Advani seeks that President dismiss Bhandari
R R Nair in New Delhi
Bharatiya Janata Party president L K Advani sought that President K R Narayanan invoke Article 156 of the Constitution and remove Uttar Pradesh governor Romesh Bhandari from his post immediately.
At a press conference after he met the President, Advani said Narayanan was consulting legal experts on the future course of action in UP.
Advani pointed out that the way a governor could be ousted was by invoking Article 156 which states that the governor holds office at the pleasure of the President. He said Bhandari's "criminal act" on Saturday amounted to murder of democracy. "The BJP considers the governor's act to be a fraud on India's constitutional order," he said.
"The Rashtrapathiji can invoke his own constitutional powers to dismiss a delinquent governor, who has ceased to enjoy 'the pleasure of the President of the Republic'," Advani said. His party is apparently worried that what happened in UP could be repeated at the Centre if the saffron party does not get a simple majority there.
The BJP fears the other parties could gang up under Sonia Gandhi. An indication of this was Advani's statement, "The dying Congress party's slavish dependence on Mrs Sonia Gandhi for survival has turned the current election into a battle of republican values against dynastic feudalism." But he claimed the BJP's
prospects in the current Lok Sabha election would not be affected and that it would be able to win a majority vote.
Advani also warned the Congress, the Communist parties, the Samajwadi Party and others involved in the latest plot in UP that they would pay a very heavy price for their misadventure.
"In the days to come, my party will unveil several other steps to sharpen our offensive against the evil forces of fascism," he said, adding that the BJP had not launch an agitation yesterday itself because that would have disturbed the poll process.
The BJP claimed that Kalyan Singh can still prove his majority on the floor of the House if given a chance on February 24, when Bhandari has asked new Chief Minister Jagdambika Pal to prove his government's majority.
Advani described Bhandari as a "delinquent" and that the Raj Bhavan had never been misused so "brazenly" as by the governor. This was not the first and only time that Bhandari had acted like this. Bhandari had been the "principal mischief-maker in UP ever since he was sent to Lucknow as governor" to help anti-BJP parties, the BJP president said. He described as patently perverse the governor's current step to let a new government be formed without the old one being allowed to prove its majority.
Five months earlier too, in October when the Bahujan Samaj Party withdrew support to the Kalyan Singh government, Bhandari had recommended President's rule in the state. The crisis was resolved only after the President asked the Union government to reconsider the recommendation.
Advani said the BJP cadres had not lost heart and was, in fact, more active after BJP prime ministerial candidate Atal Bihari Vajpayee decided to undertake a fast unto death. But the party is clearly worried that the upheaval in UP could rob it of its stability plank.
Even in Gujarat, where it had a comfortable majority, former chief minister Shankarsinh Vaghela and his group deserted the BJP and formed a government with help from the Congress. Advani struggled, explaining that the party's effort to form a government in UP had nothing to do with stability.
"We have said that we are not happy with the government in UP. The UP situation would only caution the voter against a hung Parliament. And whatever happened in UP doesn't reflect on our stability," he claimed.
Asked whether Kalyan Singh's choice of friends was proper, Advani said all of them belonged to the Congress.
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