HARIDWAR, June 12: The Vishwa Hindu Parishad(VHP), at its two-day steering committee meeting here, decided to launch a decisive agitation from August for the realisation of its demand for the construction of a grand Ram temple at Ayodhya in consonance with the sentiments of the tens of crores of the Hindus in the country.
Acting international president of the VHP, Praveen Bhai Togadia, told reporters that development should go together with the realisation of the cultural issues related to Hindutva.
VHP patron Ashok Singhal said the main focus of the meeting was to devise the strategy for the construction of the Ram temple.
He said a decisive and massive agitation, in phases, would be launched from August onwards, by the sant community and the people to put pressure on the government to get Parliament to enact a law to pave the way for the construction of the temple
In other resolutions, the steering committee demanded a ban on cow slaughter,abrogation of Clause 370 of the Constitution, which provides special status to J&K, protection of the purity of the Ganga and an effective check on Islamic terrorism.
Speakers at the meet, which concluded today, flayed the inaction of the UPA government on the issue of construction of the Ram temple.
There were indications that the sants and other participants favoured Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi as the next prime minister to further the agenda of development as well as of Hindutva.
The decision of the VHP is seen as an attempt to whip up sentiments on Hindutva-related issues just before the Lok Sabha elections meant to boost the prospects of the BJP.
National spokesman of the VHP, Prakash Sharma, said the BJP should take up the Hindutva agenda in a big way, without caring about the opinions of its allies.
“The Hindutva agenda is bound to increase the BJP’s tally in the Lok Sabha. If the party succeeds in increasing the number of its seats in the Lok Sabha, the allies will automatically gravitate towards it,” Mr Sharma said.
(UNI)