A senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader has supported the idea of re-admitting Bharatiya Jan Shakti chief Uma Bharti to the party in response to her move to withdraw candidates in Uttar Pradesh.
BJP vice-president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi told RSS mouthpiece Panchjanya that he believed the rebel leader was committed and would remain committed towards his party's ideology.
"Her move to withdraw candidates in Uttar Pradesh is a welcome step. In this context, if you ask me my personal opinion, I would say there is no harm in taking back to the party all those who are working for its ideology while being outside of it," he remarked.
Naqvi was asked whether efforts are on to bring the former Madhya Pradesh chief minister back to the party fold.
His comments followed former deputy prime minister L K Advani's call earlier this month to Bharti, whose influence especially in Uttar Pradesh's Bundelkhand region had threatened to split saffron votes, to rejoin the BJP.
Party sources, however, said many second-rung leaders, whom she accused of botching up the BJP's ideology, have given the cold shoulder to the idea.
Almost the entire BJP in Madhya Pradesh, led by Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, disapproves of attempts to readmit her to the party, from which she was expelled last year, the sources say.
Bharti, who is believed to have cut into BJP votes in Uttrakhand, says her Janshakti party espouses the Sangh's core Hindutva ideology.
