20 March 2013, 01:27 PM IST
Much like the Bourbons of France, the BJP seems to be at pains to either learn anything or forget anything. On the eve of the last two general elections, the party sought to exploit to the hilt the 'foreign origin' of Sonia Gandhi. It came a cropper on both occasions. The nation did not buy its slogan that Indians had to choose between 'Ram and Rome.' Nor did it lose its sleep when the redoubtable Sushma Swaraj went to the extent of threatening to tonsure her head in case the Congress president was made prime minister.
Indeed, it is Sonia Gandhi who took the wind from the BJP's sails when she refused the job and proposed the name of Dr. Manmohan Singh instead. That put paid to the 'foreign origin' campaign. Some others had also raked up the issue. Foremost among them was the NCP. But Sharad Pawar, sensing the nation's mood, made his peace with the Sonia Gandhi-led Congress. The NCP was part of the UPA at the centre and shared power with the Congress in Maharashtra.
That move eventually led Purno Sangma, a former Speaker of the Lok Sabha, to break ranks with the NCP. But there was an odd twist to this tale of defiance: Sangma's daughter, Agatha, held a junior ministerial post in the UPA government. She quit only after her father threw his hat in the ring for the presidential election. Armed with the 'foreign origin' campaign theme, he hobnobbed with every anti-Congress party only to end up with egg on his face. Except for the election in his home state he hasn't been seen much in public since then. But given his never-say-die reputation, trust him to pop up with the 'foreign origin' slogan once the campaign for the general elections gets going in earnest.
The BJP has announced the trailer. In Parliament, its leaders insinuated a connection between three disparate spats with Italy and the origins of the Congress President: Quattrocchi in Bofors, Choppergate and the Italian government's duplicity on the issue of two marines facing trial in Indian courts for the alleged murder of Indian fishermen. On the first count, nothing happened to Quattrocchi even when the NDA government was in power. On the second count, the stand taken by the UPA government has served to blunt the BJP's attack in some measure as has the charges pressed against former air chief Tyagi and his close relatives.
And on the third, Sonia Gandhi herself has condemned the defiance of the Italian government with words that should sound like music to the main opposition party's ears: a 'betrayal' of India's apex court that is 'outright unacceptable.' She went on to say that 'all means must be deployed to ensure that the commitment made by the Italian government to our Supreme Court is honoured.' To leave no room for doubt on her position regarding Italy's double-dealing, she added for good measure that 'no country can, should or will be allowed to take India for granted.'
But, as it turns out, this was no music at all for BJP ears. The party proffered the argument that the Congress party's president should have said what she said earlier. So we are back to witnessing the old game: heads I win, tails you lose. The plain fact is that Sonia Gandhi has put paid to the whispering campaign that alleged that New Delhi would, in complicity with Rome, expel the Italian ambassador to India and then sit back for the storm raised by Italy's abysmal conduct to pass.
Here is the sad part of the story: the BJP does not lack issues to paint the UPA government in a corner: scam after scam has besmirched the name of India, inflation has created havoc for the poor and the middle classes, the uneven pace of the economic reform process hasn't instilled much confidence in investors, terror attacks in different parts of the country have called into question the government's ability to contain this menace, joblessness looms large on the horizon of the nation's youth, and, not least, the country's foreign policy vis-a-vis the Maldives, Italy, Pakistan and Sri Lanka is a source of great concern.
In this context, to engage in xenophobia( the fear and loathing of the foreigner), as the BJP never tires to do, betrays a lack of priorities on the part of the country's main opposition party. It has a ready-made agenda to haul the Congress over the coals and an impressive array of leaders to lead the charge. But if it chooses to harp on the 'Italian connection' it may well lose the plot. To flog a dead horse thrice in succession can be no more than a bizarre – and truly pitiable- spectacle.
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Flogging a dead horse yet again
Dengan url
http://osteoporosista.blogspot.com/2013/03/flogging-dead-horse-yet-again.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Flogging a dead horse yet again
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
Flogging a dead horse yet again
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar