RAISEN (Madhya Pradesh): Suspended Bharatiya Janata Party leader Uma Bharti announced at a public rally here on Sunday that she would not tender an apology in response to the notice served on her. She wanted party president L.K. Advani and the former Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, to break their silence and purge the party of those who are "far removed from the grass-roots-level party workers and have hijacked the BJP."

Ms. Bharti, who is on a "ram-roti" padyatra from Bhopal to Ayodhya, addressed the media at this district headquarters.

She said the Parliamentary Board, the supreme decision-making body of the BJP, did not have any representative from the weaker sections. "Farmers, Dalits, tribals and women should be given representation in this body." Also, women's representation in the Board "is only symbolic at present." A "gang" of those who did have any link with the masses were taking decisions even though they had failed to identify with the hopes and aspirations of the lakhs of party workers.

Ms. Bharti said she had been given three days to reply to the show cause notice. The party had done this to her after "she gave 20 years of her life to it."

She said she was in a dilemma whether or not to reply to the notice. The reply she sent to Mr. Advani was in three parts. One raised questions about those who had committed acts of indiscipline in the past and asked what action had been taken against them. The second was a technical explanation, she said, and read out the third part of the reply to Mr. Advani.

Ms. Bharti said Mr. Advani and Mr. Vajpayee should not remain "mute spectators." She asked Mr. Advani and Mr. Vajpayee not to become "hostages in the hands of a coterie devoid of any ideology or principles."

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