Ahmedabad, May 27
Bringing to a virtual head the rising tide of dissidence in the ruling BJP in Gujarat against Chief Minister Narendra Modi in the wake of the party's slide in the Lok Sabha elections in the state, 58 of the saffron outfit's total of 127 MLAs tonight demanded the change of leadership.
The dissidents led by Purushottam Solanki, legislator from Bhavnagar, came out with the demand at a birthday party of veteran BJP leader A.K. Patel, considered close to Modi's predecessor Keshubhai Patel, at a farm house in Gandhinagar that turned to be a show of strength by Modi's critics.
Upping the ante against Modi by several notches, Solanki said the party was not happy with the Chief Minister, particularly his style of functioning, and there should be a change of guard in the state.
He claimed that the demand for the ouster of Modi had the support of Keshubhai Patel.
"Modi cannot alone take the credit for BJP's landslide victory in December 2002 Assembly elections. It has been a unified effort," Solanki told mediapersons. Asked whether the dissidents would take their demand to the BJP high command, Mr Solanki said, "we have not yet decided about that."
Keshubhai Patel, former Union Ministers in the NDA government Vallabh Kathiriya and Bhavna Chikhaliya, who lost recent the Lok Sabha elections in Junagarh, sitting MP from Surendranagar Soma Ganda, Maya Kodnani and former state Home Minister Gordhan Zadafiya, were present at the birthday party of A.K. Patel, a senior MLA from Mehsana.
More than 50 MLAs, mostly known to be Keshubhai Patel loyalists, were present at the party.
Sources close to Solanki said the
MLAs were "fed up" with Modi's "autocratic" style of functioning, "not" meeting the legislators and not visiting their constituencies.Keshubhai Patel is still smarting under his unceremonious ouster from the top post that paved way for Modi to come to the helm of affairs.
A.K. Patel openly hit out at Modi accusing him of making all attempts to stop several MLAs from attending the birthday party.
Patel said Modi had developed a dislike for him and others after they started pointing out his administrative "weakness and mistakes".
Meanwhile, a BJP MLA said on condition of anonymity that "at least 85 legislators are disgruntled with Modi's style of functioning and the demand for his ouster was in the offing since the electoral setbacks in the Lok Sabha elections when BJP's tally went down to 14 from 21 of the total 26 seats in Gujarat".
"MLAs are of the opinion that there is no internal democracy in the party and they are not in favour of a person, who is harmful to this democracy, being at the helm of affairs," he said.
— PTI
