Ruling BJP’s estranged NDA ally Shiv Sena has asked the Centre to cut down its rhetoric on the construction of Ram Temple in Ayodhya and instead bring an ordinance on the same.
Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray will visit Ayodhya on Saturday and Sunday. Shiv Sena workers across the country will conduct a puja on Saturday.
Before the party chief’s visit to Ayodhya, the Sena on Friday through its mouthpiece journal dared the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government at the Centre to bring an ordinance and announce a date for the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
“Why did those, who call themselves pro-Hindutva, get a stomach ache when we announced our plans of going to Ayodhya?” the Shiv Sena, in an editorial in its mouthpiece Saamana, said. “We are not going there for political purposes…The Shiv Sena does not go around with a begging bowl in the name of Ram during elections, nor does it indulge in jumlebaazi [fake promises],” the party said. The party further said Ayodhya was not the private property of any individual. “There is no Ram Rajya there now, but the rule of the Supreme Court. However, in 1992, Shiv Sena founder Balasaheb Thackeray’s Shiv Sainiks had destroyed Babur’s raj in Ram Janmabhoomi,” the editorial added. The Shiv Sena said the party in power at the Centre should be proud of its workers.
On November 18, Uddhav Thackeray had called for “temple before government”. “Har Hindu ki yahi pukar, pehle mandir fir sarkar [This is every Hindu’s call – first the temple then the government],” Thackeray said at a press conference after a meeting with party leaders in Mumbai.
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