Just two days after BJP president Amit Shah served a gag order on leaders of his party accused of making questionable statements with regard to the Dadri lynching incident and cow slaughter, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley called for a “civilised mode” of discussing and debating issues.
Addressing a press conference in New Delhi on Tuesday, Mr. Jaitley spoke out strongly against what he termed an “extremely disturbing trend” of intolerance and vandalism. His remarks were addressed mostly to NDA ally, the Shiv Sena, whose members had forced their way into the office of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to prevent talks between the boards of India and Pakistan on a possible series, and to a certain extent his own party men, who have been accused of making insensitive statements on the Dadri lynching case.
Referring to the Shiv Sena’s protest on Monday at the BCCI office and the blackening of former BJP member Sudheendra Kulkarni’s face for hosting former Pakistan Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmood Kasuri, Mr. Jaitley said it was quite possible that in a large country like India there may be “divergent views” on many subjects.
“But we had a tradition of civility in conveying those different opinions. Also particularly because some of these issues are extremely serious. There are issues which impinge on our relations with our neighbouring countries and, therefore, there has to be a proper civilised mode of discussing and debating these issues,” he said.
Gag order
And yet, the Finance Minister could not escape questions on the conduct of his own party men even as he decried the behaviour of allies. He said, despite some evidence to the contrary, that the gag order against his own party men, served by Mr. Amit Shah, would be the end of incendiary comments from that quarter.
“You see, after the Prime Minister’s comment, the party president had called the three gentlemen. He very firmly told them that their statements are not appreciated by the party at all. They have been put on notice. Therefore I am sure that they corrected themselves,” he said.
“Within the political space, there will be some people who rely on some kind of sensationalism in the media to create a constituency for themselves. Now, we have been able to identify people from their tactics and, therefore, the party has already put these people on notice. If somebody has made an error in the past, I am sure he will correct himself,” he said.
That hope had seemed a little weak even on the day Mr. Shah spoke to Mr. Som, Mr. Sakshi Maharaj and Mr. Sanjeev Balyan. Mr. Som had claimed that there had been “no talk of any dressing-down”, while Mr. Balyan had told The Hindu that he had met Mr Shah on Sunday for an appointment “fixed many days ago.”
Political compulsions
According to a senior office-bearer in the party, the BJP’s political compulsions in Uttar Pradesh especially make it difficult to put a complete lid on such statements emanating from leaders of the party from that State. “There are political rivals like Azam Khan who leave no stone unturned to polarise the atmosphere. We need people who can take him and other Samajwadi Party leaders and their minority politics on,” he said.
