Senior BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi called on RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat at the Sangh’s headquarters here on Wednesday and reportedly batted for respectable positions in the new government for “sidelined” saffron leaders.
A former HRD Minister in the NDA regime, Dr. Joshi during his meeting with Mr. Bhagwat is believed to have sought the RSS’ intervention to ensure that senior party leaders get their due and respect if the BJP-led NDA forms the government at Centre, sources said.
Dr. Joshi had reluctantly “vacated” his Varanasi Lok Sabha seat in Uttar Pradesh for BJP’s prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi and contested from Kanpur. Besides Dr. Joshi, party veterans like L.K. Advani and Jaswant Singh too were “sidelined”. Mr. Singh was denied a ticket from Barmer and contested as an independent and was expelled from the party. Mr. Advani was asked to contest from Gandhinagar against his reported desire to shift to Bhopal seat.
