India's BJP in downward spiral, says expelled leader (Roundup)

Aug 20, 2009, 12:14 GMT

   New Delhi - India's main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is in a downward spiral, senior leader Jaswant Singh said Thursday, a day after the party expelled him.

   Singh, who was minister of defence and finance in the former BJP-led government, was expelled from the BJP Wednesday after he praised Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of neighboring Pakistan, in his recent book, Jinnah - India, Partition, Independence.

   The Hindu right-wing BJP, which is holding a meeting of senior leaders in the northern Indian hill town of Shimla to discuss its defeat in the recent general election, had earlier disassociated itself from the contents of the book.

   'The important role of MA Jinnah in the division of India, which led to a lot of dislocation and destabilization of millions of people, is too well-known. We cannot wish away this painful part of our history,' an entry on the party's website said.

   The BJP-led government of western Gujarat state banned the book which also criticizes India's first federal home minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, a Gujarati, for his role in the partition of India.

   'Banning books in India is shutting the doors to thought,' Singh said at a press briefing in the Indian capital.

   'I join the eminent company of authors like Salman Rushdie and books like Satanic Verses,' Singh said, adding that he wondered whether the BJP leaders had read his book.

   Indian media reported that there was more to Singh's expulsion than his book on Jinnah.

   'The decision is being read in the party as a stern message of zero tolerance to ideological deviation and indiscipline,' veteran journalist Neena Vyas wrote in the Hindu newspaper.

   The right-wing Hindu Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the BJP's ideological parent, has reportedly asked senior leaders of the party to put a lid on dissension.

   Singh was among party insiders who criticized the BJP leadership for the party's defeat in the general elections and some recent appointments of office bearers.

   He is also one of the few leaders in the BJP who has maintained a distance from the RSS.

   Singh said that Patel as India's home minister was one of the first to ban the RSS.

   A defeat in an election was a time to reflect, Singh earlier said in an interview with news channel NDTV.

   'But the BJP has gone into an inward, downward spiral which is worrisome,' he said.

   Singh's book, which was published Monday, was selling briskly and was top of the non-fiction bestseller list in Delhi, IANS news agency reported.