BJP president Amit Shah is likely to postpone his January 12 programme to launch an anti-drug campaign from Amritsar.
Though various reasons are being cited by party leaders, the conciliatory Step follows the announcement by Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal to stay away from the January 5 dharnas being organised along the international border to protest smuggling of narcotics from Pakistan into the State.
The leaders of BJP’s Punjab unit who were seen quite active, at least in the media, countering Akali and Congress criticism, have suddenly gone quiet. One such leader, while talking to this correspondent, said January 12 was only a proposed date; the party’s central office or the spokesperson were yet to finalise the programme and make a formal announcement.
Other leaders have said that with the forthcoming elections to the Assembly there, Mr. Shah’s would be required to be in Delhi. Yet another leader said that the weather conditions, especially occurrence of heavy fog, led to the party postponing the programme.
A party insider said the strong posturing by Akali Dal had forced the BJP central leadership to rethink Mr. Shah’s programme. Further, allegations of association of some functionaries of the BJP’s Punjab unit with drug smugglers had also contributed to the decision.The BJP also seems to have sensed the reluctance within the Akali Dal, especially the latter’s old guard, at arriving at a flashpoint within the alliance. The questioning of Punjab Revenue Minister Bikram Singh Majithia by the Enforcement Directorate, protests by the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarathi Parishad, and hostile posturing by some of BJP’s Punjab leaders towards the alliance partner had ruffled many feathers within the Akali Dal.
The announcement that Mr. Shah would launch a campaign against drugs in Punjab “forced” the Akali Dal to launch a counter-offensive, as a dominant section within believed that the BJP was heading to gain political capital through such programmes. Meanwhile, the president of the Shiromani Akali Dal, Sukhbir Singh Badal, who is also Punjab’s Deputy CM, has said that the January 5 protests were against Pakistan and Afghanistan.
He said that the aim of these programmes was to highlight the fact that Punjab was not producing any drugs.Mr Badal told reporters after a party meeting that that the party did not doubt the capabilities of the Border Security Force to plug the smuggling. However, it wanted deployment of modern infrastructure to effectively seal the border as the U.S. had done along its southern boundary with Mexico.
