Surat, 20 May 2012

Once he was a Chief Minister of Gujarat, but nowadays he is novice. He has lately formed Prabuddh Nagarik Manch. He was last seen holding a press conference with p-seculars in Mumbai to defend Teesta Setalvad. He is Suresh Mehta. When Keshubhai was asked to resign from the post of Chief Minister, Suresh Mehta was of opinion that as the next senior person and former Chief Minister, he should be installed as the Chief Minister and not Narendra Modi.

However he was unheard. When Modi became the Chief Minister for the first time, he had visited Suresh Mehta’s bungalow to seek his blessings, and Suresh Mehta had presented him an English book on politics. Suresh Mehta was one of the Gujarat BJP leaders unhappy with the entry of Narendra Modi in Gujarat as Chief Minister.

The other prominent leaders were Keshubhai and Kashiram Rana. As the election season is coming closure, these leaders in political hibernation are surfacing. They did same job in 2002 and 2007 also at some level, but with poll victory of Modi, they were again pushed to corner.

Suresh Mehta in this talk speaks on Modi, Keshubhai, Gujarat poll 2012 and other political affairs in guarded words. He observes that the minister who have not done their job enough will be the weakest candidates in forthcoming Gujarat assembly poll. The next class of weak candidate will be the MLAs who have not performed, according to Mehta.

How much Mehta understands Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh’s ideology is evident in the last phase of this interview where he says that Keshubhai’s movement of Patel unity is as per the RSS motto ‘sanghe shakti kaliyuge(Organization is Strength), while the fact is that division in the name of castes within Hindu community is completely against the ideology of RSS.

Mehta’s observation that the “people of Gujarat need mental food”, is perhaps thanks to the consistent stand of people of Gujarat to back Modi, by re-electing the BJP repeatedly.

Mehta’s this interview was taken on the sideline of MahaGujarat Janata Party leader Fakirbhai Chauhan’s birthday function in Surat.

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