BJP smarting from Chidu’s sharp ’un

Home minister P Chidambaram took on the Bharatiya Janata Party leadership and Board of Control for Cricket in India head-on over the shifting of the Indian Premier League abroad.

He described their outbursts against the Centre as “unwarranted”. At the same time he reflected on the studied silence maintained by host states on providing match security that he felt made a strong case for poll-related security.

If it was the no-holds-bar accusations by senior BJP leaders Arun Jaitley and Narendra Modi and BCCI president Shashank Manohar against the government for dithering on security on Sunday, it was Chidambaram’s day on Monday. He not only picked on them individually for a rebuttal but had an implied message in his outburst that the IPL was a shrewd combination of sport and business, and that there was no reason to add politics.

Home Minister P Chidambaram cornered BJP’s Arun Jaitley for heaping scorn on the United Progressive Alliance for not allowing the IPL to be held in India. “I know Jaitley’s penchant for exaggeration, but as he too wears the cap of the Delhi and District Cricket Association president he seems to have gone overboard. Perhaps he has forgotten that several National Democratic Alliance leaders had sought the IPL’s postponement till the polls were over,” he said.

Seeking to set the record straight, Chidambaram said that till Monday morning only three states and a union territory had responded to the proposed IPL schedule and most were prepared to host matches after April 30. These included BJP-ruled Karnataka, Punjab, Andhra Pradesh and Chandigarh. Andhra Pradesh expressed inability to provide security for matches in April.

Jaitley and Modi retaliated and added a political touch to the issue but preferred to maintain silence on the security impact of holding the general elections and IPL together. “The decision to shift the IPL abroad has almost clubbed India with Pakistan as an unsafe sporting venue. It has given the country a bad name,” they said.

Jaitley stretched his argument on India not being a safe destination. “Today it is sporting events, tomorrow it could be religious events such as the Kumbh Mela or Ajmer sharif urs. The home minister must realise that clubbing India with Pakistan amounts to giving India a bad name,” he said.

He said that when Chidambaram was finance minister, the finance ministry was unsafe. Now under his stewardship as home minister, the country’s security was unsafe, he said.

Chidambaram maintained that India was safe for cricket and the only issue was about scheduling matches. “I have repeatedly said cricket or any other game when played in India is completely safe and all players will be provided full security. The question is when the IPL matches should be played,” he maintained.