BJP president L K Advani said yesterday that mid-term elections to the Lok Sabha was unavoidable. He termed the insistence of Prime minister I K Gurjral that the crisis within the Janta Dal would not affect the United Front government as wishful thinking.
Advani made this statement here before resuming his Swarna Jayanti Rath Yatra, stuck here for two days from Saturday due to his illness. Advani had suffered flu and throat trouble. The crisis in the Dal had already affected the functioning of the Union government, he said.
The BJP president said the Prime Minister was to be blamed for the peculiar situation prevailing in Bihar. Dictated by considerations pertaining to internal rift in the Janta Dal, Gujral has found it expedient not to disturb Laloo Prasad Yadav. According to him, while the previous government at the Centre was weak since it did not have the peoples mandate, the problems of the present government had been aggravated due to a weak Prime Minister.
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Advani declared that the Janta Dal had no moral ground to rule the country since its base had eroded over the years. The party had suffered considerably in the five states - Uttar Pradesh, Orissa, Bihar, Haryana and Karnataka, which it had once ruled under the leadership of V P Singh. He said the Janta Dal had lost its mooring in Uttar Pradesh and Haryana with Mulayam Singh Yadav and Chautala forming their own parties. When Biju Patnaik was alive he used to talk about forming a regional party but with his death the party has suffered a setback in Orissa.
, where the Rath Yatra received enthusiastic response. Though the party is in power in Karnataka, it has also suffered a setback there with Ram Krishna Hegde forming the Rashtriya Nav Nirman Vedike.
The BJP leader maintained that it was certain that the Dals remnants would split in Bihar and the Bihar Janta Dal will become an autonomous party. Advani ridiculed the Centre for not initiating remedial measures to check the anarchy in Bihar. The Centre owed an explanation to the people of Bihar since it allowed to get the state administration paralysed.
To a question Advani said he had always detested the Communists, who, he said, had stabbed the freedom movement in 1942 and 1947, betrayed the national security in 1962 during Indo-China war and also betrayed the democracy during the JP movement in early seventies.
The BJP president claimed that his rath yatra was getting enthusiastic response and he had been laying stress on the imperative for a two-fold transformation: change in the leadership and change in the mindset of the people.
He said he had been asking people to take three-point Swarna Jayanti pledge that I shall neither take nor give bribes, shall work with honesty, dedication and discipline and give priority to my patriotic duty over my narrow self interest and shall not discriminate on the basis of caste or creed but, instead be guided solely by the considerations of rationality and interests of my Motherland. He believed that if the three commandments of the Swarna Jayanti pledge was carried out in right earnest by every Indian citizen would produce a radical social transformation and enable India to emerge as a front ranking nation in the early years of the 21st century.