BJP rejects Kejriwal’s charges, assures Gadkari second term

Rejecting IAC activist Arvind Kejriwal's allegations against its party president as "false and baseless", the BJP Wednesday rallied around Nitin Gadkari and even indicated that he would get a second term as party chief as expected at the end of the year.

"The allegations are completely baseless. The entire cadre and party leadership stand firmly behind Nitinji," Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj told a press conference. She also indicated that Kejriwal's allegations would not change the party's plan to give Gadkari a second term in December. "If they feel he is going to get the second term, this is none of their business. It is beyond his brief," Swaraj said referring to IAC and Kejriwal.

Her Rajya Sabha counterpart Arun Jaitley came down heavily against the "overstatement, exaggerations and falsehood" of Kejriwal. He said the "hitman has hit a self-goal", denting the credibility of civil society organisations. "It is like making a mountain of what was not even a molehill," Jaitley said.

"Kejriwal's press conference is a failed attempt to bring a moral equivalence between the ruling Congress and the BJP," Jaitley stressed in an apparent indication of the BJP's relief over what the party sees as Kejriwal's unconvincing attempt to paint the BJP with the same brush as the Congress. Similar sentiments were expressed by Gadkari who said Kejriwal was trying to project himself as the lone opposition voice.

"Congress' image is going down due to corruption cases and they (IAC) are trying to defame BJP to occupy the opposition party space which belongs to us. This is a conspiracy of the Congress and IAC to divide the opposition votes," Gadkari said. Swaraj and Jaitley said that Gadkari's Purti trust had got the land in question on lease for 11 years. They said it was not being used for farming but to grow subsidized sugarcane saplings for Vidarbha's farmers.

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