Launching a book written by the former Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) veteran Yashwant Sinha said “it would be the best day of his life” if his party takes action against him and asserted that “there is no age bar to fight for freedom”.
Mr. Sinha said he had not done anything that called for disciplinary action and said, “This is as much my party as anyone else’s. Don’t forget that I have given my blood and sweat for it. I have worked with the tallest leaders of the party,” said Mr. Sinha, who served as Minister of Finance and External Affairs in the Vajpayee government.
The former Finance Minister maintained that people in the BJP did not speak up out of fear, even though many agree with him.
“Since the Mahabharata is the flavour these days, let me tell tell you that there were 100 sons in the Kaurava clan but only two attained infamy — Duryodhan and Dushashan,” said Mr. Sinha.
A war of words had broken out between the BJP veteran and senior Ministers in the Modi government after he severely criticised Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and called his handling of the economy a “mess” in a recent opinion piece.
Mr. Jaitley, without naming Mr. Sinha, countered with a jibe that there was an 80-year-old applicant for his job. “I have been called an 80-year-old job applicant. There may be an age bar in joining government service but there is no bar in fighting for freedom,” said Mr. Sinha, who urged the audience to stand up for freedom and face it with courage.
Speaking about his son and junior minister in the Union government, Jayant Sinha, defending the government’s economic record, he said an attempt had been made to create a rift between father and son so that the issues he had raised died down.
“That did not happen. Yesterday, someone would not have spoken for one hour and 25 minutes on the state of the economy otherwise,” said Mr. Sinha.
Kejriwal sees a churning
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, too, was present at the event, though he emphasised that it should not be seen as the beginning of a new alliance for 2019.
“I think the election for 2019 will between the BJP and the rest of India. Alliances are part of the arithmetic,” said Mr. Kejriwal, who claimed that, “there is a churning among the people caused by retrenchment and job losses because of the note ban and GST”.
“There is now an atmosphere of fear... Phones are being tapped, there is raid Raj today,” he said.
Former United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Minister Manish Tewari, who released his book Tidings of Troubled Times , admitted that arrogance and complacency had set in during the UPA rule. “I think that is a fair admission to make and, given a second chance, I would never do it,” he said.
