LK Advani’s Blog

I feel sorry that we have lost in Karnataka. But I am not surprised. The surprise would have been if we had won.

As it is, I think the Karnataka results have a profound lesson for the BJP. In a way it has a lesson also for the Congress. The common lesson for both of us is : let’s not take the common man for granted. He himself may occasionally deviate from the norms of ethical conduct, but he does feel extremely angry when he sees those at the helm of national affairs behaving immorally. This is the principal reason why there is such intense allergy towards politicians generally nowadays.

If corruption provokes indignation in Bangalore, why would it not cause the same feeling in New Delhi?

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I was in school when I had first read the famous fairy tale by Hans Anderson titled “The Emperor’s New Clothes”. 

Anderson’s story was about two weavers who promise an emperor a new suit of clothes which would be exceptionally beautiful and yet have the remarkable quality of being invisible to any one unpardonably stupid or then, incompetent for his office.

Listening to the two weavers, who were actually swindlers, the emperor who was always fond of good and expensive clothes thought “If I were to be dressed in a suit made of this cloth, I would be able to find out which men in my empire were unfit for their places and I would also be able to distinguish the clever ones from the Click to Read More

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In its last 66 years of independence, India has had as many as fourteen Prime Ministers, six of whom have lasted less than one year each. Out of the remaining eight, two ruled the country for more than fifteen years each. These were Pandit Nehru (17 years) and Smt. Indira Gandhi (16 years).

There have been four Prime Ministers whose tenure has lasted for five years or more.  These have been Dr. Manmohan Singh (9 years), Atal Bihari Vajpayee (6 years), P.V. Narasimha Rao and Rajiv Gandhi (5 years each).

Morarji Desai ruled the country for Click to Read More

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Earlier this month I had written a blog captioned “White Paper on Black Money  notwithstanding, not a single paisa has been recovered”

This blog had highlighted how the BJP’s sustained campaign against black money had forced the UPA Government to present a White Paper on the issue. This White Paper rightly affirmed that success of the country’s “inclusive development strategy critically depends on the capacity of our society to root out the evil of corruption and black money from its very foundations.”

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In May 2012, Shri Pranab Mukherjee, then Finance Minister presented to Parliament a White Paper on Black Money. In this White Paper, the UPA Government promised to curb generation of Black Money in the country, its illicit transfer to tax havens overseas and to take effective measures to secure the repatriation of all this illicit wealth of ours to India.

May, 2013 would mark the first anniversary of the presentation of this important document.   It would be in place first to recall what made Government to present this White Paper, and what has been the follow up till date.

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Last Sunday, March 31, 2013 was Easter Sunday, a very important Christian Festival.  While all other Christian festivals, according to the Gregorian calendar, fall on a fixed day every year, Easter is a festival that takes place on different dates each year.

Next year for instance, Easter is to be celebrated on April 20, 2014.

For us in the B.J.P. a party launched in 1980, Easter Sunday has a very special significance. In 1980, Easter Sunday fell on April 6^th, the day on which the BJP was Click to Read More

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India has now been an independent country for over 65 years. If any one were to ask me as to what has been the country’s biggest achievement during this period of six and a half decades I would unhesitatingly say : Democracy.

We have not been able to overcome poverty, illiteracy and malnutrition. But notwithstanding the intense cynicism of western scholars, India is practically the only one among the developing countries liberated from colonial rule which has remained a vibrant, vigorous multi-party democracy all these years since 1947.

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Last month I received a copy of Khushwantnama: The Lessons of my life.  I completed the 188-page book by Khushwant Singh almost in a single sitting. And the first thing I felt like doing after reading the book was to ask my office to connect me to Khushwant Singh so that I could offer him my salutations for this wonderful book published by Penguin Viking.

The person who picked up the phone at the other end told my office that Khushwant Singhji may not be able to come to the phone. A message was also conveyed that if Advani wanted to meet Khushwant ji, he was welcome to see him that evening. I immediately responded that I had another engagement that evening, but I would certainly call on him the next day.

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I have been in Parliament for over forty years now. There was a time when the people who came to me with some or other request, the largest number used to be those wanting a telephone connection. Most of them would say that they have been on the waiting list of applicants for a connection for years, and yet the possibility of getting a phone connection is nowhere in sight. 

With the arrival of cell phones, things have radically changed. Today hardly any one comes with this demand. Mobile Phone use in India is growing faster than anywhere else in the world. By 2010, it was estimated that there were in the country more than 60 crore cell phone subscribers and 15 million new subscribers are being added to this number every month. There is an explosion in the number of Internet users also. In 1998, this number was 1.4 million. Today it is more than 75 millions. Harvard Professor Diana Eck whose book on India titled Click to Read More

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