RK Singh steps up attack as dissent in BJP grows louder

There was no let-up in the chorus of dissent in BJP over Bihar poll debacle with MP Manoj Tewari today finding fault with party's strategy and sulking MP R K Singh supporting the demand of veterans like L K Advani that accountability be fixed.

"Accountability has to be fixed. Review should be made of the election debacle. We need to find out what went wrong, who were responsible. That's what 'margdarshak mandal' said," Singh, the Ara MP, said in a reference to the statement of Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and two other veterans.

The former home secretary, who during the campaign had spoken against the choice of candidates of BJP-led NDA, claimed BJP gave tickets to people with criminal background, stressing that some of them were not "ordinary criminals" but those on whom government had declared reward.

"We thought we were a party with a difference. We will give a clean government.... Then you give tickets to criminals. That is very bad, very sad," Singh told NDTV.

Manoj Tewari, MP from Norh-East Delhi who was one of the leading BJP campaigners for the poll, also joined other BJP leaders in criticising the party's election campaign in Bihar and lauded the strategy of JD(U)-RJD-Congress alliance as "undoubtedly better".

The Bhojpuri singer-turned-politician, who is a Lok Sabha member from Delhi, said the party failed to convince the people to vote for BJP candidates.

"We clearly failed to convince people of Bihar on our party's agenda. Undoubtedly, the strategy of grand alliance (of JDU-RJD-Congress) had been proved better than ours. We could have campaigned in a more strategical way to reach out larger masses," said Tewari, who represents North East Delhi in Lok Sabha.

A number of Bihar BJP MPs like Shatrughan Sinha, Hukumdev Narayan Yadav and Bhola Singh have criticised the party's campaign with likes of Sinha and Singh drawing the top party brass in their line of fire.