BJP old guards, Advani, Joshi, Shourie are losers. Don't take them seriously

The statement issued by BJP's "Margdarshak Mandal" in the wake of party's humiliating defeat in Bihar Assembly elections is on the expected lines. One would have been surprised if they had kept silent, leave aside lending support to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, party president Amit Shah and other decision-makers.

Party stalwarts LK Advani, MM Joshi, Yashwant Sinha and Shanta Kumar said: "Bihar results show that no lesson has been learnt from the fiasco in Delhi. The principal reason for Bihar defeat is the way the party has been emasculated in the last year. The review should cover the way the party is forced to kow-tow to a handful and how its consensual character has been destroyed. The review must not be done by the very persons who have managed and have been responsible for the campaign in Bihar. To say that everyone is responsible for the defeat is to ensure that no one is held responsible."

The statement of these veterans is not surprising because they have been decisively sidelined ever since Modi took over as prime minister and Shah was annointed as the BJP chief on the basis of age criterion. Be they the Margdarshak Mandal members or other leaders like Arun Shourie and Shatrughan Sinha, their anger can be termed as rumblings of disgruntled leaders who feel they have not got their due after BJP came to power in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

All of them held key portfolios in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government and expected to be part of Modi government. The expectations of most of them - particularly Advani, Joshi and Shatrughan Sinha - were misplaced as they had opposed elevation of Modi as the prime ministerial candidate for the last general elections.

It is really surprising why Yashwant Sinha has joined this bandwagon of old guards. His son Jayant Sinha not only was given a ticket in his place but also made a Union minister ignoring the charge of promoting dynasty.

It is also surprising that the veterans have now rejected "collective responsibility" for defeat in Bihar. Was an individual leader or a group of leaders held accountable when the BJP had lost the 2004 and 2009 Lok Sabha elections? The party had lost several Assembly elections, like in Rajasthan and Delhi, earlier too but the party leadership as a whole was held responsible. Hence, an outright rejection of collective responsibility by these patriarchs now does not hold ground now.

At a time when the party should have shown unity and stood solidly behind the current leadership, the public airing of grievances does not enhance the stature of these senior leaders.