Little love for Oppn in BJP bastion

"THE RAM TEMPLE has been built...But what about our small neighbourhood temple for Hanumanji?" asks Indra Raj Singh, a resident of Arthala village in Ghaziabad, head of the organising committee of the local Hanuman Temple which was brought down for reconstruction.

- LIZ MATHEW

Work on it is stalled due to the Ghaziabad Municipal Authority's claim over the land.

"We approached everyone, they are not just unhelpful, rude too. This is the problem when you have an MP, MLA and Mayor, all from the same party, the BJP, and when the Opposition so weak. These leaders have become ghamandi (arrogant), confident of staying in satta (power), because there is no vipaksh (Opposition).

That's not healthy." Singh's words find an echo in Deepansh, a final-year B. Tech student at a private university in Meerut, who says it's hard to hold to account a ruling party that's taken victory for granted.

A sign of the disarray in the Opposition, says Mohammad Mehtab, a flower-seller in the heart of Meerut city, is that this time the Samajwadi Party has twice changed its candidate-it doesn't augur well, he says.

Of course, there's not much love lost for the Opposition here, no visible dent in this solid BJP bastion - Meerut has been a party stronghold for the last 15 years, Ghaziabad for two decades, the party's vote share in the last election touching just shy of 50% in Meerut, above 60% in Ghaziabad. But you do hear a refrain of the "missing Opposition." The arrest of Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, his deputy Manish Sisodia, exJharkhand CM Hemant Soren, and the tax notices to Congress are talking points. Some say "every party in power does this (flex its agency muscle)." But there are others who, even as they blame the Congress and SP for not getting their act together, express concern.

"In a democracy, there should be an Opposition.