Voices of dissent after BJP's flop show

NEW DELHI: Voices are being raised against the BJP state leadership after failure of a protest organised to observe as “Black Day”, at Jantar Mantar on completion of four years of Arvind Kejriwal government on Thursday. Large section of party leaders, including current and former office bearers, questioned low turnout of workers and other mismanagement at the venue.

A party insider said that with a low turnout of around 300 to 400 workers, BJP in the national capital is trying to dislodge the Kejriwal government which won 67 seats out of 70 assembly seats in 2015 polls.

A senior party leader and ex-state office bearer told this newspaper that it’s surprising that BJP, which has over 50,000 office bearers at block level, was not able to bring 10 per cent of office bearers in a protest organised against the Kejriwal government.

It’s time to introspect the failure to mobilise office bearers and cadre at ground. On first hand, it is disconnect between state leadership from ground workers and absence of proper planning for any agitation or programme, he added.

Explaining about total numbers of office bearers at party structure, he said that apart from main organisation there are seven morchas in 280 blocks and each have minimum 30 office bearers including members of executive.

“If we calculate this number it crosses 65,000 but in a protest we are not even able to ensure presence of 10 per cent of total key workers at block level,” he observed.

Another senior party leader blamed key group of five senior leaders of the state unit which consists of Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari, general secretary (organisation) Siddarthan and general secretaries Kuljeet Chahal, Rajesh Bhatia and Ravinder Gupta.

“Top leadership including key group is completely disconnected with realities. They are surrounded by sycophants and yes men, hard working people are ignored or sidelined,” he said.

Some leaders even blamed lack of proper planning for failure of Thursday’s protest. “Why was it not planned a week in advance? Why was it finalised one day before? Is it not the responsibility of these senior leaders and sycophants to inform the state president or plan the protest?” he asked.

Questions were also raised over theme of protest, “4 years, 70 promises and 74 frauds of Kejriwal Government”, a senior leader said, adding that the state leadership failed to explain the theme to those who attended the protest.