GANDHINAGAR, Sept 1: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate and Union Home Minister L.K. Advani faced a hostile crowd of government employees, who heckled and hooted, forcing him to cut short his speech at an election meeting organised near the Secretariate complex here on Wednesday afternoon.Tension mounted at the venue as someone from the slogan-shouting crowd hurled some object at Advani. The Black Cat commandos in charge of Advani's security immediately threw a ring around him. As this was happening, the protestors came to blows with some local BJP workers who tried to push them away. Police immediately cordoned off the area.After this Advani was able to handle the protestors rather diplomatically.It was about 2 p.m. when Advani, who is seeking re-election from the Gandhinagar constituency arrived near Sachivalaya to address a 2,000-strong gathering of government employees during their recess. As he started addressing the meeting from the decorated jeep, the crowd grew restless and raised anti-Advani and anti-government slogans.The protesters sought to know why Advani had failed to fulfil the poll promises he had doled out in the last general elections. ``What happened to the promise given to government employees that the income-tax limit would be raised to Rs 1 lakh?'' someone in the crowd shouted.Others complained that the upgradation of Gandhinagar railway station and its direct link with Delhi, new post offices in the developing sectors and residential plots for employees in Gandhinagar were some of the promises Advani had failed to keep.An angry employee in the crowd sought to know from the BJP leader as to what happened to the promise to declare Gandhinagar as a link city with Ahmedabad, as has been done in the case of Hyderabad-Secunderabad, to enable the government employees to claim the increased rates of dearness allowance (DA).The presence of agitating employees of the defunct Gujarat Dairy Development Corporation (GDDC) at the meeting made things worse for the organisers. As Advani attempted to establish a dialogue with the gathering through the make-shift public address system installed on the jeep, the GDDC employees shouted at him, "Your BJP government in Gujarat is anti-employee and anti-labourer. Your government has terminated our services without paying due compensation to us under the voluntary retirement scheme (VRS).''This made Advani jittery. He shouted back at the GDDC employees, ``Problems related to the state government can only be solved by Keshubhai Patel, who is your chief minister. I am your representative in the Lok Sabha. Don't try to bring in state-related issues in the Parliamentary elections.''This aggravated the situation, inviting much more vociferous protest. Local MLA Vadilal Patel and the Sachivalaya Class III Employees' Association president Yogen Sevak tried to pacify the angry crowd, but the two were shouted down.Advani was dumbstuck. His daughter Pratibha and son Jayant turned menacingly to the local MLA pulled him up for misjudging the mood of the crowd. ``Before organising the election meeting, you people should have briefed us on the local problems facing the electorate of Gandhinagar,'' Pratibha shouted at Vadilal Patel and other local party leaders standing on the jeep.But in the din, Advani thought it wise to call the employees' leaders up to the jeep and listen to his grievances. This worked.The BJP nominee resumed his speech, telling the gathering how successfully and diplomatically Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee handled the Kargil issue. But those in the crowd were more concerned about their local problems than Kargil. They started dispersing before Advani could complete his speech.Sensing the mood, Advani wound up his address, and departed - looking dejected.
