New Delhi, July 20
A former member of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s Economic Advisory Council today came to the defence of BJP president L.K. Advani but accused the BJP ministers in the NDA government of having failed to live up to the reputation of belonging to ‘Sangh sanskar’ and provide a distinctly different administration.
In his letter addressed to Mr Advani, Dr Shettigar, also a former convener of the BJP Economic Cell, said a distorted nature of debate was going on after the BJP president’s recent Pakistan visit. Though he did not agree with the statement made on Pakistan founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah, he said it was a condonable lapse considering his (Mr Advani’s) valuable contribution to the parivar for over five decades.
Dr Shettigar said when the BJP-led NDA came to power, people, especially the Sangh cadre, had high expectations from the BJP ministers and wanted them to be distinctly different from the rest because of values, discipline and character and clean image.
“Unfortunately, our people not only got exposed within a couple of months of coming to power but even proved to be like past masters in the game,” Dr Shettigar alleged without taking any names.
When contacted, Mr Shettigar said “I have no comments to make. I have been writing letters from time to time and I do not have the habit of discussing internal party issues with the media.”
On the Sangh charge that the BJP had deviated from its ideology, Mr Shettigar in his letter said it was not limited to the construction of Ram temple at Ayodhya.
