What happened to collective wisdom ?

In times of crisis the nation should talk one language. Remember when the Parliament was attacked by some dastardly terrorists - the entire polity came out and condemned it. No body thought of taking political mileage out of the situation.

Contrast this with the response to the varanasi blasts and one understands the desperation that BJP as a party and Advani in particular feels.

What else can one say when the president of the party says that the blasts are a result of policy of Indain Government - and the leader of the opposition in the parliament announces that he will go on a yatra across the country in protest to the blasts.

BJP appears dry of ideas and more significantly it appears distanced from people's feelings too. Is the nation in the mood to accept yet another yatra? It might very well fail as his last one did. Economically and even politically most initiatives have been ceased by the Manmohan/Sonia combination (read this post for more on this). Gauarv has this interesting post on the confusion within the BJP.

More disappointing is the response of the Congress on this. In the same article the congress spokesperson is quoted as saying
Describing the Leader of Opposition as ‘Jinnah Krishna Advani’, Congress spokesman Rajeev Shukla said BJP plans were condemnable as the yatras, which he dubbed as danda yatras (procession that would trigger riots), would only divide the society and affect communal amity. “You have exploited Lord Ram fully. Now at least leave alone Lord Hanuman,” he quipped rejecting the saffron party charge that Congress was practicing vote bank politics and said that the cap fits BJP.

Now, think for a moment . This was another opportunity to paint the BJP in the red by responding in a dignified manner. But by becoming the party to the mud slinging they are hardly doing anything good to themselves.

One wonders what happened to our collective wisdom which always worked in times of crisis? Our politicians need to be responsible. They worsen the situation. At least an Advani needs to rise above these petty political considerations - even at the cost of the fact he may never become the PM of this country.