The BJP office-bearers’ meet, held on the eve of its two-day national executive, saw heated exchanges on Varun Gandhi’s hate speech with the party’s Muslim faces putting the leadership on the defensive on Hindutva.

Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Shahnawaz Hussain made passionate interventions, prompting parliamentary party leader L K Advani to say that the BJP “had never supported Varun on his anti-Muslim speeches.”

“I had immediately asked Ravi (Shankar Prasad) to disown the statement. It was only when he (Varun) was implicated under the

NSA that the party supported him,” Advani told the leaders.

Both Naqvi and Hussain said that “instead

of Rahul Gandhi, his cousin Varun should have been given credit for the Congress victory.”

Party vice-president Naqvi asked: “What brand of Hindutva do we believe in? Is it the Pilibhit marka (model) Hindutva or is it the one being discussed by the Sarsanghchalak (RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat, who has been invoking the names of Varghese Kurien and A P J Abdul Kalam while elucidating on Hindutva)? Do we believe in Deen Dayal Upadhyaya’s or L K Advani’s or Pilibhit’s Hindutva?”

He also questioned the propriety and rationale of party president Rajnath Singh visiting Varun when he was imprisoned (at Etah).

“How does the party expect us (BJP’s Muslim leaders) to face the people under these circumstances,” Bhagalpur MP Shahnawaz Hussain asked, referring to the speeches made by B L Sharma “Prem.”

Apart from the debate on Varun, it was a letter that kept the BJP abuzz through the day. A PTI report said that Arun Shourie’s letter to the party chief said that “conspirators” have taken over the party. There was no discussion on the letter.

... contd.