Nagpur: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is not against any community and wants to work by taking along all communities, religions and castes, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari has said.
He also said the ideas of Jana Sangh founder Syama Prasad Mookerjee are still relevant, and the BJP must move forward with them.
India should be made ‘Vishwaguru’ by binding the people of all religions with national ideals. It is not a Hindu-only India, but it belongs to all Indians, Gadkari said at the Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee lecture series here on Saturday.
He alleged that Congress and Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru adopted the policy of appeasement, and blamed the grand old party for spreading misconceptions about the Jana Sangh, the BJP’s predecessor.
“Two countries, India and Pakistan, were created. You all know their history after creation. And we are still suffering its consequences,” the BJP leader said, referring to Partition.
“Even today, our (BJP’s) defining (ideological) feature is that the nation is supreme; nationalism is our collective faith, devotion and inspiration. Devotion to the nation was also the hallmark of Syama Prasad Mookerjee’s life. But the policy adopted by Congress and Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru was appeasement,” he said.
For its votebank politics, Congress embraced appeasement in the name of secularism, the Union minister alleged.
It sowed divisions among religions and led to casteism and communalism, said Gadkari.
“But what we say is that we are all one…in our country, someone will go to a mosque, someone to a Buddha Vihar, someone to a gurudwara, and we are all one. We are Indians; our culture, history, and heritage are one. Our modes of worship and prayer are different. And we accept that our Constitution has granted rights to everyone,” said Gadkari.
The BJP is not against any community, he stressed.
The Congress misinterpreted the concepts of Bhartiyatva, Hindutva and nationalism, and repeatedly branded the Jana Sangh as a caste-based or communal party, he claimed.
“The BJP is not against any community; the BJP wants to work by taking along all communities, all religions, and all castes. Therefore, the BJP states in its philosophy that this nation belongs equally to the people of every caste, sect, and religion….Everyone should have equal rights,” he said.
Good governance and development are the party’s mission, he added.
The values of Dr Mookerjee, Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya and Atal Bihari Vajpayee are the BJP’s legacy and capital, the Union minister said.
