NEW DELHI, 15 June 2004 — The split in the BJP deepened yesterday with right-wingers dismissing former Premier Atal Behari Vajpayee’s comment that the Gujarat riots were behind his party’s crushing electoral defeat.

In a television interview, Vajpayee had said the party made a “big mistake” in keeping on Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi after the riots.

But BJP President M. Venkaiah Naidu yesterday ruled out any leadership change in Gujarat. “There is no proposal to make any change in leadership in Gujarat,” he told reporters after speaking to Vajpayee on the phone.

Naidu said the Modi issue would not be discussed in the BJP National Executive meeting in Bombay, which would instead focus on a strategy for coming assembly elections in Maharashtra, Bihar, Jharkhand, Haryana and Arunachal Pradesh.

Earlier, BJP leaders met at Naidu’s residence, apparently to discuss Vajpayee’s comments. Naidu later denied Vajpayee held the Gujarat violence responsible for the party’s defeat.

He said Vajpayee’s comments had been misinterpreted.

“He and we are of the view that the BJP was not defeated because of the Gujarat violence,” Naidu said.

Vajpayee’s remarks also drew criticism from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Bajrang Dal. Without naming Vajpayee, RSS chief K. Sudarshan said that it was wrong to attribute the BJP defeat to Gujarat. If it was, the BJP would have lost assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chattisgarh too, he said.

He was speaking after a month-long RSS training camp here on Sunday night.

The media had blown the Gujarat riots “out of proportion,” Sudarshan said, and Vajpayee might have succumbed to “pressure” from the media which portrayed the carnage as the prime reason behind the BJP debacle.

“All English newspapers and electronic media blew the post-Godhra riots out of proportion, but conveniently forgot the Godhra carnage,” Sudarshan said, referring to the burning of the train coach in which many Hindus were killed.

The Bajrang Dal yesterday lashed out at both Vajpayee and former Deputy Premier L.K. Advani for distancing the party from the Hindutva ideology and called for them to retire from politics.

Bajrang Dal National Convener Prakash Sharma said that Vajpayee should stop humiliating Hindus and Hindutva.

The true reason for the electoral debacle was that the BJP distanced itself from its hard-line Hindu ideology.

“If the party leaders do not see their weakness and will not realize the actual cause of their defeat, they will face more problems,” Sharma said.

“Age is on the wrong side of Vajpayee and Advani,” he said. “They should take a rest now to allow young leaders to take charge.”