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Govindacharya in Lucknow to assess damage

Tara Shankar Sahay in New Delhi

The Bharatiya Janata Party central leadership today sent party general secretary Govindacharya to Lucknow, even as it became clear that Kalyan Singh's suspension from the party was not going to generate the groundswell of support that the backward class leader had been so heavily banking upon.

"It is one thing to talk big when you are part of an established party, but quite another when you have been suspended from it and have become a persona non grata," said party spokesman Venkaiah Naidu in New Delhi.

Kalyan Singh was suspended from the primary membership of the party yesterday for his outbursts against Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee.

The BJP leadership was quick to latch on to the fact that the ousted Uttar Pradesh chief minister had arrived in Lucknow to a lukewarm reception. Only some of his close aides - Kusum Rai, Ram Kumar Shukla and Bhagwati Shukla - received Kalyan Singh at Amausi airport in Lucknow.

Naidu indicated that the central leadership was aware that Kalyan Singh could have bitten more than he could chew.

Significantly, BJP's allies in Uttar Pradesh - the Loktantrik Congress (20 MLAs) and the Jantantrik BSP (24 MLAs) - have distanced themselves from the ousted chief minister.

Soon after reaching Lucknow, Govindacharya told reporters that Kalyan Singh was yet to file his response to the show-cause notice served on him.

He indicated that the ousted chief minister did not appear in a mood to relent.

Later, addressing party legislators Govindacharya said Kalyan Singh's criticism of Vajpayee was an affront to the party and exhorted partymen to come forward and strengthen the hands of Chief Minister Ram Prakash Gupta "at this critical stage through which the party is passing."

The ousted chief minister's pro-Ram temple statement yesterday also does not appear to have helped him. On the contrary, his clarion call for building the Ram temple in Ayodhya may prove to be stumbling block in his attempts to forge an alliance with Mulayam Singh Yadav of the Samajwadi Party.

Yadav had recently told Kalyan Singh that the two of them could work wonders in the state if the latter abandoned the Ayodhya issue.

According to some senior BJP leaders, the chances of Kalyan Singh's success in wooing OBC legislators in Uttar Pradesh are receding because he took too much for granted about his own stature.

"Kalyan Singh must be out of his mind to take on Vajpayee,'' said a BJP vice-president who did not wanted to be named. "Politics is all about power and one who does not have it should know that he has a very limited scope," he added.

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