Assam CM rubbishes 'old' and 'new' BJP tussle

NEW DELHI: Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma dismissed the "old BJP” versus “new BJP” debate and said Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party president J P Nadda have made it amply clear that anyone can join the saffron party by giving a missed call to achieve 'Congress-mukt' India.

He made the remarks on Tuesday amidst an apparent tussle between some of BJP's old guard in Assam and those who have joined the party in recent times.

Sarma asserted that he himself, his predecessor Sarbananda Sonowal, Manipur Chief Minister N Biren Singh, Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu, Leader of Opposition in West Bengal Assembly Suvendu Adhikari, and former Karnataka chief minister Basavaraj Bommai were the so-called “new BJP" people.

“There is nothing called new or old BJP. Had the party thought in that way, do you think Sonowal or Himanta Biswa Sarma could have become the chief minister (of Assam)?” he told reporters here in response to a question about the tussle within the Assam BJP unit.

Sarma was part of the Congress, while Sonowal was with the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) before joining the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

He claimed that the “old and new BJP” is actually a Congress-sponsored game as he recalled Union Home Minister Amit Shah's words that the new entrants in the BJP have blend in with the party just like sugar does with tea. He further said that Biren Singh, Pema Khandu or Basavaraj Bommai could not have become chief ministers, or Suvendu Adhikari the leader of the opposition, if the BJP would have believed on the lines of "old or new BJP". Both Singh and Khandu were with the Congress, Adhikari with the Trinamool Congress, while Bommai was in the Janata Dal before they shifted their allegiances.

“The saffron party made two chief ministers in Assam and both of them were 'new BJP'… BJP is such a large-hearted party,” Sarma said.

He reiterated that the raising of this issue was unfortunate, adding that "media likes to highlight it, while a few of our own people when they get emotional, sometimes say something on it." “This issue does not have any relevance. The BJP wants that no one should be left in the Congress. If there is a Congress-Mukt India, new people will have to join the BJP from there. We in BJP want that the Congress should have no existence in India,” he said.

The Assam chief minister added that if new people keep coming to the BJP, 'sanatan dharma' will be strengthened and civilisation will get bolstered. “Narendra Modi and Nadda have made it clear that anyone can join the BJP after giving a missed call so that India becomes Congress-Mukt,” he said, adding that after Modi came to the national scenario, the issue of “old and new BJP” has come to an end. “If the issue is raised, the Congress feels happy as no one from the Congress will join the BJP and there will be people to contest election under the Congress banner,” he said.

Former Union minister Rajen Gohain, a four-time BJP MP from Assam, former BJP state unit president and former minister Siddhartha Bhattacharya, former party MLA Ashok Sarma are some of the senior leaders who had spoken about the alleged neglect of the old BJP guard in the state.

Besides Sarma, his ministers Pijush Hazarika, Jayanta Malla Baruah and Ajanta Neog, and several MLAs were earlier associated with the Congress, while a few MLAs and minister Chandra Mohan Patowari were with the AGP before joining the BJP.