The Hindu : BJP to go it alone in Himachal

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Dec 24, 2002

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National

BJP to go it alone in Himachal

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI DEC. 23. In Himachal Pradesh, where Assembly polls are due in February-March next year, the BJP plans to "go it alone''. It may not enter into any seat adjustment or alliance with Mr. Sukhram's Himachal Vikas Party.

The party general secretary and spokesperson, Arun Jaitley, today said that "as of now'' the party had "no plan to enter into any alliance with any party in Himachal.''

The BJP is confident about retaining power in Himachal. The Chief Minister, P. K. Dhumal, had already announced a `yatra' which would take him to different regions of the State, and the party feels that Himachal, which is the very next electoral battle-ground between the BJP and the Congress (after Gujarat) "must be won'' to keep up the party morale. Over the last few years every by-election was won by the BJP, Mr. Jaitley said.

Will Hindutva play a role in the Himachal campaign? Will the `Modi line' prevail in the coming Assembly elections? Mr. Jaitley said that Hindutva was the party ideology and it was the "mainstay'' although specific issues may differ from State to State. "It will only be the BJP line,'' he said.

Mr. Jaitley also said that Gujarat had not seen a communal polarisation during the elections but "an ideological polarisation''.

It was Hindutva versus the secularists, as the BJP would like to put it, or "nationalist forces'' (the BJP has claimed that forces friendly to Hindutva are the only nationalist forces) against "those willing to compromise on national issues,'' as the BJP president, Venkaiah Naidu, had put it.

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