Bharatiya Janata Party president Nitin Gadkari said here on Thursday that terrorists have spread their tentacles from Kashmir to Kanyakumari and 233 districts in the country are in the control of Naxalites and Maoists.
The BJP president, who arrived here to address the concluding session of the BJP legislators’ training camp, was speaking to media persons at the state party headquarters. He said that terrorists do not belong to any caste, sect or religion.
Taking a dig at the UPA-led government at the Centre, he said that the new meaning of secularism is appeasement of terrorists for vote bank politics. Citing the example of Afzal Guru, who has been awarded the death sentence for conspiracy to attack Parliament and the Batla house encounter against terrorists, he said: “The way the Government of India is behaving in both these matters is shameful”.
Taking strong exception to Union home minister, P. Chidambaram for using the term saffron terror, Mr Gadkari said this is a Congress party’s political strategy to deflect public attention. He said that this amounts to perpetuating injustice on the majority population. He went on to point out that those connected with Abhinav Bharat even had plans to target the members of Rashtriya Swayam Sevak (RSS).
Answering a pointed query on Ayodhya, Mr Gadkari said: “Let us await the court order.”
He further said that considering the faith of majority of the people in this country, the Ram temple will have to be built at the original site. At a short distance, the mosque should also come up.
Mr Gadkari said that the Congress party is not ready to take action against terrorists under the Indian law and Constitution.
Talking of human rights violation cases, he said that out of 1,100 cases identified by the National Human Rights Commission, there were only 19 cases relating to Gujarat.
It was after pressure was built by some NGOs, the CBI became vindictive, he said adding there were 22 criminal cases against Sohrabuddin (said to have been killed in a fake encounter in Gujarat).