Jammu: Hitting out at dynastic politics, BJP president Amit Shah on Saturday said his party chooses leaders based on merit, while others give more importance to family interests.
He cited his own example saying he joined the BJP as a member in 1982 without any political background and still made his way to become the party president, PTI reported.
When I joined the party in 1982, I was a booth member, and without any political backing, I went on to become the party president from the booth president and this shows the proof of the internal democracy in the party,” he said addressing a gathering.
Former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee, senior leader LK Advani and Prime Minister Narendra Modi were first-generation leaders of the party and did not have any political background. This shows BJP’s internal democracy, he said.
“Can anybody tell me who will be BJP chief after me? Nobody can tell. But everybody can easily tell you who will be the party president after Sonia Gandhi (in the Congress),” he said.
“This is the difference between the BJP and the rest of the parties. Take for example Samajwadi Party after Mulayam Singh Yadav. His son Akhilesh took over the party,” he said.
Shah said most parties had such a leadership but out of 1,650 political parties only the BJP and the CPI-M kept alive their internal democracy and constitutional values.
“Tell me what is the ideology of the Congress… before Independence, it was not a party based on ideology. It was a group of people with different ideologies who had come together for free India,” he said.
“From the Bhartiya Jan Sangh to the Janata Party and to the BJP — from 1980 till today — the party maintains in high spirits its internal democracy as per its constitution,” he added.
(With PTI inputs)
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