HVK Archives: Sushma's histrionics to the fore
Sushma's histrionics to the fore - The Hindustan Times
HT Correspondent
()
23 April 1997
Title : Sushma's histrionics to the fore
Author : HT Correspondent
Publication : The Hindustan Times
Date : April 23, 1997
If one played unabashedly to the gallery, the other rose above it
to display a statesman-like approach. And yet, both Ms Sushma
Swaraj and Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee - two of the three speakers
fielded by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) during the debate on
Prime Minister I. K. Gujral's confidence motion in the Lok Sabha
today - exploited the televised proceedings to the hilt while
launching a sharp attack on the Congress and the United Front (UF).
Former Premier and the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Vajpayee,
promised constructive cooperation to the new Government if it
sincerely followed up on its promise of working through consensus.
Ms Swaraj, by contrast, was at her scintillating best, as she went
into the history of "betrayal and fraud" that marked the
convulsions in the United Front-Congress relationship and the UF's
own volte face on not compromising on Mr H. D. Deve Gowda's
leadership.
Both, however, said that the Congress has pulled down the Gowda
Government essentially to prevent exposure of corruption cases. Ms
Swaraj was more direct in her attack on the Congress in this
regard. As for Mr Vajpayee, he referred to the "mystery" behind the
Congress decision to withdrew support to the UF on March 303
Mr Vajpayee was immediately on his feet when the Prime Minister,
while moving his confidence motion, assured members that there
would be no witch-hunt. "What is the need for saying this? Has it
been there or is there an attempt to cover up the cases?" he
queried. Mr Gujral ducked the question, maintaining that since he
had just taken over, he had still not seen any files.
Unlike the other UF constituents, or the Congress which was
extending support to it from the outside ' the BJP was better
placed today during the debate to fulfil its natural role - of the
Opposition. Not surprisingly, the speeches by the BJP members were
replete with barbs, jibes and allegations.
Castigating the "political untouchability" being practised as a
ploy to keep the BJP out, Mr Vajpayee, in his inimitable style,
ridiculed the new political order in which the Left was playing the
Brahmin to decide who was politically untouchable, the Samajwadi
Party's Mulayam Singh Yadav was the Kshatriya, and the Congress was
playing the Vaisya and the BJP the Shudra, the untouchable.
The focus of his speech was the inherent instability of the new
formation. Pointing to the incongruous situation in which 419 of
the 543 members (204 of the BJP and its allies and 215 of the
Congress, some of the Left Parties and the TMC) were out of power,
Mr Vajpayee said that he had urged the 'President to ask the
Congress to be part of the coalition Government.
"If the Government has to be stable, its shape and contour has to
be changed," he said. In this connection, he also cautioned the UF
about the manner in which the Congress was being assertive during
the course of the debate today.
His colleague, Ms Swaraj described the UF as a "labyrinth" and a
car whose front wheel had been punctured with the Tamil Maanila
Congress' decision to stay out of it.
It was the soft approach that the BJP leaders adopted towards Mr
Gowda that stood out, though. If Mr Vajpayee claimed that Mr Gowda
had been made a sacrificial lamb, Ms Swaraj quoted extensively from
the speeches made by the UF leaders during Mr Gowda's confidence
motion on April 11 in which they vowed to stand by him.
Mr Ram Vilas Paswan, Mr Indrajit Gupta and Mr I. K. Gujral were the
three leaders she picked out while charging that Mr Gowda had been
stabbed both by people. "A kalyug Ramayana was being played out
with Laxman usurping Ram's place," she said, referring to Mr
Gujral's elevation.
Wondering why Mr Gujral had accepted the Prime Ministership, Ms
Swaraj pointed out that no one appeared to have learnt from the
Congress' track record of pulling down the very Governments it had
propped up. Pointing out that the Congress and the UF would justify
their coming together in the name of secularism, Ms Swaraj said
that mere declarations would not help. She said that the BJP had
grown from strength to strength and this had been proved by the
electoral results. She claimed that the next "trial of strength in
the people's court" would wipe out the non-BJP forces from
politics.
Earlier, Mr Vajpayee's assertion that the Congress was confused
about the meaning of secularism drew a strong reaction from the
Congress members. Quoting extensively from Congress spokesperson V.
N. Gadgil's recent write-up on secularism, he stressed that the
party was using secularism in an opportunistic fashion to promote
its unprincipled politics.
The BJP's third speaker, Col Ram Singh, concentrated his attack on
the Congress, claiming that as a former Congressman he knew the
Congress midset. Giving the Gujral Government only two months, Col
Singh also said that there was a secret understanding between the
Prime Minister and the Congress president which probably explained
Mr Sitaram Kesri's elation at the selection of Mr Gujral.
Mr Madhukar Sarpotdar of the Shiv Sena, an ally of the BJP,
cautioned the UF leaders against the Congress, warning that the new
Government would meet the same fate as Mr Gowda's.
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