BJP babus flunk their own Vajpayee quiz

Dear BJP, you really need to practice what you quiz. Or at least do your homework first before foisting it on hapless schoolchildren. The Telegraph reports that a quiz the BJP had come up with for schoolchildren in Patna on Atal Behari Vajpayee has left its own leaders foxed. The occasion was Atal_ji_’s 87th birthday which the BJP decided to celebrate with much pomp and pomposity with an eye on the upcoming UP polls. The party decided to designate his birthday Good Governance Day or Sushasan Day. Aah, the happy memories of “good governance” and an image as the “party of the masses.”  Unfortunately, the memories don’t extend to remembering much else about “ the tallest leader, best parliamentarian and best Prime Minister”. For example, the year he was born, where he was born, his first portfolio. [caption id=“attachment_165507” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“A quiz the BJP had come up with for schoolchildren in Patna on Atal Behari Vajpayee has left its own leaders foxed. Reuters”]  [/caption] All those were part of  a quiz the BJP organised for schoolchildren in Patna as part of the former PM’s great birthday jamboree. No surprise, the students of Rajkiya Kanya Mahila Vidyalay, Rajkiya Saraswati Vidyalay and New Harijan Academy were confounded. They at least had an excuse. Vajpayee is not on their syllabus. But what about the BJP’s own spokesman Rajiv Pratap Rudy? “Why don’t you search it on Google?” he told The Telegraph when asked in which state Vajpayee was born. Singh had been a minister in the Vajpayee government. Nitin Navin, an MP who was part of the entourage that went to Delhi to greet Vajpayee on his birthday, flunked the quiz and then like a good politician tried to get back on message. “Today, I met Atal_ji_ on his birthday and I feel I have been blessed. Vajpayee is such a great leader,” he said. Sorry, that was not the question. Eventually after he flailed on everything from the year of his birth to Vajpayee’s first portfolio as minister, Rudy started to bristle. “I will suggest you do not write about my replies to your queries,” he told reporter Amit Bhelari. “I do not think such stories will help you in the future. You have a long way to go in this profession: so you better avoid such things.” Ouch. When in doubt Google. When still in doubt, ask for 10 minutes. When even more in doubt, start threatening. And then came the final straw. How many times has Vajpayee been the PM? Rudy just hung up the phone. If the ailing PM lives on at all in the party’s memory it seems to be in a slew of schemes adorned with his name — the Atal Bijli Bachat Yojana, the Atal Swasthya Sewa Yojana, the Atal Awaj Yojana. Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has announced every government office in the state would have Vajpayee’s picture. Party leaders like Himachal CM Prem Dhumal have demanded the government give him the Bharat Ratna. Perhaps they all need to do a little homework first. It seems like Vajpayee’s niece, Rekha Shukla was not far off the mark when she told The Times of India “Since the last few elections, we were feeling very bad that the party which grew because of Atal_ji_, did not remember him.” Read more about how Rudy and other leaders fared on the Vajpayee quiz here. An earlier version of the story had written the name of BJP spokesman Rudy incorrectly. That error is regretted.