Jaswant Singh and controversy not apart

Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) senior leader Jaswant Singh and controversies are not new to each other. In fact, both are two sides of the same coin. The fresh controversy erupted from the releasing of his new book 'Jinnah — India, Independence, Partition' in which he made Jinnah as custodian of secularism and Nehru as the culprit of partition of India.

Cutting across the party lines in thought and principle, Jaswant Singh has been expelled from the party for eulogising Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, in his latest book.

The 71-year-old leader, perhaps, has to pay the price for creating needless controversy through his book. Had he been known that by going against the BJP and above all its ideological boss Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) principle through his nascent discovery – a secular Jinnah, he would have thought twice before praising Jinnah.

RSS once again has proved its hegemony over the BJP, and driven home the straightforward message that the party is still driven by the Hindutva message and any kind of dissent in the party will no longer be tolerated. However, grabbing public attention by touching off controversy through his writing is not new for Jaswant Singh.

He had used the same gimmick during the releasing of his previous book “A Call to Honour: In Service of Emergent India in 2006”, when he alleged that there was a mole in the prime minister’s office in the nineties during the tenure of Congress prime minister PV Narsimha Rao who leaked vital information to American sources.

But, he dramatically backtracked when contradicted by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh who asked him to name the mole. The former external affairs minister said he had a strong hunch that information was being leaked from the PMO.

And now in his latest book that released on Monday, he has glorified Jinnah and held India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru and its first home minister Vallabhbhai Patel responsible for the country's partition in 1947. He claimed Nehru as the culprit of partition and Jinnah as a supporter of federal polity, which even Gandhi accepted.

He has also earned disgrace for escorting terrorists to Kandhar, Afghanistan who were released by the government in exchange of passengers from the hijacked Indian Airlines plane. The decision, however, was taken mutually by bringing all political parties in confidence, but he personally faced ridicule and criticism as he accompanied terrorists when he was the then foreign minister.

He again found himself in the midst of controversy last year after being accused of illegal drug possession. He was accused of offering saffron milk laced with opium to his guests at his home in Jasol, Barmer during the feast known as ‘riyan’. Jaswant Singh, however, denied the charge in the court.