New Delhi, March 24
Former Union Minister Jaswant Singh, who had been associated with the BJP for around 30 years, today filed his nomination papers for the Barmer Lok Sabha seat as an Independent candidate.

He said senior BJP leaders, including Rajnath Singh, had betrayed him, while Narendra Modi hijacked the Lok Sabha poll campaign with the “NaMo, NaMo tamasha”.

Though the BJP made all the right noises about his seniority and experience, it appeared in no mood to give in to his demand, leaving Jaswant Singh with no choice but to accept the changes in the party and mark his own course.

BJP leader Jaswant Singh files his nomination papers as an Independent candidate in Barmer on Monday. PTI

Sources, however, said the BJP was open to giving him a chance to return and would wait till the last date of withdrawal of candidature.

It is now clear that the BJP has the blessings of its ideologue RSS on all these issues. Sangh pramukh Mohan Bhagwat’s remarks that “change is the law of the nature” and should be accepted by all appeared to be directed at all those who had been raising the red flag against the ongoing shift in the BJP dynamics. The remarks were made at a function for the launch of RSS publications Organiser and Panchjanaya in a magazine format. Considering that LK Advani was a part of the audience lent weight to speculations that Bhagwat’s remarks were not exactly directed at the changes in publications’ format.

Jaswant Singh said the “NaMo, NaMo tamasha” and the decision-making process being adopted by the BJP reminded him of 1975. “There is more of arrogance and less of taking everyone along, he said after filing his nomination papers.

He said it was for the party to decide whether he should continue in it or not. “They can sack me,” he said. Jaswant Singh said the denial of Barmer ticket to him was a “huge humiliation” for workers in the constituency.