A climate change was effected this week in the BJP with the party patriarch L K Advani finally quitting the post of the Leader of the Opposition and paving the way for GenNext. Significantly, it coincided with the Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen on December 18.
The very next day, Rajnath Singh, too, bowed out of office, paving the way for Nitin Gadkari to assume office. With a complete climate change, the party is likely to acquire a new look, with fresh faces inducted at various levels.
Referring to climate change, Nitin Gadkari himself said he needed a new wardrobe, as he was not used to Delhi winter. With Marathi being the flavour of the season, Leader of Opposition Sushma Swaraj was overheard as saying that though she never tried learning Marathi in the past, she was now open to the idea. After all, Sushma Swaraj stunned the party with her flair for learning languages. A Haryanvi, she gave Congress president Sonia Gandhi a run for her money during the Bellary parliamentary contest in Karnataka in 1999 when she learnt Kannada to the level of delivering speeches.
She even went on to quote Tamil poet Thiruvalluvar in Tamil recently. Now, she may turn her attention to Marathi! Former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee who celebrated his birthday amid fanfare last week, also spoke in Marathi to Prakash Javadekar, “Tumi kaam karlo, mee karto aaraam (You work now, while I will take rest).”
New rooms are ready
With large scale changes in the BJP, there is a rush for rooms. Leader of
Opposition Sushma Swaraj will now occupy Room No 44 in the Parliament House, which has already been vacated by L K Advani. Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley not only occupied Room No 43, but also replaced the official furniture with his own personal furniture.
The deputy leader in Lok Sabha Gopinath Munde will now get the designated Room No 2, which too was tastefully done up by Sushma Swaraj during her tenure, prior to her elevation. Sushma Swaraj may quit as Parliamentary Standing Committee on External Affairs chairperson, and the party has to name a nominee. The fallout of PAC chairman Jaswant Singh quitting is that he loses a room in the Parliament House. The party has to nominate a new PAC chairman.
Advani, who became BJP Parliamentary Party cChairman, needs a room. Moves are on to elect him as NDA chairman so that he could occupy Room No 4, which has been lying vacant, as former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, who held the post and the room, is not active, on health grounds.
Murali’s lobbying
Veteran Congress leader K Karunakaran’s son K Muralidharan was seen in the Parliament House, meeting with senior Congress leaders Pranab Mukherjee, A K Anthony, Motilal Vora and others, in his bid to regain entry into the Congress. Though no firm assurance has been held out by the Congress leaders, Murali has not given up hope and in fact, he is confident of gaining re-entry into the Congress soon.
Grapevine has it that two letters are pending with the Congress high command. One is by Karunakaran, saying it is his last wish and desire to see his son back in the Congress and the second one by Murali, who tendered an apology for his acts of commission and omission for the past six years. KPCC president Ramesh Chennithala and Oommen Chandy are principal aspirants for Kerala Chief Ministership. Since Chennithala has an edge, given his access to Congress high command, Oommen Chandy, the other aspirant, wants Muralidharan as counterpoise to Chennithala. In the event of contest between Muralidharan and Chennithala, Oomen Chandy could hope to emerge as a compromise candidate!