Resentment brews in BJP

PATNA: Resentment prevails among the rank and file of BJP in Valmikinagar, Siwan, Gopalganj, Gaya and Jhanjharpur after the party on Sunday allotted its sitting seats to JD(U) to contest the Lok Sabha elections. Within hours of the announcement, over half a dozen district level functionaries and 15 block level office-bearers of BJP resigned in West Champaran.
Sources said JD(U) was earlier vying for the Sheohar seat represented by Rama Devi of BJP, but it could not materialize. BJP had to leave five sitting seats for JD(U) led by CM Nitish Kumar under the 17:17:6 formula for NDA in Bihar. LJP, the third NDA partner, managed to retain six seats it had won in 2014, but it had to exchange Munger with Nawada. BJP had won 22 seats in 2014 while JD(U) had contested that election alone and won just 2 seats.
Satish Chandra Dubey had won the Valmikinagar seat in 2014 as a BJP nominee. “I fail to understand why a young leader like Dubey ji has been denied ticket,” said BJP district farmers’ cell chief Pawan Kumar Verma. Dubey had earlier represented Chanpatia and Narkatiaganj assembly seats in West Champaran.
Arvind Soni, Jaishankar Thakur, Aakash Srimukh and Pawan Kumar Verma were among the prominent district level functionaries who resigned. The block functionaries of Sikta West, Gaunha East, Narkatiaganj West, Narkatiaganj North, Bagaha, Chautarva and others also resigned.
Dubey, however, refused to comment. “I don’t want to say anything on the issue at this juncture,” he said over the phone from Delhi. His supporters in Bettiah said Dubey was trying to persuade the BJP central leadership to retain him form Valmikinagar.
Dubey supporters feel the decision will have ‘adverse’ impact on the NDA performance in Champaran region. “Brahmins of East Champaran and West Champaran will not vote for the BJP. It will also affect the neighbouring Gopalganj where its MP Janak Ram has also been denied ticket,” said Sanjay Kumar of Gopalganj.
“We had not imagined that the sitting MP would not be fielded this time,” said Tapeshwar Ram, a diehard supporter of Janak Ram, who was earlier associated with Bahujan Samaj Party of Mayawati. But he switched over to BJP and was made the party nominee from Gopalganj in 2014. “It was because of Modi wave that he had won the election,” another BJP functionary said.
A team of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) had conducted a survey in Gopalganj about six months ago. “I think the team had made some adverse remarks against Janak,” the BJP functionary said.
Siwan MP Om Prakash Yadav, however, couldn’t conceal his resentment. When contacted, Yadav said on Monday the party should have taken him into confidence before arriving at any conclusion. “The kind of struggle I had to wage to wrest the seat from RJD and Mohammad Shahabuddin is an open secret. But the party leadership didn’t think over it before giving it away to JD(U),” he added.
The supporters of other BJP sitting MPs, Hari Manjhi (Gaya) and Birendra Kumar Choudhary (Jhanjharpur), were also disappointed. Choudhary met JD(U) state president Bashishtha Narayan Singh in Patna after the Sunday announcement. Bashishtha, however, said it was an informal meeting. “He is a close friend of mine,” Singh clarified.