The Hindu : PM's musings, bid to create confusion: Bardhan

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jan 03, 2003

National

National

PM's musings, bid to create confusion: Bardhan

By Our Staff Reporter

BHUBANESWAR JAN. 2. The Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee's New Year musings were aimed at creating an "atmosphere of confusion", the CPI general secretary, A.B. Bardhan, said here today.

The Prime Minister, with his latest interpretation of Hindutva signifying the unity of all people, after hailing Narendra Modi's "performance of dividing the people during 2002", was "blowing hot and cold at the same time''.

The CPI leader saw a pattern — "while from the top Mr. Vajpayee will go on making soothing sounds, down below the RSS/VHP cadres and BJP activists will go on practising hardline Hindutva.'' ``All this implies that people are to be subjected to both, to Mr. Vajpayee's musings and homilies, and Mr. Sudarshan's and Mr. Togadia's tirades.''

Mr. Bardhan said that Gujarat had shown that Hindutva was the BJP's weapon of coming to power by bringing out a communal divide. Sinister attempts were being made by the BJP to appropriate Swami Vivekananda as a Hindutva icon, though he was "as far away from Hindutva as a political doctrine, as heaven was from hell''. The BJP was also trying to paint Ambedkar as `anti-Muslim' and therefore presumably another Hindutva icon. These attempts had to be rebuffed by the Left parties and other truly secular forces.

The CPI leader blamed the Congress for not helping to facilitate one-to-one fights against the BJP in Gujarat. There was little chance of the Left parties entering into any kind of alliance with the Congress in Delhi, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh where Assembly elections were due this year.

Mr. Bardhan, who was here to attend the State executive and State council meeting of his party, cautioned that the BJP/VHP combine had chosen Orissa as the next `soft target' after the Gujarat experiment. "The ground had already been tried out through the murder of Graham Staines and the attack on the State Assembly".

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

National

Stories in this Section

No pressure to resume talks with Pak., says Advani

Kelkar report

Asian Social Forum gives a call to fight globalisation

Sunni meet to discuss Shariat tenets

Pak.-India forum disapproves of visa restrictions

Centre wants joint plan on Veerappan

"Only Ayodhya on BJP's agenda"

CPI(M) condemns 'doublespeak'

Buta Singh wants more powers for PAC

PM cannot be taken seriously: IUML

PM's musings, bid to create confusion: Bardhan