At first Prez's birthplace in Bihar, Yogi rakes up 'insult' of Rajendra Prasad by Congress PM Nehru

Siwan (Bihar), Oct 31 (PTI) Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Friday charged Congress' Prime Minister Jawahar Lal Nehru with having insulted Rajendra Prasad, the country's first President, by asking him not to attend the inauguration of a renovated Somnath temple.

The senior BJP leader made the remark while addressing an election rally in Siwan district of Bihar, which was the birthplace of Prasad.

"The Congress has been rejected by the people of Bihar because it has insulted stalwarts like Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel, Babasaheb Ambedkar, Rajendra Prasad and Karpoori Thakur. Even the party's own former president Sitaram Kesri, who belonged to this state, was humiliated," Adityanath alleged.

He also claimed that when "Rajendra babu decided to attend the inauguration ceremony of the Somnath temple in Gujarat, Congress' Prime Minister Nehru told him that he must not go there".

"But for Rajendra babu, it was a matter of faith, and he said he would choose to give up his post rather than not attending the function," the Uttar Pradesh chief minister told the rally.

Squarely blaming the opposition party for poverty and backwardness in the country, he described the Congress as an "heir" to the British imperialists who had "destroyed Indian industries and handicrafts, bringing economic ruin to the country which once contributed 40 per cent to the global GDP".

"Bihar was home to the ancient seat of power, Pataliputra, and produced glorious emperors like Chandragupta. A renowned seat of learning was destroyed by foreign invaders whose descendants survive till date, trying to bring political Islam", said the Hindutva icon.

The BJP leader also alleged that the Congress and its Bihar ally RJD have always been "disrespectful towards our heritage", and cited the stopping of Lord Ram's chariot, an obvious reference to the arrest of BJP patriarch Lal Krishna Advani while he was taking out the Ram Rath Yatra decades ago.

Yogi also pointed out that an affidavit filed in the Supreme Court, by the Centre when Congress-led UPA was in power, had said that there was no evidence of the existence of Lord Ram.

"But the BJP and the NDA have always given pride of place to our heritage. We fulfilled the promise that the temple of Ram would be built at the intended spot in Ayodhya (mandir wahin banayenge the place where the disputed structure called Babri Masjid formerly existed)," Adityanath said.

He also said that if the NDA retained power in Bihar, the mafia would be "finished, just like in UP, where they are deprived of their ill-gotten properties and many of them have been sent to hell".

Notably, the Yogi Adityanath administration has been known to raze the properties of criminals, which has earned the religious leader-turned-politician the sobriquet "bulldozer baba", and over the past few years, a number of dreaded gangsters have been killed in police encounters.

Adityanath recalled his previous tour of the poll-bound state a couple of days ago when he visited the adjoining assembly segment of Raghunathpur, where "a hereditary (khandani) Mafia is trying to rear its head".

The allusion was to Osama Shahab, the RJD candidate, whose late father Mohd Shahabuddin was one of the most dreaded gangster-turned-politicians of his time and a several-term MP from Siwan.

"The enthusiasm I saw at my rally in Raghunathpur has made me confident that in Bihar, the land of Goddess Sita, no demons like Marich will be allowed to flourish. Just like in UP, such elements have been crushed under bulldozers", said Adityanath. PTI NAC BDC BDC