Advani sees pro-BJP wave in country

MANDATE 2004

Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani yesterday said while he was hopeful of a good response from Kerala, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Orissa and Madhya Pradesh for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), it was Bihar where the response was most promising.

Addressing reporters after his Bharat Uday Yatra, Advani did not refer at all to low turnouts in his rallies in Maharashtra and the joint rally with the Prime Minister in UP.

He said he discerned a distinct pro-incumbency wave as opposed to an anti-incumbency wave for the BJP and said his yatra had succeeded in creating a movement in favour of good governance and development. The 8,540 km long yatra lasted 33 days and passed through 128 constituencies in 14 states.

Advani said his yatra was different from previous ones because the emotional content was missing.

But it was clear that although it was hard to glamourise issues like water and electricity, "the thought that my country should be a great country" or the issue of good governance was an emotional one. "BJP is an India-First party. We are redrawing our political strategy in tune with the changing environment," he said.

Advani went out of his way to emphasise that the BJP had shed its tag of being a Hindu party.

"In Hubli, where communal tension has existed for years and riots have taken place, the BJP office told me that 100 to 150 Muslims were coming to the office every day for membership of the BJP".

"Our assessment is that six years of NDA rule has impelled the minorities to start having a second look at the BJP. Many have come to the conclusion that the hatemongering by the Congress about the BJP is absolutely baseless" he said.

Advani said he had seen a high level of public satisfaction, a "universal appreciation" about the government's performance during his month-long yatra that ended in Puri last evening.

Earlier too incumbent governments had been voted back to power but because of "circumstances" like the 1971 war. But "for the first time the pro-incumbency wave is not due to any situational (reason) but because of the performance of the government. This is certainly remarkable," he said.

The yatra, he said, had provided him the opportunity of seeing the stark contrasts in development as he passed through 128 Lok Sabha constituencies, but found that the urge for development united the whole country.