Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat met Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha L.K. Advani here on Wednesday. While there was no word from the Bharatiya Janata Party on what transpired at the hour-long meeting, Mr. Bhagwat said he had lunch with Mr. Advani. “We had not met for some time,” the RSS chief told journalists on the sidelines of a function where he released Tarun Vijay’s book ‘India Battles To Win’.
Asked whether changes expected to be made in the BJP were discussed with Mr. Advani, he said: “Such matters are not discussed at one-to-one meetings ( yeh batein akele mein nahin hotin).
In the BJP, there is speculation that the meeting, coming about 20 days ahead of the start of the winter session of Parliament, was a reminder to Mr. Advani of his promise to the RSS leadership that he would step down and help a younger leadership establish itself.
At the book launch, one speaker, Rajesh Kalra, said that “like Mr. Bhagwat,” Tarun Vijay had also suggested “chemotherapy” for the BJP. He was referring to a statement attributed to the RSS chief the BJP needed surgery, chemotherapy or some medicine but it must decide for itself what course of treatment it wanted.
Speaking after Mr. Kalra, Mr. Bhagwat, however, denied that he talked about the BJP needing “chemotherapy.” “I do not want to go into this,” he said, suggesting that his remarks had been taken up “in a very crude fashion ( halke tareeke se).”
A large number of BJP leaders attended the function.
