The question that provoked Amit Shah

“Had you gone abroad when results of Uttar Pradesh came, when the results of Assam came, when the results of Uttarakhand was declared?” was the sharp rejoinder by BJP President Amit Shah on Monday while responding to a question on why his assessment had gone wrong in Gujarat as in Bihar earlier.

The journalist had made the mistake of blaming Shah for ‘always’ making wrong assessments, prompting Shah to snap. Till then he had maintained his poise and a straight face even when he blamed Congress for ‘low-level of campaigning’ and injecting casteism in Gujarat. As is now the practice, Shah’s presser was being aired ‘live’ on Television.

Nobody asked Shah to comment on the Prime Minister’s conspiracy theories, on PM Modi latching on to stray statements of Congressmen outside Gujarat or the PM asking in public meetings whether Congress wanted a temple or a mosque at Ayodhya.

Shah was at pains to point out that BJP now had governments in 19 states and that even in Gujarat the BJP had bagged almost 50 per cent of the votes polled. Conceding that the party had lost seats it had won in 2012, Shah declared patiently that various reasons could be attributed to victory and defeat and the party would deliberate on what went right and what went wrong in the election.

Addressing the media at the BJP headquarters in Delhi, Shah said, “People of Gujarat have voted for politics of performance and blamed the opposition for divisive politics”.

Nobody asked any question on dynasties within BJP and the NDA; nor was any question asked whether the controversy over his son’s trading company that posted a dramatic 16,000 times hike in turnover in one year before shutting it down the very next year, had affected the party’s performance in Gujarat.

“This is a victory of development over dynasty and polarization,” he declared.

Nobody asked Shah about the Prime Minister’s charge of treason levelled against his predecessor in office Dr Manmohan Singh. While in campaigning in Gujarat, the Pm had accused Dr Singh, a former Army chief General ( Rtd) deepak Kapoor and former Vice President Hamid Ansari of hatching a conspiracy to destabilise Gujarat in connivance with Pakistan. Nor did Shah refer to it.

But while Dr Manmohan Singh has sought a public apology and the opposition in Parliament is likely to seek a discussion and the PM’s response to it, no question was asked by the representatives of the mainstream media.