Hyderabad: There's something about the Bharatiya Janata Party top brass that mulls and executes its decisions clinically leaving other political parties to scratch their heads. At a time when the Monsoon Session was almost at its dead end and India's performance at the Tokyo Olympic was not all that dismal given the recent history, the government of the day renamed the top Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna to Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award leaving the Opposition with little choice to counter.
"I have been getting many requests from citizens across India to name the Khel Ratna Award after Major Dhyan Chand. I thank them for their views. Respecting their sentiment, the Khel Ratna Award will hereby be called the Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award! Jai Hind!," Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted.
Leaving sports aside, BJP pinned down Congress on the mat. But why did the Modi-led government took this decision and gave the latter a jolt. Ideally, the government could have instituted another award after Major Dhyan Chand alongside Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna, but that would be too naive in political parlance.
Predictably, the Congress ran out of oxygen soon after the news of renaming splashed across the social media and reacted sharply terming the change of name Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna as the "BJP playing politics over sports award". Olympian and Rajasthan Congress MLA Krishna Poonia has criticised the Modi government of playing politics over the naming of sports award.
But there is a larger picture that distinctly emerges behind the renaming spree — it started on a large scale in Uttar Pradesh and went on in many other states — is BJP hasn't forgotten its Congress-mukt Bharat agenda. The party will leave no stone unturned till its mission is accomplished. It's true the Gandhi family overlooked other tall leaders of the Congress and named major airports, institutions, roads — all after Nehru, Indira and Rajiv Gandhi.
The undoing of Congress dominance started ever since the BJP came to power in 2014. Of course, there was a fair degree of public disenchantment over naming a majority of all institutions after the Gandhis. Clearly, the BJP is taking the advantage of it to remind the Congress about its bleak future.
Curiously, neither the Congress during its 64 years of rule nor the BJP has ever thought of honouring the legendary Dhyan Chand with the Bharat Ratna award.
