Jammu/New Delhi, Jan. 24: The BJP’s attempt to repeat Murli Manohar Joshi’s 1991-92 Ekta Yatra to hoist the tricolour at Srinagar’s Lal Chowk on Republic Day hit a roadblock on Monday when three of its senior leaders, Mr Arun Jaitley, Mr Ananth Kumar and Ms Sushma Swaraj, were stopped at Jammu airport and asked to return. The party leaders, who reached Jammu on a chartered flight from New Delhi, were stopped at the airport itself as the authorities imposed prohibitory orders under Section 144 CrPc.
The BJP’s move to hoist the tricolour at Lal Chowk is being seen as an attempt by the saffron party to address its core ideological votebank and send a clear signal to the RSS, now under intense pressure over the rising allegations about “Hindu terror”.
It is well aware that the administration will not allow it to move to Srinagar to hoist the tricolour on Republic Day, so saffron strategists plan to turn its entire agitation into a “symbolic movement”. The BJP plans to hold nationwide protests from Tuesday to protest against the “violation of democratic rights.”