NEW DELHI — Top leadership of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the fountainhead of India's Hindu nationalist organizations, has advised the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to keep lines open with anti-Congress regional parties in order to form a strong and stable government at the center. Sources said the advice was conveyed to BJP president Rajnath Singh when he met the top RSS leadership at organization's headquarters in Delhi. The leaders of the RSS present on the occasion said while they shared BJP's optimism, it should be ready to approach those who are not closely aligned with its rivals in order to form a strong government. People who can liaison with such non-aligned players should be identified and be in a position to approach the prospective partners, a BJP source quoted RSS leaders advising Singh. The RSS elders also said a team should be kept ready to deal with post-poll possibilities but they didn't suggest that ministerial choices should be identified. Among those who met Singh were RSS general secretaries Bhayyaji Joshi and Suresh Soni and joint general secretaries Dattatreya Hosbole and Krishan Gopal. Singh's visit to Jhandewalan, the Delhi headquarters, followed BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi's meeting with RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat on Saturday. Modi's meeting with the RSS chief led Congress to chide him for being a puppet of the “most unaccountable remote control.” AICC spokesman Abhishek Singhvi said, “The people of India for many decades have seen that it is the most unaccountable remote control of Nagpur and the prime ministerial aspirant is no more with his 56-inch chest but someone running on remote control.” The jibe appeared a return compliment for Modi's blunt election campaign dubbing PM Manmohan Singh as remote controlled by Congress chief Sonia Gandhi. Modi met the RSS leadership on Saturday after he finished campaigning for the final phase of the Lok Sabha elections. BJP chief Rajnath Singh followed suit a day later. The two BJP leaders were said to have discussed the possible outcome of the elections with the RSS brass. Congress picked on the meetings to question how could the RSS call itself a “cultural organization” when it was so deeply involved in politics and promoting a particular party. The UPA had framed the election campaign as one between RSS and Congress, dubbing Modi as the face of the saffron fountainhead. The Congress campaign was anchored in the calculation that it would polarize the minority voters towards the party. It remains to be seen how strongly the attack on Modi for “communalism” brought electoral benefits to the “secular” bloc given that the line of aggression also carried the risk of polarizing the majority community behind the BJP.
