Silent in Bengaluru and MIA in Delhi: Advani not invited to BJP's 35th birth anniversary

The BJP held its 35th foundation day function at the party office in New Delhi but party patriarch LK Advani was reportedly not “officially” invited for the event, while  senior leader Murli Manohar Joshi was also absent from the BJP function. The two are members of the party’s Margdarshak Mandal and former presidents of the party.  In fact  is one of the founding members of the saffron party.

Meanwhile, sources told Ibn Live  that Advani’s office got to know about the function through an sms that was also sent to the media while Joshi was in Kerala and was only expected to be back on Tuesday.

“Earlier, the party would issue a circular about the function and senior leaders would be personally invited on phone. But this time no such niceties were shown,’’ a veteran BJP leader was quoted as saying by  The Hindu. [caption id=“attachment_2186921” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  PTI[/caption] The foundation day function had special significance this year for BJP, which came to power with an absolute majority for the first time in last year’s general elections, as it has also become the largest political party in the world with about 9.5 crore members. Party members dismissed speculation over Advani not being invited at all by saying formal invitations had not been sent to anyone. A general SMS was sent to all saying party president Amit Shah will address party workers on “sthapana diwas” at 10 am at 11, Ashok Road. A Bharatiya Janata Party functionary, who did not want to be named, told IANS that since many party officials returned from Bengaluru on Sunday and there was not much time to prepare for the function, an sms was sent communicating the time for the function. The only founding member present at the function was VK Malhotra. Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, also a founding member, is unwell and has retired from public life. Apart from party president Amit Shah, the foundation day function was attended by union ministers M Venkaiah Naidu and Thawar Chand Gehlot andgeneral secretary Ram Lal. The absence of the two leaders at the party’s event has clearly raised eyebrows since Advani did not even deliver  the valedictory address at the recently-concluded BJP national executive in Bengaluru too — the first time in all such meetings which he has attended. Moreover, Advani last blogged on April 23. Since then, he has chosen to remain silent. Since BJP’s formation in 1980, Advani has always spoken at the national executive meeting, except once at the Goa meet in June 2013 . Advani  was apparently upset over the party’s move to project  Narendra Modi as the head of the campaign committee in the run up to the 2014 Lok Sabha election.  Not only did Advani skip the meet, but he resigned from all party posts a day after the national executive ended in June 2013. The issues were reconciled later and since then Advani has praised Modi for leading the party to victory more than once. However, soon after Amit Shah took over as BJP president, Advani was shunted out of the top decision making body - parliamentary board of the party and a new “Margdarshak Mandal” (guidance committee) was formed which  has Advani, Vajpayee and Murli Manohar Joshi, the three seniormost members, along with Modi and Home Minister Rajnath Singh.  According to an NDTV  report, this  committee has not even met once since it was announced, while its members have been excluded from important decisions like allying with the PDP to form the government in Jammu and Kashmir, or choosing Kiran Bedi as the BJP’s chief ministerial candidate for the Delhi election. As Firstpost noted earlier , " although there has been some pretence of a working relationship between Advani and Modi, the turn of events as has been displayed by Advani’s decision to be completely silent on an occasion as significant as the National Executive meet, means that that the trust deficit amongst them is far deeper than perceived.” That silence in Bangalore has now worsened to a total absence in Delhi. Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted to greet BJP activists on the birth anniversary. “On the BJP’s ‘Sthapana Diwas’, my greetings to all the BJP ‘karyakartas’ and well-wishers,” he said. “BJP’s phenomenal growth is due to the efforts and hard work of generations of selfless ‘karyakartas’ who devoted their lives to our nation,” he said. Neither Advani nor Joshi seem to be on that list anymore. With inputs from IANS