Ahmedabad, October 03: Mahatma Gandhi may have devoted his life to the cause of communal harmony but, not one to be deterred, Chief Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday dragged him into the Ayodhya dispute.
Kickstarting the BJP’s campaign for the civic polls in Saurashtra on Gandhi Jayanti day, Modi said the Allahabad High Court’s verdict on Ayodhya title suits would help realise the Mahatma’s ‘Ram Rajya’.
“Bapu worshipped Lord Ram till his last breath. For Bapu to remember Ram was very natural. He wanted Ram Rajya. The Ayodhya verdict has provided us strength to establish Ram Rajya,” Modi declared.
On a whirlwind tour covering Porbandar, Bhavnagar, Rajkot and Jamnagar, Modi harped on the Gandhi talisman at almost every campaign venue. He also dubbed the civic polls “battle between Gujarat and the Government in Delhi”.
“They have destroyed the fabric of democracy. Gujarat will not tolerate this. They have been threatening us to keep jails ready,” Modi said.
He did not spare the Prime Minister either. “The PM said in J&K that the police should exercise restraint. What if I had said something similar? The so-called secular forces should notice this — when policemen are getting killed, the PM has asked them to be restrained.”
He summed up: “Inflation, corruption, Commonwealth Games, terrorism, Naxalites, Pakistan, Bangladesh, cabinet minister, state leader… Everything is out of control of the lameduck Congress government.”
BJP slams Home Minister for Babri remarks
NEW DELHI: The BJP on Saturday slammed Home Minister P Chidambaram for his remarks that the Ayodhya title suit judgment did not justify the demolition of Babri Masjid, saying the matter was before a court and he should not jump to conclusions. “He (Chidambaram) should not judge as to what happened in 1992. The matter is before a court and he should not jump to conclusions. Let the court decide,” BJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar said here. Chidambaram had on Friday said, “The judgment in no way justifies the demolition of the Babri Masjid. In my view, it remains a criminal act.”
——–PTI