Delhi polls: Soft Hindutva takes centre stage as parties play religious card

New Delhi, Jan 18 (PTI) The Delhi election campaign is tinged with saffron as a jostle is on between the ruling AAP and the opposition BJP to become the biggest benefactors of the priests and the like.

So far in the run-up to the February 5 election, the Aam Aadmi Party has been seen to be coasting along a religious course, in an apparent bid to force the BJP, a Hindu hardline party, to defend its turf.

The Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP recently announced a monthly honorarium of Rs 18,000 to temple priests and the granthis of gurdwaras under a “Pujari Granthi Samman Yojna” -– to be implemented if the party returns to power in Delhi.

The BJP, in its turn, is likely to announce 500 free units of electricity monthly to worship places, including temples and gurdwaras.

Both parties have accused each other of shortchanging the poor and marginalised Hindus while patronising the illegal migrants to beef up a vote bank.

Recently, while addressing a rally at the city’s JLN stadium on the first anniversary of the consecration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya, Union Home Minister Amit Shah raised the slogan “Jai Shri Ram” and urged the slum dwellers to become Delhi’s “liberators” by changing the government.

The BJP accused the ruling party of filing applications for the deletion of the names of 44 voters in the Valmiki Mandir area, accusing Kejriwal of being “anti-Dalit.”

On January 14, BJP’s Parvesh Verma, pitted against Kejriwal from the New Delhi constituency, alleged that the Election Commission “at the instance of Kejriwal,” was verifying voters in the Valmiki Mandir area but doing nothing about mosques and dargahs.

He said the EC must refrain from “targeting and defaming” Hindus at the instance of the AAP chief.

The AAP supremo, a self-proclaimed “Hanuman Bhakt,” filed his nomination papers from the New Delhi seat after praying at the Valmiki Temple and Prachin Hanuman Mandir.

Chief Minister Atishi started her nomination procession after offering prayers at Kalkaji temple and a gurdwara in the area.

Former Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia, after being fielded from Jangpura went on a visit to several prominent shrines, including Vaishno Devi in Jammu. He too sought the blessings of Kali before filing his nomination papers.

Sisodia started his campaign in Jangpura after a Hanuman Chalisa recital at Anguri Devi Mandir in the Kilokari area of the constituency.

All these temple visits were widely publicised through social media by the party.

The AAP has also appointed office bearers for the “Sanatan Sewa Samiti,” which is supposed to oversee the implementation of its grant scheme.

The BJP has fielded its Mandir Prakoshth head, Karnail Singh, from Shakur Basti against AAP leader and former minister Satyendar Jain.

The elections to the 70-member Delhi Assembly are going to be held on February 5.

The BJP, out of power in Delhi since 1998, has been making all-out efforts to dethrone the AAP, ruling the city since 2015.