Mumbai, June 24
Committing itself to restoring the primacy of ideology and idealism and not to be defensive or apologetic about its relationship with the Sangh Parivar, the BJP today decided to undertake a sustained counter-offensive against the Congress and the Communists, who reject "Hindutva as the basic identity of the Indian nation."
The party, which had been a votary of disinvestment and open-economy policy while in power at the Centre, made a major shift by committing itself to India's integrated and accelerated development, based on the Swadeshi concept.
In a paper titled "Tasks ahead: Immediate and Long-term" adopted on the last day of the BJP's National Executive meeting here, the party also laid emphasis on the culture of discipline and self-discipline at all levels and called for demonstrative action against gross indiscipline and repeated misconduct.
Although the major thrust of the 11-page document was on treading the path of Hindutva, as an obvious post-script, underlines the need to champion the issues relating to empowerment of minorities and to bring them in the mainstream.
On the party's ideology and idealism, the paper asserts that "we should not be defensive or apologetic about projecting our distinctive ideological identity, about our relationship with other nationalist organisations, and also about our commitment to comprehensive social progress inspired by the eternal and universal values of our civilisation."
Calling for combining the virtues of a mass party with a strong cadre network, it said: "Restoring the primacy of ideals and ideology has also become necessary to separate committed and good “karyakartas” from opportunists.
Stressing the need to stem indiscipline, it said "one of the manifestations of indiscipline is the tendency to use the media to air one's grievance. Wittingly or unwittingly, some people in the party share organisational matters with the media, which causes considerable damage to the party's image and internal cohesion."
In cases of gross indiscipline and repeated misconduct, deterrent and demonstrative action will have to be taken, it said. The paper called for strengthening the grievance redressal system whereby workers and functionaries can air their grievances freely at proper fora and feel satisfied.
As part of the short-term and long-term tasks ahead for the party, the document listed induction of more "full-time workers" in the party organisation at all levels, promotion of young leaders, widening the party base among farmers, Dalits and women, upgrading training activity, better interface between workers and elected representatives.
