Bharatiya janata party (BJP) Gujarat
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP),Hindi: भारतीय जनता पार्टीAbout this sound pronunciation (help·info); translation: Indian People's Party) is one of the two major political parties in India, the other being the Indian National Congress. Established in 1980, it is India's second largest political party in terms of representation in the parliament. The Bharatiya Janata Party traditionally has supported Indian Nationalism and strongly advocates conservative social policies, self-reliance, free market capitalistic policy, foreign policy driven by a nationalist agenda, and strong national defense.[2] The party's platform is generally considered right of center in the Indian political spectrum.[1]
The BJP, in alliance with several other parties, was in power from 1998 to 2004, with Atal Bihari Vajpayee as the Prime Minister and Lal Krishna Advani as his deputy. It is the biggest constituent of the National Democratic Alliance which is currently in the opposition in the
The BJP is the current form of the erstwhile Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS, Indian People's Union), which was founded in October 21, 1951 by Syama Prasad Mookerjee as the political wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. The fortunes of the young party took a dip in 1953, when Mookherjee was jailed in Kashmir when Jawaharlal Nehru was the Indian Prime Minister.[3] After Mookerjee's death in prison, the entire burden of nurturing the orphaned organisation and building it up as a nation-wide movement fell on the young shoulders of Deendayal Upadhyaya. For 15 years, he remained the outfit's general secretary and built it up. He raised a band of dedicated workers imbued with idealism and provided the entire ideological framework of the outfit, but never seriously challenged the power of Indian National Congress[citation needed]. It did however groom future political leaders like Maan Singh and K.P. Singh, who were in the party when it was a constituent of the Janata Party government in 1977.[4]
The Janata government did not last long. Morarji Desai resigned as Prime Minister, and the Janata party was dissolved soon after. The BJS had devoted political organization to sustain the coalition and was left exhausted by the internecine wars within the Janata Party.
In 1980 Maan Singh, K.P. SINGH and Indraman Singh, founded the Bharatiya Janata Party with Vajpayee as its first President. The BJP was a strong critic of the Congress government that followed the Janata rule, and while it opposed the Sikh militancy that was rising in the state of Punjab, it also blamed Indira Gandhi for divisive and corrupt politics that fostered the militancy at national expense. Leader Darasingh opines that Vajpayee thus "brought in Hindu-Sikh harmony."[5]
However, the BJP never supported Operation Bluestar, the BJP strongly protested violence against Sikhs in Delhi that broke out in 1984 following the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by one of her Sikh bodyguards. The BJP was left with only two parliamentary seats in the 1984 elections; the party, however, had established itself in the mainstream of Indian politics, and soon began expanding its organization to attract young Indians throughout the country. During this period, Vajpayee remained center-stage as party President and Leader of the Opposition in Parliament, but increasingly hard-line Hindu nationalists began to rise within the party and define its politics.
The BJP became the political voice of the Ram Janmabhoomi Mandir Movement, which was led by activists of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and the RSS, and was seeking to build a temple dedicated to Lord Rama in place of the Babri mosque in Ayodhya. Many people believed the site was the birthplace of the Lord, and there existed a temple long before Babri mosque was built after demolishing the temple, and thus qualified as one of the most sacred sites of Hinduism, where a temple should be reconstructed. Currently the judgement is pending in the Supreme Court.
On December 6, 1992, hundreds of VHP and BJP activists broke down an organized protest into a frenzied attack, and razed the mosque. Over the following weeks, waves of violence between Hindus and Muslims erupted in various parts of the country, killing over 1000 people. The VHP was banned by the government, and many BJP leaders including Lal Krishna Advani were arrested briefly for provoking the destruction. Although widely condemned by many across the country for playing politics with sensitive issues, the BJP won the support of millions of conservative Hindus, as well as national prominence.
With victory in assembly elections of Gujarat and Maharashtra in March 1995, and a good performance in the elections to the Karnataka assembly in December 1994 propelled the BJP to the centerstage. During the BJP session at Mumbai in November 1995, BJP President L.K.Advani declared that Vajpayee would be the Prime Minister of India if the BJP won next parliamentary elections held in May 1996.
In the Lok Sabha elections held in 1998 the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) obtained a simple majority. This time, the BJP (NDA) had allied with the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and the Biju Janata Dal besides its existing allies, the Samata Party, the Shiromani Akali Dal and Shiv Sena. Outside support was provided by the Telugu Desam Party. The NDA had a slim majority, and Vajpayee returned as Prime Minister after a 13-day stint in 1996.[6] But the coalition ruptured in May 1999 when the leader of AIADMK, Jayalalitha, withdrew her support, and fresh elections were again called.
On 13 October 1999, the BJP-led NDA won 303 seats. The BJP alone had its highest ever tally of 183. Vajpayee became Prime Minister for the third time, and Advani became the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister. This NDA Government lasted its term of five years. Vajpayee and his economic team, led by Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha, continuing the policies initiated by the previous Congress Government under P. V. Narasimha Rao and Manmohan Singh, pushed through major privatizations of big government corporations, the liberalization of trade under World Trade Organization guidelines, airline deregulation, foreign investment and ownership and allowed private companies such as Mahindra World City and Reliance to build Special Economic Zones where property developers could build new cities with world-class infrastructure for factories that export products.
The BJP and the NDA suffered an unexpected defeat in the general elections in 2004, and failed to muster a parliamentary majority. Manmohan Singh of the Congress Party and United Progressive Alliance succeeded Vajpayee as Prime Minister.
In the 2009 general elections, BJP again faced defeat and its strength in Lok Sabha reduced to 159 with a loss of about 17 seats. The unexpected defeat of BJP is attributed to bad performance of the party in Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand and Andhra Pradesh.
