Harish in Dreamland

Harish Khare needs no introduction. I do not want to say anything about this "intellectual". I will leave that to the readers. Let them decide after reading this article that appeared on the front page of The Hindu on the morning of August 19, 2003.

Since then Harish Khare has only got better(or worse?). His rabid anti-BJP attitude has spurred him to pen a 1800 word article brimming with lies, concoctions, exaggerations,personalised attacks, wishful thinking, mudslinging and every trick in the book to discredit the BJP and its election strategy.

Even if a Mani Shankar Aiyar or a Jayanthi Natarajan were to write an article, they would have tried to sprinkle in little bit of balance. Well, they already have party positions. But what about aspiring Rajya Sabha members? It is only opportunities like this that will help them reinforce their loyalties. Hence, Harish closes his eyes , disregards realities and writes with the sole objective of pleasing his masters. Excerpts:

More than the split within the sangh parivar, it is the alienation of the Patel community that will impact(the BJP, emphasis added) the 2007 battle

Oh.. if you thought this was the single most important factor that would work against the BJP, you are wrong. Harish is a "secular intellectual" and will have a bagful of reasons. Few lines later he says

More than the Patels it is the division in the ranks of the Kolis, another powerful community, that would work to the BJP’s disadvantage for the first time in more than two decades.

Ok. So its not just patels;but patels+ Kollis.

Because of the disproportionate and exaggerated accent on the Chief Minister and his personality, the BJP organisation has broken down

patels+ Kollis + disproportionate and exaggerated importance to Modi + organisational break down.

The Congress, too, has aggressively answered the BJP’s “soft on terrorism” charge.

patels+ Kollis + disproportionate and exaggerated importance to Modi + organisational break down+ aggressive congress

Pheww... what a combo. A sure death knell for Modi. Having satisfied himself that the BJP is headed for a drubbing, he now switches to maligning it , its leaders and its strategy.

(Modi is an , reference added)Egoist, loner, has no friend. There is nobody close to him. An emotional person, who ends up creating enemies; one who has cut himself off from normal information sources and in the process has become prone to tale-carriers. He does not believe he needs to do any ‘favour’ to any of the established crowd.

Well, isn't this applicable to Sonia Gandhi and Jayalalithaa too? Will he dare say this against JJ?

Collectors/district development officers are pressed to bring crowds in buses for the Chief Minister’s much publicised rallies

For Sonia, the rallies overflow without even the Congress having to lift a finger.

Never before in the history of Gujarat has the BJP faced the election with so open and so bitter a split within the sangh parivar as in 2007. A clash of egos between the Chief Minister and the sangh parivar has remained unresolved. The sangh parivar apparatchiks, long used to dictating to the BJP brass, found Mr. Modi, especially after the 2002 victory, not amenable to any advice or suggestion.

http://www.hindu.com/2007/12/11/stories/2007121155891100.htm

Now comes the most interesting part. Having painted such a gloomy picture , the last line of the article is :

Unless there is a ‘big incident,’ it could be touch and go.”

If even after all this, the fight is going to be close, isn't this a tacit acknowledgement of the gap between the two parties?

There is only one place this article deserves to go- THE DUST BIN.