At Gujarat BJP meet, Cong, Khurshid face fire over Hindutva criticism

The Gujarat BJP strongly condemned the Congress for targetting Hindutva and its senior leader Salman Khurshid for equating the ideological doctrine with radical jihadist groups like ISIS and Boko Haram in a political resolution passed at a meeting of the state executive of the ruling party held on Wednesday.

The day-long state executive meeting, held at the Gujarat BJP headquarters in Gandhinagar, was called to discuss organizational matters and preparations for the next year's assembly elections.

It was the first state executive meeting after the BJP changed its chief minister and all other ministers in September.

"As a part of its appeasement politics ahead of elections to different states of the country, the Congress party is targetting Hindutva. One of its leaders, Salman Khurshid, has hurt sentiments of the entire Hindu community by comparing Hindu religion with ISIS and Boko Haram. The Gujarat BJP strongly condemns this anti-Hindu mentality of the Congress party," the political resolution passed in the meeting said.

The resolution was presented by party leader Bharat Boghra.

Khurshid, in his book ''Sunrise Over Ayodhya: Nationhood in Our Times'', has equated Hindutva with radical Islamist groups such as ISIS and Boko Haram. On the other hand, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has said Hindutva and Hinduism are different concepts.

The resolution also praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for India achieving the milestone of administering 100 crore doses of coronavirus vaccines and for his various development and policy-related works.

The resolution highlighted works done by the Centre, including abrogation of Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir, and those by it and the Gujarat government for farmers, and good show by the BJP in various state and local bodies elections.

Gujarat BJP president C R Paatil, in his address, said the key to win maximum seats in the next assembly elections is to work on strengthening the party's page and booth committees.

"If the page committee (looking after voter lists) is strong, it will be easier for us to win seats," he said.

Paatil asked party workers to ensure that the benefits of schemes launched by the Centre as well as the Gujarat government reach to all eligible people.

"If people benefit from our government then they will automatically vote for us," he said.

Gujarat chief minister Bhupendra Patel, his predecessor Vijay Rupani, former deputy CM Nitin Patel and other state leaders were present in the meeting in which all aspects of the assembly elections were discussed, BJP sources said.

The BJP leadership in September, over a year ahead of the assembly elections scheduled in December 2022, replaced the entire state government and appointed Bhupendra Patel, a first-time MLA, as the CM with a new cabinet.

The saffron outfit is in power in Gujarat since 1998.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)