee.
