Senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and former Union minister Yashwant Sinha has once again lambasted his party and the Narendra Modi government. In an opinion piece in The Indian Express, Sinha appealed to the BJP lawmakers to stand-up and question the top leadership.
Sinha, in his opinion piece, says that the BJP leaders including him had put in hard work to dethrone the Congress party from the Centre, with the hopes that things will change for the better. He writes, “The government has now completed nearly four years in office, presented five budgets and used up all the opportunity available to it to show results. At the end of it, however, we seem to have lost our way and the confidence of the voters.”
According to the former finance minister, the state of the economy is “grim”. Pointing out at the non-performing assets, Sinha wrote, “A fast-growing economy does not accumulate the kind of non-performing assets in its banks, as we have done over the last four years. In a fast-growing economy, the farmers are not in distress, the youth are not without jobs, small businesses do not stand destroyed and savings and investment do not fall as drastically as they have done over the last four years.” The BJP veteran has claimed that corruption has raised its ugly head in form of the banking scams. “The scamsters also manage to run away from the country somehow, as the government watches helplessly.”
Speaking about the recent rape cases, Sinha wrote, “Rapes have become the order of the day and instead of acting strictly against the rapists we have become their apologists.” According to him, “minorities are alienated.”
Hitting out directly at Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah, Sinha has pointed out at the allegedly failing foreign policy in the backyard. In a no bars held blow to the BJP, Sinha wrote, “Internal democracy in the party stands completely destroyed. ..The prime minister has no time for you. The party headquarter has become a corporate office where it is impossible to meet the CEO.”
PM Modi had recently asked BJP leaders to hold a nationwide one-day fast to protest against the Opposition parties which according to them were responsible for the Budget session washout. Sinha holds the BJP leadership responsible for this washout. “I compare this to the days of Atal Bihari Vajpayee when all of us were under strict instructions to accommodate the Opposition and ensure that Parliament functioned.”
Appealing to the party parliamentarians, Sinha wrote, “The situation demands that you speak up in the national interest…If you remain silent now you will do a great disservice to the country. Future generations are unlikely to forgive you.”