OUR PARTY’S SEVENTEENTH PRESIDENT
In 1950, the Constituent Assembly of Independent India adopted a constitution committing the country to Parliamentary Democracy as its system of government.
Till then, Dr. Syama Prasad Mookerji was a member of Pandit Nehru’s Cabinet, holding the important portfolio of Industrial Development. In the Constituent Assembly, along with Pandit Nehru, Sardar Patel, Dr. Ambedkar and others like Dr. K.M. Munshi etc., Dr. Mookerji also played a critical role in shaping India’s constitution.
With the constitution framing task completed and the country poised at the threshold of its first General Election, Dr. Mookerji decided to part company with the Congress Government, launch a party of his own, and seek the support of the masses on issues like Kashmir, Tibet, China’s designs, plight of Hindus in Pakistan-both West and East, and the urgent need to make the people realize that our country’s economic progress could not be achieved by imitating western models. All these were issues on which he differed very sharply with Pandit Nehru’s way of thinking. On several of these matters even Sardar Patel did not agree with Pandit Nehru.
In 1951, thus, Dr. Mookerjee founded the Bharatiya Jana Sangh. Those of us who are in the BJP today and were old enough at that time to aspire making some worthwhile contribution to free India’s nascent democracy were attracted towards Dr. Mookerji’s thinking. Our political yatra thus started in 1951 and except for a short period of three years, 1977 to 1980, is continuing still. During those three years, Bharatiya Jana Sangh became part of the Janata Party which under the leadership of Lokmanya Jaya Prakash Narayan had waged a grim and successful battle against the Emergency, and defeated the Congress Government in the 1977 elections. So, during those three years several of us led by Shri Vajpayee had our first experience of governance in New Delhi under the Prime Ministership of Shri Morarji Desai.
The Janata Party did not last long, nor did its government. We who earlier belonged to the Jana Sangh resumed our yatra as Bharatiya Janata Party in 1980. The yatra is continuing till today. A major difference however has taken place in the meanwhile.
BJP is no longer a fringe party of the opposition. It is one of the two principal poles of national politics, and so the principal opposition in both Houses of Parliament. Besides it is the ruling party in nine states of the country – in six of these on its own, and in the remaining three in alliance with its other partners in the National Democratic Alliance.
If Dr. Mookerji was our first National President, recently elected Shri Nitin Gadkari is our seventeenth President. In between, we have had several distinguished Presidents including Pandit Premnath Dogra, Acharya Raghuvir, Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya and Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
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A three-day session of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s National Council cum National Executive has just ended at Indore.
The session, attended by nearly four thousand delegates witnessed the Party’s newly elected National President Shri Nitin Gadkari formally taking over the reins of office, delivering his first Presidential Address, and interacting with senior state BJP representatives, and BJP Chief Ministers at a single combined conclave for the first time.
For Gadkariji, this must have been no doubt a very fruitful and worthwhile experience.
But as a party activist who has attended every single National Council session of the party since the First National Conference held at Kanpur in 1953, I can say that the participants at this session had all arrived at the tented township put up at Indore with a question mark writ large and bold on their faces. The question bothering them all was :
Will the new All India President of the Party, 52-year old Nitin Gadkari, be able to inspire confidence in the Party cadres, seemingly disheartened and disappointed by two successive setbacks in the Lok Sabha elections of 2004 and 2009 ?
Again having attended all such gatherings in the past I am in a position to affirm that seldom before have I seen delegates so upbeat, and enthusiastic participants in every single programme at the session as I have seen this time.
In those three days I could see all the initial scepticism rapidly melting away, so that when the delegates left Indore on the third day all their doubts had been replaced by a mood of optimism and confidence, and a strong feeling that the attributes of transparent frankness and forthrightness that they had been able to discern in the new president were exactly what the party needed at this point of time.
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While I was gathering my thoughts for my concluding remarks to the session, it struck me that for me personally, it was in a way significant that Indore had been chosen as venue for this session. The first city I visited outside Sind, the region where I was born and where I spent the first twenty years of my life, was Indore. This was in 1943, when I was just 16 years old. My Indore visit was for an RSS training camp (my First Year OTC). In my speech on the last day I reminisced: “For me this 67-year long journey from Indore to Indore has been really breath-taking and exhilarating.”
In the last two decades of this period, particularly, we have seen the party rising like a phoenix from its ashes. The year 1984 saw the BJP slump to the lowest point in its political career – only two Lok Sabha seats in the entire country !
And yet we all witnessed a virtual revolution taking place five years later. 1989 proved revolutionary both on the global level as well as on the national level. The crumbling of the Berlin Wall that year led to the disintegration of the Marxist empire. In Indian politics, the 1989 Lok Sabha election saw BJP make a huge leap forward, from two seats to eight six seats ! Looking back it is the tremendous appeal of the Ayodhya movement which enabled us to smash Congress hegemony for all time in national politics and transform India into a bipolar polity !
L.K. Advani
New Delhi
February 22, 2010
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Tags: LK Advani on President
February 22nd, 2010 at 3:32 pm
Respected Sir,
I am a great fan of yours. I have read your My country my life and urged my children to read it too. I have been keenly following the happenings in the BJP and I can only say that I am little disturbed by the happenings but I have not lost hope. In 1989, I voted for the first time being just 19 yrs. At that time, I was against you for Ayodhya but as days passed I read a few articles and then read one interview and could understand your straightforward views on the whole issue and became BJP fan and VOTER.
Of late, I feel Why are BJP men defending what they believe in. There should be an abject neglect of the others and (you should) let them keep talking about it, our focus should be on doing what is required to be done. This is my feeling. You are more experienced than me.
February 22nd, 2010 at 4:12 pm
Very well said, Mr Advani ji. Gadkari ji has conviction and vigor to work in the direction of bringing positive change. Hope he will be successful.
Wish you good health so that you continue to provide valuable, fatherly advice to the BJP and its workers.
February 23rd, 2010 at 12:16 am
Sir,
I wish that your journy continues for the welfare of the country….
February 23rd, 2010 at 10:44 pm
It’s most heartening to see you still so enthusiastic. I always admired you. BJP’s ascendancy is mainly due to your strategic and organizational skill.
But I know the mistakes you made too. The moment you joined NDA ministry, I knew it would harm BJP badly. Because, BJP was still not strong enough. The party needed overall consolidation and further expansion where it was absent. This was only possible by your full time leadership, guidance, strategizing and oversight. With ministerial duties this was not possible.
While the NDA govt. was doing better and better, the party was neither consolidating nor improving its image among the people. Innumerable scams and corruption cases were surfacing.
Your strong oversight is needed again. Now onwards there should not be the slightest open criticism, indiscipline and silly out-of-the-line statements by any BJP man.
What Gandhiji was to the congress leaders you have to be to the BJP leaders.
February 26th, 2010 at 5:01 pm
Respected Sir,
I very much admire the work of BJP. Sir please take actions to become a majority power in Tamil Nadu.
February 27th, 2010 at 4:30 pm
Sir namaskar,
India needs patriotics ruling but power unfortunately goes in the hands of cong.
Sir, why are you not concentrating on south states, specially on Andhra Pradesh, as most of the MPs that helped UPA to gain power, came from AP.
Andra pradesh public is in favour of BJP ruling at the centre. But the state unit of BJP is not acting properly. It is performing media shows only.
Sir, in the present political scinario, party must improve its performence in AP. Its not only for victory but also to control congress. Mr. Venkaiah Naidu, Mr. Bandaru Datthatreya, Mr Indrasena Reddy, Mr. Vidyasagar Rao, Mr. Kishan Reddy…. are not enough. BJP needs to bring in new faces in AP who can perform.
Sir, I am not a politician and do not belong to your party. But I request you to please concentrate on AP in the larger interest of the nation.
Jai Hind
February 27th, 2010 at 6:02 pm
Respected Sir,
I request you to personally increase BJP’s share in Southern States, especially TN and Kerala as these two states will be going for election in next few years.
There are sufficient leaders who can take challenge for BJP in Northern States but BJP lacks that courage here in South to take on Dravidian Parties. BJP leaders must take on challenge like Dr. Subramanium Swamy who is leader of the Janata Party.
I heard from Mr. Gadkari that he will focus on Southern States also, so he came up to Trivandrum. But he should also come down to Kanyakumari which just 2 hours distance from Trivandrum. It will give a boost to party cadres’ morale.
Now as BJP has assigned roles to the new leaders, at least you can come down to South and focus on these two states. I heartily request you to personally increase BJP’s share in Southern State especially TN and Kerala.
Thanks,
Jay Kumar
February 28th, 2010 at 2:38 pm
What Nandhini said is correct and should be conveyed to Advaniji. LKA has the highest stature as a leader all over India. He could take one by one the southern states of Tamil Nadu, Andhra and Kerala and visit there and motivate local party leaders and workers as well as appeal to the public for nationalism and good governance. He could do it like Gandhiji used to do during freedom fight. He is now free from compulsion of vote banks. He can talk now about Nation Building with morality and patriotism.
Today’s youth will definitely respond to him because they are aware of his self-less service to the nation for the last six decades. Gandhiji was 77 in 1946 but still inspiring the youth of our country. Rahul is no match for LKA.
March 1st, 2010 at 10:14 pm
India and BJP lost a Golden opportunity in not understanding the Political Masterstroke played by you in describing Jinnah a secular person. It would have given BJP at least addl 42 muslim dominated constituencies and today BJP would have been the party running India.
Alas !! The homework was perhaps not done. In comparision look at Soniaji’s move of not accepting post of PM in 2004. Today she runs the entire country.
March 2nd, 2010 at 10:41 am
Mr. Shibun Dudha,
You are wrong. In 2004, Soniaji had a plan of being PM but only after the opposition from people and other parties she changed her mind. As she was not born in India, everyone opposed. Now everyone knows she is ruling government and not Dr. Manmohan Singh. Could you confirm that they dont have that plan ? She will make Rahul Gandhi as prime minister in near future. And have it in mind that BJP is not a party handled by one single family since the day it was formed. There is no need for members in BJP to act as per the whims and fancies of one family.
March 2nd, 2010 at 7:05 pm
Dear Respected Sir,
What India lacks is inspirational leadership. Yourself, Vajpayee, Jaswant (at that time), and Nitish Kumar, provided a leadership which was inspirational during NDA regime.
And I was waiting for you to take the PM mantle after the recent elections.
One reason I thought BJP did not get enough votes was that the people of India (the cross section of people) did not comprehend that you could take India to the same heights to which you have taken the BJP.
Another reason was that the lower rungs of BJP and allies did not stand behind you more vocally. Probable reason ? I guess it was the iron hand rule you would establish which would leave them little space for achieving selfish goals. In this context it would have been better if you were the BJP president at the time of the Elections.
A golden chance was missed. Just as we missed Sardar I, we missed Sardar II.
I believe you can contribute for many more years.
March 2nd, 2010 at 11:25 pm
Advaniji:
It is the examples like you of probity in public life, disdain for Corruption and passion for prosperous and secure India from which some of us took inspiration to start a people’s movement in the name of http://www.JitegaBharat.com to help define the Winning Ways of 21st Century India. We seek your blessings in this endeavor to awaken Aam Admi.
The site is full of inspirational forums and blogs on all things Indian - from defining issues for 21st century India to sports, entertainment, arts, business etc. to inspirational discussions on what all pillars of democracy can do to evolve, excel and enrich India. Here is a brief introduction to this movement - http://jitegabharat.com/showthread.php?t=1
Your blessings will go a long way in inspiring millions of us to carry the work forward of enlightened Bharat achieving its deserved spot of leadership in every sense of the word.
April 25th, 2010 at 9:19 pm
Respected Sir.
I am Akhtar Khan Akela, advocate from Kota, Rajasthan. I read your biography ‘My country, my life’. It is appreciable, so congratulations to you. - Akhtar Khan Akela, Kota, Rajasthan