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LK Advani: India BJP Leader 'Refuses To Reconsider'
BBC NEWS, INDIA
June 11, 2013: The veteran leader of India's main opposition BJP, LK Advani, has refused to reconsider his resignation from party posts, media reports say. Mr Advani quit on Monday saying that party's current leaders were "now concerned with their personal agendas".
Reports say he is upset over the appointment of controversial party colleague Narendra Modi as head of the BJP's election committee. The 85-year-old politician is a founder member of the BJP. He was India's home minister and deputy prime minister when the BJP was in power in the late 1990s.
The BJP has rejected Mr Advani's resignation offer and senior colleagues have met him at his residence in the capital, Delhi, to dissuade him from quitting.
Crisis
Media reports say Mr Advani has refused to reconsider his decision so far, placing his "party in a quandary". He reportedly told the leaders who visited him that Mr Modi "is not the right leader for India", the NDTV news channel said.
On Monday, Mr Modi said he had a "detailed conversation" with Mr Advani on the phone and "urged him to change his decision". He tweeted that he hoped Mr Advani would not "disappoint" party workers.
Correspondents say Mr Advani's resignation has plunged the party into a crisis ahead of next year's general elections. However, BJP leader Sushma Swaraj tweeted that there was "no crisis" in the BJP. "We are all united. We are all one. We will move forward with the blessings of Mr Advani," she said.
In his resignation letter to Mr Singh on Monday, Mr Advani said he was resigning from all the main organizations of the party, including the parliamentary board, the national executive and the election committee.
"For some time I have been finding it difficult to reconcile either with the current functioning of the party, or the direction in which it is going," he wrote in the letter. "Most leaders of ours are now concerned just with their personal agendas."
Mr Advani's comments are being seen as criticism of Mr Modi, who will lead the BJP's campaign in next year's general elections. The appointment in effect positions the Gujarat leader as the party's candidate for prime minister. Mr Modi is seen as a dynamic and efficient leader who has made Gujarat an economic powerhouse. But he is also a deeply divisive figure whose reputation was tarnished by anti-Muslim riots which took place in 2002 under his watch. More than 1,000 people, most of them Muslims, were killed. Mr Modi denies doing too little to stop the violence.
