India protest against BJP
Demonstrators shout slogans as they hold placards during a protest against the BJP government for arresting Kanhaiya Kumar, a Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) student union leader accused of sedition. REUTERS/Anindito Mukherjee

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is facing an increasing backlash following the arrest of a student leader on charges of sedition. One day after the hashtag #IndiaAgainstBJP was trending on Twitter, social media has now unearthed a BJP politician resignation letter that accused the Modi government of being gripped by "madness".

Prodyut Bora, founder of the successful IT cell of the BJP, quit the party one year ago on 19 February 2015. The Assam leader handed in a four-paged resignation letter, in which he accused Prime Minister Modi and BJP president Amit Shah of being "arrogant" and destroying the "democratic tradition" of the Party. At the time Bora, 40, told the Economic Times that he had lost hope in the BJP's leadership and said that India needed a "political alternative".

"Madness has gripped the party," Bora said. "The desire to win at any cost has destroyed the very ethos of the party. This is not the party I joined in 2004. The country needs a different kind of political alternative. It is up to the BJP to be that or people will look for choices."

Bora claimed that the situation within the BJP had become so dire that no cabinet minister or MP could question Prime Minister Modi. He said under Modi's rule, the Foreign Minister wouldn't know that the Foreign Secretary is about to get fired and Cabinet Ministers are unable to appoint their own Officers on Special Duty. He hit out at the BJP for the fact that power was increasingly being centralised in the Prime Minister's Office.

Bora said: "Does the Cabinet System still exist in this country? I am mortified to see that no Cabinet Minister, no National Office Bearer, no Member of Parliament has demonstrated the courage to question Modi-ji on the subversion of this fine democratic tradition."

India's Prime Minister Modi is facing challenging times as the country has remained divided on the arrest of Jawaharlal Nehru University student leader Kanhaiya Kumar. He was apprehended for his role in a rally against the hanging of Mohammed Afzal Guru, at which anti-India slogans were allegedly shouted. Afzal Guru was convicted over a 2001 plot to attack India's Parliament, charges which he had always denied.

On 18 February thousands of people took to the streets of New Delhi to protest against the BJP's actions against Kumar. Many have criticised the Modi government of cracking down on freedom of speech, as well as condemned the recent behaviour of BJP lawyers attacking journalists and students at Patiala House Court ahead of Kumar's trial.

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