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Kalyan refuses to compromise on his proteges

Sharat Pradhan in Lucknow

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Kalyan Singh has flatly ruled out a compromise on the appointment of some controversial Bharatiya Janata Party members to prominent positions in the state, which has sparked the current round of infighting in the party.

Singh told reporters that "there is no question of withdrawing any of these appointments". With a smirk, he added, "Each of the persons nominated by me as chairpersons of different bodies is an active BJP worker; I have not appointed any Samajwadi Party or Congress activist for anyone to crib about it."

His outburst followed a suggestion by BJP general secretary Sanghapriya Gautam to revoke the controversial appointments. A visibly angry Singh said, "Mr Sanghapriya Gautam is our general secretary all right, but I would not like to comment on whatever he might have said."

Likewise, he seems to have brushed aside the advice proffered by former Union minister Sushma Swaraj to exercise restraint. "I would not like to make any comment on the remarks of Sushma Swarajji either," he said.

Insisting that "there is no dissidence in the party", the chief minister continued to plead ignorance about the submission of resignations to BJP president Shashikant 'Kushabhau' Thakre by as many as 36 dissident legislators who have set May 15 as the deadline for his replacement.

Unofficially, however, the legislators said they were willing to settle for the removal of three controversial persons from the chairmanships of state corporations. These three appointees are recently ousted Lucknow BJP chief Rajendra Tiwari, former MLA Ram Kumar Shukla and one-time councillor Kusum Rai.

When his attention was drawn to certain posters and graffiti that seem to give the infighting the colour of a war between the backward classes and the upper castes, Kalyan Singh said, "I am not aware of this." He added, "In the BJP we do not believe in any kind of casteism; we are true nationalists and above petty caste-ridden and sectarian politics."

But in the same breath, he insisted on participating in the proposed 'Kashyap rally' organised by his OBC (other backward classes) supporters whose belligerence was visible in certain provocative graffiti saying, "Jo Kalyan ko hatayega, hum usko mitaenge" (those who remove Kalyan Singh will be destroyed). He denied that his participation in the rally would send out wrong signals about his tacit approval to the poster war. "I had given my consent to the organisers more than a month back", he argued.

Later, state BJP chief Rajnath Singh, with whom the chief minister is not even on talking terms, also said all was well with the party and "there is no question of a mid-term election".

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